Jessica Manly talks with Equity and Organizational Change Director and Accountability Report author Michelle A. T. Hughes about what it means for the National Young Farmers Coalition to be accountable to its farmers, partners, and its racial equity commitments. 

Read the report at www.youngfarmers.org/2020accountabilityreport and join us for our first accountability report webinar on Wednesday June 23, 2021 at 4pm by registering here.

Young Farmers Racial Equity Toolkit: https://www.youngfarmers.org/resource/racialequitytoolkit/.

Edited by Hannah Beal.

Michelle A. T. Hughes is a former large-scale hog farmer from New Haven, Connecticut with lived experience navigating systemic inequity and an educational background in food and agriculture policy reform. Prior to her graduate studies at New York University’s Department of Nutrition and Food Studies, Michelle worked in swine reproduction at the University of Pennsylvania, with both non-profit and food and agriculture start-ups in NYC and the Hudson Valley, and served on a program evaluation team for the NYC Mayor’s Office of Food Policy. At the Coalition, Michelle has worked on the equity and organizational change team since January 2020. Over the course of 2020, Michelle helped align our organization-wide efforts to institutionalize racial equity by implementing a strategy for organizational transformation. Michelle now works with executive leadership as Equity and Organizational Change Director to develop short- and long-term strategy to continue our anti-racist transformation, regularly evaluate and uphold accountability measures with staff, and develop practical tools and financial resources to support the organization’s racial equity goals. 

Become a member of the National Young Farmers Coalition today at youngfarmers.org/join.