WI Farms Work With Immigration Fears And Jefferson County Bold On Food Innovation Campus

Jefferson County is investing in their economic development with a new food and beverage innovation Campus. Kinkkoman foods  has already started construction  on their new factory with OnegoBio coming soon. Deb Reinbold is the President of ThriveED in Jefferson county.  She explains the evolving project to Ben Jarboe.  She says that all the advancements are part of an updated strategic plan for the county. She says the reason for choosing food and beverage is because they already have a strong presence in the industry and it will not take away from other municipalities industrial complexes in the area. Another part of this plan is making new housing for the city. She says that they have not had a large increase in new housing since 2008. The hope is that the people that go to Jefferson to work will fill these new places. Reinbold says they have big things coming soon that she is unable to announce yet but that the ultimate goal is to boost the economy for Jefferson county as well as the state as a whole.

Hot and sticky weather for all of Wisconsin today.  Stu Muck says it may be what plants want, but cows will need attention.

The farm workforce in Wisconsin might be made up of family, foreign-born labor, or people across different generations. How can farm managers better retain those employees? Stephanie Hoff gets an outline from Michael Hoffman, president of Igniting Performance, who works closely with agricultural organizations such as Professional Dairy Producers. He specializes in helping develop leaders in the family business. One of the presentations he gives to dairy farmers is on how to make farm employees feel comfortable and valued in the workplace. He tells us the top challenges for farm families when it comes to managing farm labor. 

Wisconsin's making more resources available to farms that want to concentrate on retaining employees and better training them.  Hernando Duarte, Bilingual Farm Labor Outreach Specialist Agriculture Institute, is a boots on the ground resource that farms turn to to bridge gaps in developing new leaders.  Duarte says that farms identify potential managers and turn to Duarte to help move them down that path.

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