Focus on Agriculture

SALINAS VALLEY — Rancho Cielo’s annual Veggie Box and BBQ Fundraiser took place Aug. 8-11 on the Rancho Cielo Youth Campus in Salinas. The fundraiser was the biggest success to date, with more than 14,000 boxes sold, 300 volunteers packing boxes and over 2,000 barbecued...

KING CITY — King City FFA is enhancing their journey; it’s a brand-new school year and they have new goals, new officers and new ideas. Some of the objectives they hope to reach include being more involved in the community as well as having more...

KING CITY — Lauren Peterson, an agricultural teacher at King City High School, has been recognized as a finalist for the 2022-23 Ag Educator of the Year honor through Nationwide’s Golden Owl Award. California FFA, California Farm Bureau and Nationwide made the announcement on Feb....

KING CITY — Salinas Valley Fair will host a virtual livestock auction this Saturday, June 20. This year’s auction is a charitable auction, with no meat product exchanging hands. Proceeds will instead be directed to 4-H and FFA exhibitors who participate in the auction. Some...

KING CITY — Hundreds of South Monterey County third graders took part in the 2026 South County Farm Day on Jan. 22 at the Salinas Valley Fairgrounds in King City, getting a hands-on introduction to agriculture, public safety and local resources. The annual event, hosted...

GREENFIELD — Lavender Creek, a family-run lavender farm and growing wellness brand near Greenfield in South Monterey County, has transformed its first Lavender Wellness Experience at the farm into a growing series of community workshops that bring calm and comfort directly to seniors and...

SALINAS VALLEY — Agriculture and Land-Based Training Association (ALBA) is spotlighting its transformative Programa Educativo para Agricultores (PEPA), a comprehensive training program empowering farmworkers to transition into successful organic farmers. This program is reshaping agriculture in the Salinas Valley, offering Latino farmworkers the tools and...

SALINAS VALLEY — Monterey County Board of Supervisors will host a special ceremony on Tuesday, June 10, to commemorate the 50th anniversary of a landmark legal case that arose out of the Salinas Valley and outlawed the use of “El Cortito,” or the short-handled...

Editor’s Note: The following profile is an excerpt from Amy Wu’s upcoming book, “From Farms to Incubators: Women Innovators Revolutionizing How Our Food is Grown,” which tells the stories of women entrepreneurs who are transforming agriculture through high technology. Martha Montoya never imagined that her...

GREENFIELD — South Monterey County Joint Union High School District (SMCJUHSD) will launch two farm-to-cafeteria educational programs between Greenfield High School and the district’s Food Services Department. The first-of-its-kind collaboration was made possible by a new grant from the California Department of Food and Agriculture’s...