Africulture

Michael Carter

Join Michael to learn about the principles, practices, plants and people of african descent that have contributed to American agriculture.

BIO

Michael Carter Jr. is an 11th generation farmer in the United States and is the 5th generation to farm on Carter Farms, his family’s century farm in Orange County, Virginia where he gives workshops on how to grow and market ethnic vegetables. With Virginia State University, he works in the capacity of the Small Farm Resource Center Coordinator for the Small Farm Outreach Program. He sits on the board of directors of the Virginia Association of Biological Farmers (VABF), Virginia Food Systems Council, The Center for Natural Capital, Virginia Agrarian Trust and Foodshed Capital respectively. He serves as a fellow for the Center for Food Systems and Community Transformation. Michael was recognized as a 2020 Audubon Naturalist Society Taking Nature Black Regional Environmental Champion, the 2020 VSU Small Farm Outreach Agent of the year and Future Harvest Casa Farmer of the Foodshed for 2021. He acquired an agricultural economics degree from North Carolina A&T State University and has worked in Ghana, Kenya and Israel as an agronomist and organic agricultural consultant.

He presently consults with numerous governments, organizations, and individuals throughout the region and nation on food access, food security/insecurity, market outreach, social and economic parity/equity/evaluation programs, racial understanding, immersion, history, and cultural training, among other areas. As a cliometrician, curriculum developer, and program coordinator for his educational, cultural, and vocational platforms, Hen Asem (Our Story) and Africulture, he teaches and expounds on the principles, practicess, plants and people of African descent that have and do contribute to agriculture worldwide and trains students, educators, and professionals in African cultural understanding, racial literacy and cognition, racialized values and implicit bias recognition, among others. He happily assists his sons in running their respective businesses, Carter Brothers and Sunnyside Entertainment, when not homeschooling his three youngest sons.

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