‘Feed Your Farmer’ event in BC celebrates the people behind the harvest

By Luke Faulks, Local Journalism Initiative Reporter, Pique Newsmagazine

By the time the October rains roll in, farmers can be running on fumes. Twin sisters Natalie and Michelle Austin remember that feeling well. Before founding Two Sisters Farms, they spent years as farm hands—harvesting through the mud, chill and long days that mark the valley’s end-of-season push.

“I first came to Pemberton as a farm hand, and that’s where I found my friends and my community,” said Natalie. “At the end of the season, we’d have these events where all the farm hands and farmers would go to one farm, play a game, share food—and we realized the value of that. 

“Farming can be really difficult financially, physically and mentally. Creating community is a really healthy way of keeping you in a good place within that job.”

That sense of community and the exhaustion that often accompanies it sparked Feed Your Farmer, a new event designed to help local growers end their season together.

Turning connection into action

The inaugural Feed Your Farmer dinner, organized by the Austins under their Two Sisters Farms banner, will take place on Nov. 2 in Pemberton. The evening will bring together farmhands, farm owners and agricultural workers for a night of food and conversation.

“Feed Your Farmer started really rooted in the purpose and mission behind our company,” said Michelle. “We started our farm to connect our community, connect town folk with farmers, connect farmers to each other.”

Two Sisters Farms, which the sisters launched in 2024, operates as a small-scale regenerative farm between Pemberton and Squamish. Its name comes from the Squamish story of the Two Sisters, known to many as the Lions mountains above Vancouver. The legend recalls twin sisters who ended a war by inviting rival nations to share a meal.

“That really spoke to us,” Michelle said. “It’s one version of how we’re bringing our mission to life through this event.”

The sisters said Feed Your Farmer fills a gap in the community calendar. While events like Pemberton’s Slow Food Cycle celebrate local food, those gatherings often ask farmers to play host. 

“I don’t know of another event that looks primarily at the farmers themselves as people,” said Natalie. “We’re used to inviting everyone to the farm, but this is about the people who bring the food to our tables.”

A season of fatigue and fulfilment

By late fall, many farmers are balancing pride and exhaustion; wrapping up production while dealing with worsening weather, financial uncertainty and staff turnover. The Austins wanted to create a space that acknowledges both the challenges and the satisfaction of the season’s close.

“It’s like any job when you can see a deadline on a project,” Natalie said. “There’s a lot of joy—’you did it, you pulled this off,’ but you’re also crawling in the mud to pull potatoes. It’s cold, it’s raining, you’re tired and your body starts to fail.”

Many farmhands also move on after harvest, adding an emotional dimension to the season’s end. 

“You’re aware that your community is about to disperse,” Natalie said. “You’ve worked side by side with someone for months, and then they might be about to leave.”

According to a 2023 report from the Canadian Centre for Policy Alternatives, farmers in Canada are experiencing “declining mental health,” driven by higher rates of stress, depression and anxiety than the general population. The Canadian Parliament’s agriculture committee has also catalogued key stressors like extreme weather, market volatility, paperwork burden and isolation—ultimately identifying farmer mental health as a priority.

The financial picture isn’t easing the pressure, either. According to a Statistics Canada report, farmers’ net profit dropped by about $3.3 billion, or nearly 26 per cent, down to about $9.4 billion from 2023 to 2024. At the same time, farm debt climbed, too, rising by 14.1 per cent in 2024 to approximately $166.7 billion, the largest annual jump since 1981.  

So, by the end of the harvest season when fatigue sets in, deadlines are met, and the crew heads home, the mental and financial stresses line up. Michelle said the event aims to create a moment of relief. 

“Farmers experience isolation and loneliness at really high levels,” she said. “When you invest in farmers connecting, it heals that part that’s been hurting. This is just our small thing to help combat that.”

A night built around food

The event itself will be casual—centred around good food and conversation rather than formal speeches. After consulting with other farmers, the sisters scrapped their initial plan for a plated dinner in favour of a social, mix-and-mingle evening.

“We wanted it to focus on farmers celebrating that they did it,” Michelle said. “It’s one final chance to be together and celebrate the year.”

Naturally, some of the food will come directly from the community. But the sisters are also looking to sponsors to take some of the pressure off their target audience. 

“We asked the farmers if they’d be willing to support with some of their veggies,” said Michelle. “Some have offered, and Spud.ca and Stong’s Market have given us gift cards to shop with them. We’re also working with a local female chef to prepare everything.”

While this first event is invite-only for local farmers, the sisters hope it grows in the future. 

“We’d love to eventually include more of the Sea to Sky farming community,” Michelle said.

Grounded in gratitude

The Austins say Feed Your Farmer is both a thank-you and a reflection of their values as young farmers building a regenerative business in the Sea to Sky.

“We hope the public sees this as celebrating the people who brought the harvest,” Natalie said. “For the farmers, we just hope they feel appreciated and that they have a community that lasts beyond their workplace.”

They also made a point to recognize the land that sustains their work. 

“We’re hosting this event and growing our flowers on Indigenous land,” Natalie said. “We’re forever grateful to the original stewards and get a lot of knowledge from them. We just really want to make it clear that they have a big part to play in this.”

For Michelle, even if the event remains small, the impact matters. “If we generate a reminder in the community to think of your farmer as you’re eating,” she said, “then we’ve done what we set out to do.”