Menu

by Susie Taylor

This year's "Land and Living" display at the Ohio State Fair in Columbus has grown to fill the entire Nationwide Agriculture and Horticulture building. Last year, "Land and Living" encompassed half of the building while other groups' displays filled the other half. This year, those groups will incorporate their presentations within "Land and Living."

Ohio Farm Bureau Federation (OFBF) is coordinating the effort of the various commodity, livestock and produce groups to present this unique exhibit that shows consumers how agriculture is present everyday in their lives. The displays will be available for viewing throughout the Ohio State Fair, which runs Aug. 2 to 18 at the Ohio Expositions Center. The Agriculture and Horticulture building is located near the 11th Avenue OHIO gate south entrance.

"We're more than doubling the space we had last year," according to Jim Chakeres, OFBF director of market and risk management. "The many activities in the building will present one unified agricultural message."

A new water quality exhibit will feature water collected from all 88 counties in Ohio along with photos of county residents collecting the samples. A children's area with toy implements and a sandbox will be backdropped with enlarged pictures of the "real thing," Chakeres said. Equipment will also be parked outside the building allowing visitors to see the tools of agriculture.

Gardening will also be featured. "Gardens are everyone's link to agriculture," Chakeres said, "whether it's with a big garden or a single tomato plant in a pot on your patio."

Making a second appearance at the Ohio State Fair is the corn-climbing wall, where fairgoers can climb a giant ear of corn. To reach the wall, participants must find their way through a live corn maze with pop-up displays of products made from corn. Also available again will be a display of hatching chicks. New to the exhibit will be cages of laying hens. Aquaculture, soybeans, dairy, nursery and landscape industries will be part of the display again this year.

Another new feature will be a demonstration area with regularly scheduled craft, farm market and cooking demonstrations. Times for the demonstrations are posted on the fair's Web site, which you can access via OFBF's Web site at www.ofbf.org

Some public service aspects to this year's display revolve around food – $5,000 worth of canned food used to build a barn and silo will be donated to the Mid-Ohio Food Bank after the run of the fair. This effort is being co-sponsored by the Ohio Grocer's Association. Also, OFBF’s Club Fed committee will be collecting leftover food each day in the commodity group food pavilion and transporting it to Faith Mission in downtown Columbus to be used to feed the homeless. Club Fed is the Farm Bureau staff organization for volunteer and charitable activities.

"We want people leaving the exhibit with a positive feeling about Ohio agriculture," Chakeres said. "The idea is to show how everyone in Ohio has a link to agriculture in so many ways."