Meet Our Team: Staff & Council | NFU-O National Farmers Union of Ontario

Meet your elected farm leaders and the NFU-O staff team.

The NFU-O is governed by a board of elected farm leaders from across Ontario. Directors represent different geographical regions of the province and different sectors including grains, livestock, greenhouse and vegetable production, market gardens and CSAs, wine grapes, cut flowers, as well as urban agriculture. Directors are elected for a two-year term and set the strategic direction of the organization.

The NFU-O staff team is a small but passionate group of individuals that works on behalf of our members to undertake research, review policy, deliver workshops and educational events, and support our members with any concerns.

Max Hansgen and Orlando Martin Lopez Gomez visit an urban farm in Toronto.

Your NFU-O Board

Max Hansgen

NFU-O President, Local 310

president@nfuontario.ca

Max works with his wife Shelagh in their market garden called Earth’s Mirth just outside of Lanark Village in eastern Ontario. Earth’s Mirth grows vegetables to sell at the Almonte Farmers’ Market and for a food box program. His first paying job was harvesting and processing garlic on a large organic farm in the area. For two years after high school he worked as a paid intern/apprentice on a bio-dynamic farm. There he found a lifetime interest in sustainable farm practices by helping tend to pigs, goats, diverse vegetable crops, and by working with horses. For the past 15 years Max has worked at Kiwi Gardens where he currently manages production of ornamental perennials, maintenance of display gardens and retail sales at the nursery. Max has been selling Kiwi Gardens’ plants through farmers markets for many years.

Len Van Hoffen

Vice President / DIRECTOR-at-Large, Local 303

vp@nfuontario.ca

Len Van Hoffen is the Vineyard Manager at Southbrook Organic Vineyards, a pioneering 57- acre biodynamic, organic, and regenerative organic vineyard in Niagara-on-the-Lake. A lifelong horticulturist, Len has extensive experience growing a variety of crops, including nursery stock, greenhouse plants, athletic turf, and wine grapes. A graduate of Niagara College with a background in Horticulture, Viticulture, and Winemaking, Len combines traditional expertise with innovative sustainable practices. Since joining Southbrook in 2019, he has been dedicated to enhancing biodiversity, improving soil health, and implementing low-impact farming techniques to produce premium wine grapes while preserving the vineyard ecosystem. His initiatives include introducing a wildflower habitat to support beneficial insects, advancing cover cropping strategies, and increasing carbon sequestration through regenerative farming. In his free time, Len can be found in his vegetable garden, and camping with his wife Kelly.

Sage Barker

youth advisor, Local 351

youthadvisor@nfuontario.ca

Sage Barker is a first-generation farmer and land tender currently growing a diverse range of annual vegetables, perennial food crops, and native trees just outside Hamilton, ON. She has worked on organic farms in Ontario for the past six years and now runs a small nursery and seed collective committed to regeneration and biodiversity. Sage is passionate about land stewardship and ensuring food security for future generations.

Michael Watson

National Board REPRESENTATIVE, lOCAL 303

nationalrep1@nfuontario.ca

Michael Watson is a University of Guelph Agricultural College graduate and 6th generation farmer who has worked with his wife Sukyi for the last 20 years in the York and Niagara regions. Since 2005, Michael has established farming operations including tender and small fruit, field and greenhouse vegetables, floriculture, and herb production. Michael has a focus on financially viable sustainable agriculture, adopting a pesticide-free strategy in 2015, and introducing biological controls to greenhouse operations in 2022. Michael and Sukyi faced the expropriation of their farm house in 2022, triggering a relocation back to Niagara-on-the-Lake, where they currently reside. The focus now is redeveloping a neglected nursery into a new farm model, coinciding with the 200th year of Watson family farming in Ontario. As a new member of the board, Michael is interested in supporting first-generation farmers who don’t have the same family farming history or mentorships to rely on.

Claire Perttula

National board REPRESENTATIVE, local 305

nationalrep2@nfuontario.ca

Claire Perttula (she/her) started farming in 2017. She loves growing potatoes and raising grass-fed beef. Right now, Claire is the Food Justice Projects Coordinator at Malvern Family Resource Centre in Scarborough, Ontario, where she manages Malvern Urban Farm and its accompanying farmers' market. Claire works with 40+ community members and a staff team of 3-6 depending on the time of year to cultivate 2 acres of public land with lots of diverse vegetables and a new 1200 cell hydroponic microfarm. Claire is also a PhD student at York University studying food systems planning and policy and the succession crisis.

Amy Kitchen

Women’s Advisor, Local 344

womensadvisor@nfuontario.ca

Amy is a first-generation farmer who, alongside her partner Patrick, runs Sideroad Farm in Grey County, Ontario. They grow certified organic vegetables, cut flowers, and raise pasture-raised pork and chicken and focus on direct marketing. Amy's farming journey began in 2009 in British Columbia, where she developed a deep passion for ecological agriculture while starting a farm with a couple of friends. Amy is passionate about building a resilient local food system and ensuring that future generations have access to opportunities in agriculture in our communities.

Orlando Martín López Gómez

BIPOC Advisor, local 305

bipocadvisor@nfuontario.ca

Orlando oversees FoodShare’s food growing projects across the city – turning under utilized schoolyards, hydro corridors, and parks into vibrant and productive urban farms and community gardens. Orlando is passionate about food justice, and community leadership, and provides lots of resources and support for communities to design, implement, and run their own growing and composting projects. He is a trained agronomist with an incredible depth of knowledge in all aspects of growing food.

Dave Kranenburg

Treasurer / DIRECTOR-at-Large, local 345

treasurer@nfuontario.ca

Dave (he/him) is a farmer, entrepreneur & sustainable food systems advocate . On Kendal Hills Farm he looks after 70 acres of forest, orchard and pasture by cultivating specialty mushrooms and raising pastured poultry and pork. In 2020 he founded the Green Circle Food Hub, publicly known as Graze & Gather, as a distribution and sales channel for food from 100+ small producers to reach thousands of customers across the GTA. Previously he served as the Executive Director of Meal Exchange, a national food security charity, and as the Director of Programming for the Centre for Social Innovation, a nonprofit that provides coworking and programs for social purpose enterprises. Dave was part of the inaugural 'Getting to Maybe' Social Innovation residency at the Banff Centre and has received the Queen's Diamond Jubilee award for his work on food security in Canada.

The NFU-O Staff Team

Krista Long

Executive Director

Krista is a passionate advocate for farmland protection, ecologically viable farming practices, and local, equitable food systems. She has over 20 years experience in the not-for-profit sector with a variety of organizations including the Canadian Organic Growers, the Waterloo Region Food System Roundtable, and the Ontario Farmland Trust. She brings her experience in fundraising, policy, research, and program development to her role at the NFU-O.

Briana Vanular

MEMBERSHIP and SPECIAL PROJECTS MANAGER

Briana is an experienced farm worker and researcher with a Master’s degree in Environmental Assessment. She operates a small market garden in Sudbury, ON growing vegetables and flowers. Briana has previously worked with the NFU-O as the Land Access and Protection Coordinator, and is passionate about land access and farmland protection, the shift to environmentally considerate farming practices, supporting diversity in farming, and maintaining strong farming communities and localized food systems across the province.

Jessica Tong

Land Access coordinator

Jess (she/they) is a first-generation, young, queer farmer. She has familial roots in China, Hong Kong, Singapore and Scarborough, ON. After studying agriculture, Jess worked on several farms throughout Ontario. Alongside her partner, she started and operated a small market-garden that sold at Farmers’ Markets, a Food Co-op and through a small CSA program. She has experience leasing land, growing via incubatorships as well as purchasing/stewarding (and losing) farmland. Jess comes into this work with the intention of building meaningful relationships with the land, nourishing community connections and uplifting intersectional food sovereignty movements. These intentions are grounded by the past and present work already being done by amazing communities beyond her.

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