Video: Know Your Farmer, Know Your Food Virtual Conversation At The White House

At the White House on Monday, Senior Policy Advisor for Healthy Food Initiatives Sam Kass joined USDA's live virtual conversation about local foods, led by Deputy Agriculture Secretary Kathleen Merrigan and Jon Carson, the White House Director of Public Engagement, and followed by a madly-tweeting live audience. The event spotlighted USDA's Know Your Farmer, Know Your Food initiative and newly unveiled digital tool The Compass, an online multi-media narrative with stories, pictures, video and a geospatial map that chronicles USDA’s support for local and regional food systems across the nation.

Kass dropped by to chat about First Lady Michelle Obama's Let's Move! campaign and 1600 Penn's ultrafamous local food project: The Kitchen Garden. He discussed the importance of local food systems with about 60 leaders invited from across the US, including farmers, tech whizzes, and non-profit leaders.

The afternoon event, according Carson, seemed to be a record-breaker for White House Tweetups, with more people following along than for any previous livestream.

"We've done Tweetups on everything to womens' issues to environmental issues and I don't think we've ever had this level of participation before," Carson said. Check #KYF2 on Twitter for a continuation of the conversation.