By Doug Clark

Assistant Editor

Get your overalls ready Sampson County, the first annual Community Agriculture Day will be held Saturday, March 13 and Sampson County 4-H officials, who are hosting the event, is expecting to make it a success.

“It is going to be a big event,” said Charmae Kendall, 4-H program associate. “We are very excited about it.”

The event will be held at the Sampson County Cooperative Extension Center and Livestock Facility, located on U.S. 421 South, in Clinton, and it is free.

Kendall said coming up with the idea to host a Community Ag Day was easy.

“We had the feeling that there are a lot of children in the community that do not know exactly where milk comes from, or cheese, so we came up with the idea to bring some different vendors into the area and educate them about it,” said Kendall. “There are going to be several different areas of agriculture being displayed on that day, and we look forward to being able to educate the kids in a fun way — it is going to be a family fun day for all ages.”

Kent Wooten, Sampson County Cooperative Extension director, agrees.

“We are really excited about it,” he said. “It is going to be a big deal, and we want to make it that way. We have really good support in this community, and we are hoping that everyone comes out to have a great day with us.”

Officials of the event have left no stone unturned in their attempts to make it a success.

There will be games, prizes, a blow-up slide, a hay maze, a petting zoo, a corn box, crafts, and even entertainment. Concessions will also be available.

“We are going to have a lot of games that have an ag-related theme to them, so as they are playing the games, they will be able to learn. And we will have prizes, too” said Kendall. “It is not only going to be a big event, it is going to be a fun day for families.”

The main goal is to promote agriculture to those children who may not know anything about it.

For Kendall, showing both children and adults how agriculture impacts so many aspects of life, and the community, is important. “Everything from wheat cookies to seeing a big feed truck and seeing how that feed is transported all over the county, that’s what we hope to show them. A lot of kids do not get to work with agriculture firsthand, so we hope that by doing this, they will have an opportunity to do so and, in the process, have a whole lot of fun as well.”

Kendall said local FFA chapters will have a representative on hand at the event. “They wanted to be involved with this, too, so everyone is just really excited about it.”

In addition to Sampson County 4-H, the event is being sponsored by area agri-businesses. Fann Farms of Salemburg, Clinton Truck and Tractor, Farm Bureau, the N.C. Pork Council, Cape Fear Farm Credit and Murphy-Brown are all co-sponsors of the event.

Kendall said there will also be information available to promote the 4-H programs in Sampson County.

“Oh yes, we are also going to be promoting 4-H and what we have to offer here,” she said. “The Sampson County 4-H has been here a long time, and the organization recently had their 100th anniversary ... What we do with 4-H is to encourage the kids to pick out an area that they would like to learn more about, and we give them the resources to learn more about that area. Then they are able to do workshops to learn more about it or take advantage of our summer programs; then we encourage them to do a project book at the end of the year, and then they are able to win $25 just for turning it in.”

Getting Sampson County involved with the event is something that Kendall wants to do.

“I do hope that this will catch on so that we can make this an annual event, or at least bi-annual,” she said. “I know there are some other companies that do an event in the spring and their year is next year, so our thought is maybe we will do it on their off-year. But we know that we want to continue this.”

The free event will be held on March 13, from 10 a.m. to 2 p.m. There is no need to register, just show up, 4-H officials said.

For more information on the event or Sampson County 4-H call 592-7161.

To reach Doug Clark call 910-592-8137 ext. 123 or send e-mail to sisports@myclintonnc.com.