Food hubs key to building business for what's locally grown

A worker loads vegetables onto food washing machine, Tuesday, July 8, 2014, at Marolda Farm in Vineland, N.J. Locally grown foods aren't just for farmers markets anymore. A growing network of companies and organizations is delivering food directly from local farms to institutions like hospitals and schools, eliminating middlemen from farm to fork. They are increasing profits for smaller farms and bringing consumers healthier foods.
A worker loads vegetables onto food washing machine, Tuesday, July 8, 2014, at Marolda Farm in Vineland, N.J. Locally grown foods aren't just for farmers markets anymore. A growing network of companies and organizations is delivering food directly from local farms to institutions like hospitals and schools, eliminating middlemen from farm to fork. They are increasing profits for smaller farms and bringing consumers healthier foods.

PHILADELPHIA -- Once a niche business, locally grown foods aren't just for farmers markets anymore.

A growing network of companies and organizations is delivering food directly from local farms to major institutions like Thomas Jefferson University Hospital in downtown Philadelphia, eliminating scores of middlemen from farm to fork. Along the way, they're increasing profits and recognition for smaller farms and offering consumers healthier, fresher foods.

Over the past five years, with more than $25 million in federal aid, these so-called food hubs have helped transform locally grown foods into a bigger business, supplying hospitals, schools, restaurant chains and grocery stores as consumer demand grows.

Major institutions like Jefferson have long relied on whatever giant food-service companies provide, often processed foods that are delivered efficiently and are easy to heat and serve. But with a steady supply of locally grown food from the Common Market food hub, Jefferson now serves bok choy and asparagus, creamy yogurts from Amish country and omelets with locally sourced cage-free eggs and spinach.

The model is simple: Common Market, a nonprofit, picks up food from 75 regional farmers and small food companies and quickly turns it around in its Philadelphia warehouse. The food -- everything from vegetables to turkey to tofu -- is then sent to 220 city customers along with detailed information about where it was grown or produced. There are about 300 other similar food hubs around the country.

Shelley Chamberlain of Jefferson's dining services said the hospital hopes to eventually source 10 percent of its food from Common Market. The items can be a bit more expensive and take more labor and training to cook, but Chamberlain said it's worth it to serve more-nutritious foods.

"We can't go out to farms and say, 'I'd like to buy your cucumbers,' 'I'd like to buy your bok choy,' 'I'd like to buy your carrots,'" she said. "They provide an infrastructure for us to trust what is coming in the door."

Dawn Buzby of A.T. Buzby Farm in Woodstown, N.J., said it's a movement toward "farm to institution." Three times a week, Common Market picks up tomatoes, sweet corn, eggplant, cantaloupes and other produce from her farm and sells the food in Philadelphia 35 miles away.

She said Common Market is helping her business get urban name recognition. "People are just becoming so interested in their food and where it comes from," Buzby said. "I only see it getting better."

It's a cultural transformation for the agriculture industry -- and the U.S. Agriculture Department -- which has long been focused on the biggest farms and staple crops like corn and soybeans. Most fruits and vegetables are shut out of major subsidy programs as billions of federal dollars flow to large growers.

The USDA has increased its commitment to building small farms and locally grown food with a program started in 2009 called "Know Your Farmer, Know Your Food." Helping food hubs like Common Market has been one of its priorities. There isn't good data yet on locally grown food sales, but the USDA said it has touched almost 3,000 separate projects.

Agriculture Secretary Tom Vilsack said it's a part of a government effort to revitalize rural areas, which have been losing population -- and important political clout.

"It's all designed to reconnect people with the food that they consume so that there is a better appreciation, a greater appreciation, for the amazing story of American agriculture regardless of what production system you favor or what size operation you have," he said.

Haile Johnston said he co-founded Common Market in 2008 after seeing how little farmers were making at wholesale and how much customers were paying for the same foods in the city.

"The two anchors of the chain, the producers and consumers, are really the most marginalized in this system," he said.

Johnston said hospitals such as Jefferson, along with schools, were a part of their model from the start because they could be a steady source of business and serve a large number of low-income people who may not have much access to produce.

In 2008, Common Market generated $125,000 in sales. This year, the organization is set to surpass $2.5 million -- all money reinvested into the nonprofit. Last year, Common Market received a $300,000 USDA grant designed to improve access to healthier foods in low-income communities.

In Mississippi, Wal-Mart has started buying purple hull peas directly from farmers in the Mississippi Delta, a deal cemented with USDA help. One of the farmers, Charles Houston, said the checks from Wal-Mart have helped many of his area's small farms survive, paying for new irrigation and infrastructure.

Wal-Mart, the nation's largest retailer, pledged to double its share of locally grown foods between 2009 and 2015.

Business on 07/17/2014

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