Research and Development for Existing Cooperative Preorder Distribution of Local Foods

To develop a strong, local food system, we need to encourage local marketing and consumption of locally grown and processed foods in our county. Towards the end, over the past 3 years we have been developing a cooperative weekly pre-order distribution system for local foods within our CSA membership. To date we have distributed our products and the products of twenty other local growers and processors to our members. Participation in the project has been growing, but before the model is moved beyond our farm, we feel we need to 1) develop an informational brochure with a description and pictures of each farm and processor, 2) represent as fully as possible the range of local food available in the county and 3) develop a handbook of our operations. These are the goals for the coming season.