Supplying Demand: Optimizing Improvements to the Local Food Value Chain in Western Massachusetts

Supplying Demand: Optimizing Improvements to the Local Food Value Chain in Western Massachusetts

Summary

The Pioneer Valley has a well-established local food economy, with assets including new farmers and food business entrepreneurs, an engaged public, a successful incubator kitchen, and a strong network of agencies providing technical assistance and financing. Demand for locally grown food continues to climb, and large buyers ranging from restaurants to retailers to institutions are pursuing local sourcing. These large buyers represent important opportunities to bring locally grown food to people in the places they already eat and shop, while providing valuable markets for farmers at a time when growth in direct markets is slowing. Nonetheless, significant challenges prevent larger buyers from fully acting on their interest in local sourcing. This project focuses on effective, achievable improvements to one of the most important of those challenges, distribution and related services such as aggregation and ordering.

This project addresses the following questions:

• What are current patterns of distribution and related services that connect Pioneer Valley farmers with local and regional wholesale buyers (restaurants, retailers, and institutions)?
• How can we strengthen this existing capacity in order to ensure that it serves a robust local and regional food system? Examples of improvements include providing technical assistance to existing distributors, adding on-line ordering capacity or tracking software, filling geographic gaps, and strengthening farmer-run aggregation and distribution efforts.

Our work in 2015 has focused on interviews and information-gathering with growers, buyers, and distributors. Although most interviews have been one-on-one, we also hosted two workshops and a networking event for producers and buyers.

Objectives/Performance Targets

Objective 1:  Gain a detailed understanding of existing distribution patterns for local food sold to larger buyers in the Pioneer Valley, and identify pressure points where improvement is needed.

In 2015, our activities under this objective included:

• Review of information from other locations related to improving distribution (and related services) for local food systems, particularly focused on effective work with existing distributors. This review is ongoing.
• Three activities designed to solicit information from producers, including one in-depth interview and two workshops focused on wholesale production, pricing, and sales. We have delayed additional interviews with growers because of the growing season but will focus on these in the winter months.
• Interviews and meetings with large buyers, including 2 processors, 7 colleges, 1 restaurant, 1 retailer, and 8 school districts.
• Interviews and panel presentations with four distributors.

Accomplishments/Milestones

We have completed or are on track to complete the following activities, as laid out in our project proposal timeline. We do expect that our interviews will extend into March and April of 2016.

• Discuss project goals and plan, including interview questions and topics, with project advisors (CISA staff and advisors, April and May 2015).
• Gather and review information from other regions about infrastructure assessment and targeted improvement of distribution and related services for local food systems (CISA staff, April—August 2015).
• Plan, schedule, and complete interviews with growers, buyers, and distributors (CISA staff, September 2015—February 2016).

Impacts and Contributions/Outcomes

The research we are conducting through this project is timely and relevant to many other activities taking place in our region and across Massachusetts. These include the creation of a Massachusetts Food System Plan, the Franklin County Plus 10 Farm to School Project, and two projects focused on cooperation among college food service providers in Hampden and Hampshire Counties. Our participation in these activities has provided additional sources of information about the needs of buyers, growers, and distributors, and has allowed us to share our preliminary findings.

Collaborators: