Leopold Letter: Summer 2008 News

Three new publications target farmers and foodservice buyers and show how they can better work together. What Producers Should Know About Selling to Local Foodservice Markets (PM 2045), What Retail Foodservices Should Know When Purchasing Local Produce Directly from Farmers (PM 2046), and Buying Local Foods for Retail Foodservices (PM 2047) are available from Iowa State University Extension, www.extension.iastate.edu/store, or the Leopold Center Marketing Initiative web page, http://www.leopold.iastate.edu/research/marketing.htm#newpubs. They were developed by the Hotel, Restaurant and Institution Management program at Iowa State University as part of a Leopold Center competitive grant related to food safety.

Read stories from some of the Iowa farm and food professionals who attended a sustainable agriculture conference in Kansas City. All received scholarships, thanks to a gift to the Leopold Center from Chipotle Restaurants.

A new book from the Agriculture of the Middle (AOTM) project has been published by MIT Press, Food and the Mid-Level Farm: Renewing an Agriculture of the Middle, edited by Thomas Lyson, Steve Stevenson and Rick Welsh. The opening chapter, "Why Worry about the Agriculture of the Middle?" is based on work by Leopold Center Distinguished Fellow Fred Kirschenmann, also a convening member of AOTM. Among the other contributors are Associate Director Rich Pirog and Iowa State University economist Mike Duffy (former associate director at the Leopold Center). The book has been cited as "a clarion call" to frame the need for a national initiative to shape a sustainable U.S. food system. Learn more about the project at the Association of Family Farms web site, http://www.familyfood.net.

Leopold Center Director Jerry DeWitt and Associate Director Rich Pirog recently visited the 80-acre Stone Barns Center for Food and Agriculture in Pocantico Hills, New York and discussed ways that the two centers could work together. The Leopold Center and the New York organization are sharing the services of Fred Kirschenmann in 2008, and several collaborative projects are under consideration. Stone Barns operates a four-season vegetable farm and pastured livestock operation with chickens, turkeys, sheep, bees and pigs. The farm sells its vegetables, eggs, meat and honey at an onsite farm market three days a week, and is a major source of the local food served at Blue Hill at Stone Barns restaurant and Blue Hill Café, which are operated privately. For a pictorial tour, check out photographs by DeWitt on the Leopold Center web site at: www.leopold.iastate.edu/photos/index.htm.

In 2007, nearly $2 million worth of locally produced food was purchased by 26 institutional food buyers in the eight-county region including and surrounding Black Hawk County, more than double the amount purchased in 2006. The information is just a sample of what has been collected by the University of Northern Iowa Local Food Project (with much of its work supported by the Leopold Center) since its inception 10 years ago. In April 2008, the group announced its new name, the Northern Iowa Food and Farm (NIFF) Partnership, and issued results from an economic study on the potential for new jobs and labor income linked to increased consumption of locally grown food in the area. More about this report

A five-county area in northeast Iowa could add more than 400 jobs and $90 million to its economy if more of the fresh fruit and vegetables consumed in the region also were grown there. The estimates are from a study conducted for the Northeast Iowa Food and Farm Coalition. The study was funded by the Regional Food Systems Working Group of the Value Chain Partnerships project that is coordinated by the Leopold Center. The study, Estimating the Production and Market Value-Based Impacts of Nutritional Goals in Northeast Iowa, is available on the Leopold Center Marketing and Food Systems Initiative page. See more about the group at: http://www.iowafoodandfitness.org.