Priming the pump for local food
By Laura Ruby
It’s no secret that Fauquier County is thick with farms.
With more than 1,300 farms and 238,000 acres of agricultural land, the county has the ninth-largest ag economy in Virginia.
And, according to a 2008 Northern Piedmont Buy Fresh Buy Local Food Guide, Fauquier is home to more than 20 u-pick farms, five farmers’ markets, five grocers selling locally grown or produced foods, three Community Supported Agriculture operations, 11 specialty farms, a pair of caterers using locally grown food, multiple agritourism operations, and 17 farms selling locally raised meat, poultry or dairy products.
You get the idea ? farming is a way of life for about 5.5 percent of the workforce that lives and works here, with a total market value of $45.5 million in ag products sold from county farms.
Finding a way to support those farms ? by tapping into new markets and cultivating a local food system ? is the primary objective for a group of community activists that began meeting last summer.
Acknowledging that their efforts are still in the beginning stages, Cooperative Extension agents Tim Mize and Matt Benson and Fauquier County Agricultural Development officer Ray Pickering are optimistic about the opportunities available.
“I’m really excited to see the possibilities and the things that people are already doing,” Mize said, noting that the group has taken field trips and hosted meetings to get a better idea of what farmers need to be more competitive and what consumers want.
Connecting the large number of producers with consumers hungry for fresh, local food sounds simple enough, but it’s an idea that’s easier said than done. Large scale buyers such as grocery stores need to stock their shelves year-round, often finding it difficult to work with small-scale producers, particularly where the growing season is limited. On the other hand, producers are often reluctant to plant different or larger crops without a commitment from buyers that they’ll purchase the wares.
Bringing different players to the table ? whether they be school nutritionists in charge of making purchases for entire systems, university representatives interested in sustainability, restaurant owners or buyers for large supermarket chains ? to discuss these varying needs has been a crucial step in understanding the hurdles inherent in developing a local food system.
One idea that developed early on, the group said, was to pull together resources and create a community hub for locally grown produce, meat and dairy.
Last fall, several members of the group traveled to Hill High Farm in Loudoun County and to a former apple packing plant in Winchester to assess the possibility of using one of the sites as a distribution hub for locally grown food.
And while the trip was a success, ultimately, neither location is a good fit for local producers, Benson said.
Participants also ventured to the Northern Neck Farmers' Market late last year. Not a farmers' market in the traditional sense, the distribution hub operates as a cooperative, bringing together vegetable growers from that region.
With contracts with mid-Atlantic chain stores like Ukrops, Safeway, and Whole Foods Market, the co-op distributes about 1.2 million cases of food through the market each year, Benson said. In operation year-round, the facility has several full-time employees and also works with food service companies like U.S. Foodservice and Sysco, which provide food to institutions like restaurants, hospitals, and nursing homes, Benson said. To maintain these contracts, the co-op brings food in during the winter months so that it can continue to supply its customers, Mize noted.
Though they were impressed with the facility, Benson and Mize pointed out that the Northern Neck region has a tremendous number of vegetable growers to support the venture ? and Fauquier doesn’t.
The group has also followed the development of a distribution hub in the Thomas Jefferson Planning District, which includes Albemarle and Nelson counties and is being supported through a local government grant.
While none of these models may be ideal for Fauquier, they all offer ideas and insight into what could be developed here, the group said. Perhaps an open-air hub that would provide a meeting place for growers and large-scale buyers, Benson offered. Or agreements with area universities are a real possibility, they group said.
“There is tremendous interest from the university environment,” said Benson, noting that a number of Virginia colleges are expressing interest in offering locally grown food for students and participating in sustainable initiatives. Universities have more flexibility in how they purchase food, Benson said, pointing out that there are strict regulations governing how public K-12 schools buy food for students.
“You say ‘buy local,’ but it’s a lot more complicated that than,” said Mize.
Rappahannock County Extension agent Kenner Love, who has participated in local food group meetings, illustrated both the benefits and obstacles in putting local food on the school lunch table when he organized a Nov. 18 Local Lunch Day in Rappahannock County schools.
Featuring locally raised beef, vegetables, and apples, the lunch was a hit with students, and organizers learned a bushel from the event. Cost is one hurdle, and, interestingly, prep time is another. Many school cafeterias are simply not equipped to prepare whole foods, but rather to accommodate processed ones, Love noted.
Pickering and Mize noted progress in working with farmers one-on-one to help them grow business relationships, and all three are encouraged by the possibilities Fauquier holds.
Finding ways to make these farms more viable will be crucial to their continued existence. According to the Virginia Cooperative Extension Service, 95 percent of local farms are making less than $100,000 a year.
A 2007 analysis by the Extension service found that if each household in the county spent $10 a week on locally produced foods and other farm products, it would generate approximately $32.9 million of direct economic investment to the local economy, farm families, and communities, Benson noted. If half of the households in Fauquier spent $5 a week on locally grown or produced food, more than $8 million would be generated for the local economy.