NCGT Monthly Project Update

In This Issue

Save the Date: NCGT Annual Partner Meeting Jan 22

NCGT Redesigns Website

Web Resource Spotlight: Meat Process Walkthroughs

NCGT Local Food Inventory Useful for Farmers, Extension Agents

Partner Profile: Pilot Mountain Pride

About NCGT

GOAL | Bring more locally-grown foods - produce, meat, dairy, and seafood - into mainstream retail and food service supply chains, thus enhancing food security by increasing access to local foods and by strengthening the economics of small to mid-sized farm and fishing operations.

STRATEGY | Identify the most promising solutions by which local production and associated value-added activities can enter local retail and food service markets, pilot these solutions in North Carolina, and evaluate and report the results for the benefit of other states and regions.

November 24, 2014

Greetings all,

Thanks for reading our monthly project update and please let us know what you think!

Sincerely,

The NCGT Management Team

Save the Date:

NCGT Annual Partner Meeting Jan 22

NCGT's Annual Partner Meeting will be held on January 22, 2015 at NC A&T State University. More information will be sent to partners soon.

Have You Visited NCGT's New Website?
If you haven't already, please check out our newly-redesigned website! We've made it easier to find information on current news, events, and resources. Our content will now be updated monthly, so be sure to visit regularly.

NCGT Web Resource Spotlight: Meat Process Walkthroughs

Last month we invited you to see the inner workings of a produce distribution center. Now, 2013-2014 NC Growing Together Supply Chain Fellow Sebastian Naskaris has created two new walkthrough documents that show how meat moves through the supply chain with the same step-by-step explanation and helpful photos.

Process Walkthrough: Direct-Store Delivery (DSD) to Retail Grocery Destinations for Niche Meat Producers explains the direct-to-store distribution process at a large-scale retail grocery store. It includes arrival, merchandising, unloading, receiving, placement in inventory, shelving, and markdowns.

Process Walkthrough at a Regional Meat Distribution Center explains the warehouse management systems through which meat moves from the vendor delivering product to the warehouse to shipment from the warehouse to the retailer. It includes arrival, unloading, quality control, receiving, placement in inventory, selection from inventory, and preparation for delivery.

You can find both process walkthroughs on the Resources for Producers page of the NCGT website.

NCGT Local Food Infrastructure Inventory Useful for Farmers, Extension Agents

The NCGT Local Food Infrastructure Inventory is a mapped inventory of businesses that serve as intermediary steps in local food supply chains. This includes value-added processors, fresh produce wholesaler/distributors, multi-farm CSA's, food hubs, community kitchens, incubator farms, and cold storage locations.

"It's a great guide for new farmers," says Henderson County extension agent Craig Mauney. He regularly uses the inventory to help farmers locate post-harvest facilities near (and far) from them. "Farmers are thinking about so many things, but they don't always think about post-harvest storage or processing" of their products, he says.

He recently used the map with a blackberry grower who was looking for cold storage for his berries. Seeing the distance between his farm and the nearest cold-storage facility, the grower decided to build his own cooling unit, which he now shares with 2 smaller growers. "It's a good decision-making and networking tool," Mauney says. "The more we all use it, the more useful it will be to farmers in our region."

Visit the Local Food Infrastructure Inventory and help keep it current by adding a new location or submitting a comment.

Partner Profile: Pilot Mountain Pride

Developing profitable distribution models in a local food economy isn't always easy. Just ask Josh Cave, the Facilities Manager at Pilot Mountain Pride (PMP). Based in Surry County, PMP was founded in 2010 as a way for farmers to diversify their incomes and as an economic development tool for the county.

The food hub aggregates and distributes produce from 29 growers within a 30-mile radius and sells wholesale to grocers and distributors. It also provides technical services to its farmers, including training in Good Agricultural Practices (GAPs), required by many large-scale buyers.

Cave, a farmer himself, was one of the first to deliver produce to the hub. He quickly realized that the low margins that PMP charges for aggregating and distributing produce (and washing and packaging, if needed) meant more money in his -- and other farmers' -- pockets. In a county with an agricultural economy formerly based on tobacco, farmers need new ways to sustain their farms. "I want to see [PMP] succeed," he says. "Our community needs it".

Local pumpkins distributed by PMP.

But PMP struggled through the first few years. "You can't afford to make mistakes," says Cave, who was brought in to turn things around in 2013. Cave is now focused on growing PMP and keeping it profitable. His top three priorities for the new year are pushing open new markets, increasing their numbers of GAPs certified farmers, and stricter financial planning. "I think we've got a good year coming up," he says.

PMP will be hosting a summer 2015 NCGT Local Foods Supply Chain Intern. For more information about PMP, please visit their website.

Project Contact Information

Rebecca Dunning, NCGT Project and Research Director, rebecca_dunning@ncsu.edu, 919-389-2220

Nancy Creamer, Director of the Center for Environmental Farming Systems, NC State University; and Project Director, NC Growing Together, nancy_creamer@ncsu.edu, 919-515-9447

Michelle Schroeder-Moreno, NCGT Academic Coordinator, michelle_schroeder@ncsu.edu, 919-513-0085

Joanna Lelekacs, NCGT Extension and Training Coordinator, joanna_lelekacs@ncsu.edu, 919-244-5269

John Day, NCGT Military Partnership Coordinator, john_day@ncsu.edu, 704-785-6670

Krista Morgan, Locally Grown Accounts Representative, Lowes Foods; and Lowes Foods Liaison, NC Growing Together, krista_morgan@lowesfoods.com, 336-775-3218 ext. 53218

Patricia Tripp, NCGT Wholesaler Liaison, patriciatripp1@gmail.com, 336-458-6980

JJ Richardson, NCGT Website and Communications Coordinator, jj_richardson@ncsu.edu, 919-889-8219

This project is supported by the Agriculture and Food Research Initiative competitive grant no. 2013-68004-20363 of the USDA National Institute of Food and Agriculture.

� 2013-2014 NC Growing Together