NCGT Monthly Project Update

In This Issue:

Upcoming Events: Pasture Porkshop, GAPs Workshop

NCGT Supporting Farm-to-Base, Base-to-Farm Efforts at Camp Lejeune

GroupGAP: A New Food Safety Option for Small-Scale Growers

Peer Learning Across the Supply Chain: NCGT Activities Connect Small-Scale Farmers, Mainstream Buyers

Upcoming Events
May 25, 2016 \|Pasture Porkshop\| Winston-Salem, NC June 16, 2016 \| Good Agricultural Practices One-Day Workshop: Navigating the USDA GAP Audit \| Location TBA For more information, visit the NCGT website's Event Details page.

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.

April 30, 2016

Greetings all,

Thanks for reading our monthly newsletter and please let us know what you think.

Sincerely,

The NCGT Management Team

NCGT Supporting Farm-to-Base, Base-to-Farm Efforts at Camp Lejeune

Onslow County Incubator Farm

NC Growing Together is strengthening farm-to-base and base-to-farm connections with new project partner Marine Corps Base Camp Lejeune in Jacksonville, NC. NCGT matched funds with Onslow County Cooperative Extension and Onslow County Farmers Market Association to hire a full time Farmers Market and Incubator Farm Manager for 2016-2017. The new position will provide leadership at the incubator farm and strengthen efforts both to supply the Marine Corps base with farm-grown produce, as well as recruit base personnel, spouses, and retirees to participate in the farm.

"When we looked around at Onslow County, with the average age of farmers being 59, and the amount of farmland that the County has lost in the last 20 years -- we thought, what are we going to do?" asks Tim McCurry, Community Plans and Liaison Officer for Camp Lejeune. "You have to have some way to address new farmers. You have to find those people who have the passion, who are young enough and can work a hard day," he says.

It turns out the base is the perfect place to find new farmers. Military personnel who have retired after 20-30 years of service but who still want to work, military spouses who are looking for ways to grow healthy food for their children or supplemental income, and former combat veterans who find therapeutic benefit in farming -- all have found ways to channel their energy and talents in the incubator farm and farmers market.

"Of 17 farmers market vendors, 5 are military spouses" selling produce and crafts, says McCurry. "In addition to providing healthy food, the market is providing employment opportunities on base." One college-educated military spouse balked at the idea of taking a service job and runs a vendors' booth selling homemade crafts. Another former military spouse began farming as a way to feed her family healthy food, which led to raising sheep, growing her farm from 2 to 30 acres.

McCurry knows of several combat veterans from the Wounded Warriors battalion who find farming or, in one case, woodworking -- creating handcrafted products he sells at the farmers market -- so therapeutic that they have gone off medication they previously required. "That aspect [of this work] will keep me and this community in this for the long run," McCurry says.

Camp Lejuene will also be hosting a Summer 2016 NCGT Apprentice. Taylor Halso, a student at the University of Mount Olive, will support both farmers market and incubator farm projects and work under the mentorship of McCurry at Camp Lejeune and Peggy Garner, Onslow County Cooperative Extension Director.

GroupGAP: A New Food Safety Option for Small-Scale Growers


NCGT's Trish Tripp during a GroupGAP practice audit.

In April 2016, the USDA Agricultural Marketing Service (AMS) announced a new food safety certification program called GroupGAP. The program allows small farms to share the cost of certification across a group of growers, and was developed in partnership with the Wallace Center at Winrock International and other local and regional produce distributors across the US. NC Growing Together and the Carolina Farm Stewardship Association participated in the development of the protocols to help small farmers and local produce distributors meet the new standard.

GroupGAP audits include an analysis of the group's system of oversight, a site visit to ensure compliance with various procedures, and spot checks to verify appropriate on-farm implementation. There are no USDA limits on the number or type of farmers who can apply as a group under the GroupGAP audit program.

Many North Carolina buyers, including NCGT partner Lowes Foods, are beginning to require GAP certification and are accepting GroupGAP certification as well.

For more information on GroupGAP in NC, contact Trish Tripp, NCGT Produce Supply Chain Development Lead, who led the GroupGAP pilot in North Carolina. For resources on GAPs and Postharvest Handling, please visit the NCGT website.

To find out more about CFSA's GAPs consulting services, visit their website or contact Karen McSwain, CFSA's Farm Services and Food Systems Director, at 919-542-2402.

Peer Learning Across the Supply Chain: NCGT Activities Connect Small-Scale Farmers, Mainstream Buyers

NC Growing Together is bringing together small-scale farmers and food service and retail buyers for capacity-building along the local food supply chain. Events such as Grower-Buyer Mixers and Postharvest Handling Workshops provide opportunities for peer-to-peer learning and facilitate business connections that benefit everyone.

NCGT partners Lowes Foods, Foster-Caviness, and new NCGT partner FreshPoint have participated in several of these events. FreshPoint Senior Vice President Chris Woodring originally made the connection with NCGT and has participated in several NCGT-sponsored panel discussions and Grower-Buyer meetings. "It has been great for FreshPoint to hear ideas from growers at these meetings and share our knowledge of food service pack sizes and the complete chain from farm to fork," he says.

FreshPoint's Dan Batchelder explaining grading requirements to a producer at a recent Postharvest Handling workshop.

FreshPoint's VP of Sales, Dan Batchelder (pictured above) and Purchasing Manager, Kelly Smith, recently attended an NCGT Postharvest Handling workshop in Durham. Smith notes that what sets a local grower apart -- and helps justify adding them as a new vendor -- is when they are able to provide high-demand specialty crops as well as staples like kale and sweet potatoes. "Local growers can respond quickly and provide niche items in demand by high-end chefs, and while we're picking [those] up we can also get our staples like kale and sweet potatoes," she explains. At the recent Durham event, Smith was able to share with attendees the specialty items that are currently in demand, including baby turnips, green strawberries, and edible flowers.

Smith also notes that interacting with local farmers allows her to share the different requirements for produce destined for food service versus retail markets. For example, produce does not have to be cosmetically perfect to be marketable to chefs -- who will chop and cook the ingredients and care more about the product's taste -- whereas cosmetically imperfect produce cannot be accepted in most retail environments. FreshPoint's UBU (Unusual But Usable) program separates cosmetically imperfect produce and markets it for the farmer -- helping to move product that otherwise might be a financial loss for farmers. "It's a win-win," Smith says.

FreshPoint will be hosting an NC Growing Together apprentice in Summer 2016 whose sole focus will be bringing on 8 new local farmers over the course of the summer. Smith says North Carolina represents a "huge area of opportunity" due to its climate and location. "Really it's our future -- the more we are able to support local farmers, it helps everyone, including consumers, and helps to support our local economy," she says.

Project Contact Information

Rebecca Dunning, NCGT Project Manager, 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

Noah Ranells, NCGT Principal Investigator at North Carolina Agricultural and Technical State University, Cooperative Extension Program, nnranell@ncat.edu, 336-285-4658

Laura Lauffer, Project Coordinator, Local Farms and Food, North Carolina Agricultural and Technical State University, Cooperative Extension Program, ldlauffe@ncat.edu, 336-285-4690

Emily Edmonds, NCGT Extension and Outreach Program Manager, emelders@ncsu.edu, 828-399-0297

John Day, NCGT Seafood and Dairy Supply Chain Development Lead, 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 Produce Supply Chain Development Lead, trish@artisanfoodsolutions.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.

� 2013-2016 NC Growing Together