Potential collaboration between food policy councils and food hubs

CLOSUP Student Working Paper Series Number 21 April 2017

Potential collaboration between food policy councils and food hubs Madelyn Celovsky, University of Michigan

This paper is available online at http://closup.umich.edu Papers in the CLOSUP Student Working Paper Series are written by students at the University of Michigan.

This paper was submitted as part of the Winter 2017 course Environ 302: Energy and Environmental Policy Research, made possible through funding provided by the University of Michigan Third Century Initiative.

Any opinions, findings, conclusions, or recommendations expressed in this material are those of the author(s) and do not necessarily reflect the view of the Center for Local, State, and Urban Policy or any sponsoring agency

Center for Local, State, and Urban Policy Gerald R. Ford School of Public Policy University of Michigan

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Potential collaboration between food policy councils and food hubs Madelyn Celovsky 4/26/2017

Abstract In recent years, food policy in the U.S. has begun to address some of the implications of the industrialization of agriculture and the lack of food security. As it expands to include more voices and overlapping interests, the potential for collaboration between policymakers and the existing infrastructure expands. Food policy councils (FPCs) comprised of food system stakeholders, are developing food policy at the state, county, and regional level to address a diversity of food issues including local food system development. Food hubs, are organizations that assist local small-scale producers with aggregation and distribution of their product and are valuable elements to growing local food systems. In this paper, I conduct a content analysis of FPC achievements and priorities to measure overlap between FPCs and food hubs. The analysis reveals that while there are few FPCs who have achieved food hub related goals, there is significant overlap between FPC priorities and food hubs. This paper further identifies areas for future collaboration between FPCs and food hubs that could develop resilient local food systems across the country and improve access to healthy food for all.

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Introduction Modern technology and globalization have allowed for bigger farms run by fewer people.

This change has caused a radical shift in the distribution of farm size. Between 1982 and 2002, farms with over $1,000,000 in sales doubled their share of total U.S. agriculture sales from 24% to 48%. (Hoppe, Korbe, & Banker, 2008). The shift in how food is grown has come with both food security and ecological implications, both of which have been studied extensively. Large corporate farms tend to drain income from the local rural community (Rosset, 1999). Centralized land ownership has been shown to produce inequitable economic opportunity and less accountability in land owners which is socially, economically, and ecologically devastating to rural communities (Rosset, 1999). The World Resources Institute reports that there were only .05 workers per hectare of cropland in 2000 in both the US and Canada (n.d.). There are less people working the land locally and the food is transported hundreds to thousands of miles away to be processed in large facilities.

Industrialized food systems that have become conventional in the US and Canada are detrimental to nutrition, especially in the most vulnerable communities. A long line of US federal policy has aided the rise of industrial farms with subsidies that promote “bigger, less diverse farms� that churn out commodities which are easily processed into cheap high sugar and high fat products (Ray, De la Torre Ugarte, & Tiller, 2003, p. 1). These products are continually able to outcompete healthier options, which disproportionately affects low income communities (Ploeg, et al., November 2012).

The food being sold at the markets to the average American family has already traveled 6760 km (Matthew & Weber, 2008). This has a great impact on the environment as well as

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consumers’ relationship with their food. Longer distance between farm and table means more greenhouse gases burned, which contributes to climate change. Furthermore, the further distance creates a shadow over industrialized food production methods and decreased autonomy over what food is available.

In recent years, food policy in the U.S. and globally has begun to address some of the implications of the industrialization of agriculture and the lack of food security. It started with the expansion of the conversation around food to include more interests and voices besides just the farmers. For example, in 2012, the Institute of Medicine of the National Academies prescribed increased access to healthy food, especially local food, as a nationwide obesity prevention measure (Institute of Medicine, 2012). This contributed to the passing of food policy at the local, state, and federal level that recommends measures to promote healthy food access.

With food issues at the forefront, formalized organizations structured around the issues weren’t far behind. Food Policy Councils (FPC), where stakeholders from across the many sectors of food organize around developing food policy, have surged in the last 10 years (Palmer, Frattaroli, Scherb, & Pollack, 2012). The new FPCs are working on policy and programs that address a diverse range of food topics. However, there is great potential for growth in food policy, especially in local food development (Taber, Chriqui, Quinn, Rimkus, & Chaloupka, 2016).

Outside of policy there are other efforts to fortify local food economies against the forces of globalization. Food hubs are defined by the USDA as “a business or organization that actively manages the aggregation, distribution, and marketing of source-identified food products primarily from local and regional producers to strengthen their ability to satisfy wholesale, retail, and institutional demand” (Barham, et al., 2012, p. 2). They can act as a link between rural areas

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where much of the food is grown and the cities where much of it is eaten, or they can simply enable rural communities to eat what they are growing, instead of shipping it out.

Although both are important facets of the food movement, food hubs and FPCs have generally developed independently. “It’s a big, lumpy tent, and sometimes the various factions beneath it work at cross-purposes” says Michael Pollan about the food movement (Pollan, 2010, p. 3). He is referring to the diverse and seemingly contradictory sides of “good” food. While food hubs by definition work to support the aggregation and distribution of local food, Food Policy Councils tend to have a wide variety of goals. In this paper, I will explore the aspirational overlap between food hubs and FPCs. How do the missions of FPCs implicitly and explicitly overlap the goals of food hubs? To answer this question, I will conduct a content analysis of the missions and priorities of FPCs in the United States and Canada, searching for words that represent the goals of food hubs. The analysis will help identify potential areas for collaboration and inform future food policy.

Literature Review Although food policy in the U.S. has undergone a transformation relatively recently, there have already been important policies implemented, one being the Healthy Food Funding Initiative developed under the Obama administration. It provides federal grants to food access businesses including food hubs. There are similar state-level policies being adopted by New York, Pennsylvania, and Louisiana. These food access policies in the past generally involve grant distribution and zoning policy to promote the development of food retail spaces. Block and Subramanian (2015) have found, however that addressing food access by filling food deserts with retail spaces (eg. grocery stores, supermarkets, etc.) does not necessarily lead to increasing healthy food consumption in these neighborhoods. Studies show that other factors, like price and

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store layout have stronger effects on nutrition. Although supporting the development of food retail in food deserts and underserved communities is important to improving food access, strong local food security and improved nutrition necessitates improvement at every level of the supply chain.

Grant distribution isn’t the only approach being used to create a shift towards healthy food on the retail front. Intervention policy research from Song et al. (2009) tested the use of incentives to increase healthy food availability. In the experiment, store owners were given monetary incentives to sell healthier foods along with practical suggestions about how storeowners could stock and display healthy foods. The results were generally positive, more people were buying healthier food. This study found that the policies that increase the availability of healthy food, do, in fact, increase the consumption of healthy food (Song et al.

2009). This suggests that stocking stores with locally sourced healthy food could lead to increases in consumption. Both the incentive and grant distribution programs are proof that policy can work to promote food security in the U.S., but there is room to improve. There is a precedent being set that food policy works and FPCs are doing work to continue this precedent.

FPCs are talking about local food policies along with a wide diversity of other goals.

Palmer, Frattaroli, Scherb, & Pollack (2012) conclude from their survey of FPCs that most FPCs are currently working to effect policy change at multiple levels, on multiple topics, and through multiple activities. They suggest using grants and incentives to promote local food. At the same time, they are talking about improving nutrition, fighting hunger, and protecting the environment. It is only right that FPCs mirror the “big, lumpy tent� of the good food movement from which they were born. They are often made of people from diverse sides of the food movement with diverse interests.

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Studies have been conducted to navigate the lumps of FPCs and identify holes in understanding as well as future policy directions. In a meta-analysis of policy research done about healthy food access in rural communities, Calancie et al. (2015) found that although the policy strategy being studied is usually to “increase availability of healthier food and beverage choices”, it very rarely has to do with improving “availability of mechanisms for purchasing foods from farms”. Calancie et al. (2015) suggest that federal food access policy should focus on local food production and distribution as well as the already prevalent consumer-side accessibility policy.

Looking forward, these suggestions are corroborated by other experts in the field: local food is in fact a priority in food policy research. A study conducted by a workgroup from Nutrition and Obesity Policy Research and Evaluation Network surveyed experts in food access and economic development from across the country to analyze what policies are being prioritized (Calancie, et al., 2017, p. 9). They found that the most frequently mentioned concept was the need to develop food access solutions specific to the region and community. A highly-ranked suggestion to improve local food access specifically was policies that supported farmers’ ability in “combining forces for increased purchasing, distribution, and selling power” (Johnson, et al., 2014, p. 5). This shows that FPCs, on some level, are making the connection between food access and food production.

There is only a weak precedent of current FPCs working on policy to support the supply side of local food, however, research shows that the small-mid farms that fuel local food economies struggle to reach the scale needed to feed communities. The barriers to a local food, are “the difficulties of inadequate finance, disappearing infrastructure, and inappropriate regulation” (Mount, 2012, p. 109). Mount (2012) points out that without a developed local food

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infrastructure, small and mid-size producers will not be able to engage in the consumer side initiatives of FPCs and organizations around the country.

The literature suggests that FPCs interested in strengthening the local food economy should develop local food aggregation and distribution, but are food hubs the answer? A study that investigates the effects “entrepreneurial food systems innovations” have on rural economies and health has revealed that food hubs show “promise to benefit all participants, helping to address such problems as profitability of small farms, access to affordable produce, and possibly, low fruit and vegetable consumption” (Sitaker, Kolodinsky, Jilcott, & Seguin, 2014, p. 11).

Small and mid-sized farmers know the benefits of food hubs. A study in Ohio found that the majority of growers were interested in the development of “aggregation hubs” (Clark & Inwood, 2016, p. 515). Berti and Mulligan (2016) find in their literature review that food hubs are fulfilling both community and supply chain needs by being primarily grassroots innovations that bridge a crucial gap in the local food supply chain.

Taber et al. (2016) bring attention to another criticism of food policy, inequality in food policy. There are a few key findings that are particularly relevant to this study. One being that rural communities, Hispanic communities, and Black communities are overall overlooked by food policies; also there is significantly more inequality in zoning policies, when compared to school food policy (2016). Food hubs are a compelling solution to these problems because of their flexible and adaptable nature, they are generally guided by local knowledge. Food hubs have the potential to expand further into both rural and urban communities in a way that values equity and diversity.

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Although there is an ideological similarity between food hubs and FPCs, there is little literature analyzing the reality of this connection. This paper seeks to understand in detail the nature of the relationship between existing FPCs and food hubs.

Methods To understand the relationship, I conduct a content analysis of the accomplishments and priorities of Food Policy Councils to reveal the explicit and implicit overlap in the goals of FPCs and food hubs. More specifically, I will be using a keyword search to code the priorities of Food Policy Councils in the US and Canada based on their relation to food hub goals. Food hubs are defined by their common goals of food distribution and aggregation. The keywords I use will come from the USDA working definition of food hubs: “a business or organization that actively manages the aggregation, distribution, and marketing of source-identified food products primarily from local and regional producers to strengthen their ability to satisfy wholesale, retail, and institutional demand” (Barham J. , 2010). The keywords that represent explicit food hub goals are “food hub”, “aggregation”, “distribution”, and (more generally) “production”. The more implicit keywords are based on a broader concept of a food hub; they include “local food”, “economic development”, “farmer”, and “procurement”.

Although content analysis has traditionally been used to analyze “novels, newspapers, and other media” the use of a content analysis on mission statements and priorities is not entirely unprecedented (Norton, 2008). Norton (2008) uses content analysis on master plans and Yozgata and Karatas (2011) use it on mission statements, which are both conceptually similar to priority and accomplishment statements.

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My documents came from the directories aggregated at Johns Hopkins Center for a Livable Future in a survey of FPCs collected in 2016. I conducted my search in the answers of 2 of the 7 questions asked: “What are your FPC’s current top 3 policy priorities?” and “Describe your FPC’s achievements in the last 12 months.” Excluding incomplete responses, the sample includes 299 FPCs. Because the survey depended on self reporting FPCs, it may not be a true survey, however it is the most extensive inventory to date. I code each response with the present keywords to find raw prevalence statistics.

After coding for each of the specific words, I surveyed each instance to check for relevance. I removed from the count instances where the keyword was present but the content was irrelevant. Much of what I removed were organizational achievements and had nothing to do food (eg. “distributed leadership processes”, "local grassroots policy efforts"). Most of the food related instances that I removed because they weren’t relevant to food hubs were descriptions of community garden initiatives and food assistance program development. Although there is a total of 70 FPCs who use my keywords in their accomplishment descriptions, after surveying I found only 42 have achieved anything implicitly or explicitly relevant to food hubs. Case by case analysis of priorities resulted in the same prevalence as the keyword search on policy priorities.

Results Overall, 14% of FPCs report food hub related achievements in the last year while 62% intend to prioritize something relevant to food hubs in the future (Table 1).

While explicit references to food hubs and food hub services are generally rare, there seems to be an overlap in FPC priorities and achievements and implicit food hub goals. No FPCs mention aggregation and very few talk about distribution in their priorities or achievements

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(Table 2). Only 5 FPCs mention food hubs in their achievements (Table 2). One outlier was that 17% prioritize policy that supports food production which is an explicit goal of food hubs (Table 2).

When looking for implicit food hub goals within FPC achievements and priorities, I found more overlap. Of the 299 FPCs, 106 FPCs talk about economic development in their priorities and 66 FPCs prioritize policy related to local food procurement for schools and various other institutions (Table 2). Despite these high counts observed in priorities, there are very few FPCs who report achievements in these areas of economic development and local food procurement policy, with only 0.3% and 4%, respectively (Table 2). 51 FPCs reported achievements pertaining to farmers and farms and 42 reported local food achievements (Table 2).

Approximately 11% of FPCs prioritize policies that support farms and famers and 8% have achievements that support farms and farmers.

Table 1. Proportion of FPCs with priorities and achievements that explicitly and/or implicitly overlap the goals of food hubs General Total Achievements Priorities

Count 42 186

Proportion 0.14 0.62

Table 2. Prevalence by keyword for FPC priorities and achievements Achievements Topic Explicit

Count Prevalence

Priorities Count

Prevalence

Production

1

0.30%

53

17.73%

Aggregation

0

0.00%

0

0.00%

Distribution

3

1.00%

1

0.33%

Food hub

5

1.70%

9

3.01%

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Implicit

Economic development

1

0.30%

106

35.45%

Local food

26

8.70%

12

4.01%

Procurement

13

4.30%

66

22.07%

Farmer/farm

25

8.36%

33

11.04%

Analysis The low rates of “local food” in both the FPC achievements and priorities was surprising given that much of the literature says that FPCs are working towards local food (Calancie et al., 2017, Johnson et al., 2014). However, the high prevalence of local food related keywords (eg.

17% mention food production in their priorities), suggests that FPCs are talking about local food but in not so many words. Aggregation and distribution are both also quite rare, this, along with the rarity of direct food hub to FPC collaboration, matches what the literature is saying about FPCs and food hubs—most FPCs aren’t talking about local food in terms of supply side initiative. In order for the local food access grants and intervention policies like the one tested by Song et al. (2009) to be effective at a larger scale, there must be policy that addresses the issues with local food supply.

It is important, when analyzing these results, to remember that the number of FPCs in North America has tripled since 2008 indicating that most of the FPCs are in their very early stages (Sussman & Bassarab, 2016). This is especially apparent in the achievement descriptions-many of the FPCs reported strictly organizational achievements (eg. “hired staff” or “worked on strategic plan”). As the FPCs mature, their actions will be informed by the needs of their jurisdiction and will become increasingly specific. Even so, the results suggest that there may be

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a number of ways that FPCs and food hubs can and do overlap. Such areas of varying degrees of overlap include food hubs themselves, farmers markets, and procurement policies. Although few FPCs have achieved in areas relevant to food hubs and even fewer have actually worked with food hubs, the prevalence of food hub-related priorities reported by FPCs indicates that this may change in the future. Because my scope excluded the federal policy makers talking about food, my results show that the Calancie et al.’s findings that federal food policy should focus on local food production and distribution can be extended to FPCs at state, regional, and local levels.

Food hub The most obvious accounts of alignment of FPCs and food hubs are the five FPCs that explicitly mention food hubs in their achievements. A closer look reveals that three of the five (Montgomery County Food Policy Council, Roaring Fork Food Alliance, and New London County Food Policy Council) have conducted food hub feasibility reports that look in the need and support for a food hub in a specific region. The remaining two (Feast Down East and San Luis Local Food Council) are involved directly with food hubs.

The Montgomery feasibility report predicts that a potential challenge to the development of a local food hub would be with land use policies that are friendly to farmers markets but may or may not be friendly to food hubs. The uncertainty extends beyond just land use policy.

Because the feasibility report is for a county food hub, it points out, “it is unclear if there is the regulatory framework for the local government to be able to finance, participate directly in and/or indirectly support a commercial food hub” and cites the need for “strong policy framework and public support” as necessary for the hub to be successful (Montgomery County

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Food Policy Council, 2016, p. 15). This suggests that developing food hubs would benefit from policy and regulation support from FPCs. The Roaring Fork Food Alliance report points out a potential limit to FPC and food hubs, after a certain period of time, food hubs will outgrow the need for food coalition and FPC support. They go on to suggest that an exception to this will be the regional network many FPCs have to offer. Food hubs, no matter how mature, will be looking for more producers to ensure that supply stays steady. The Roaring Fork suggests that, in general, FPCs can help to identify and promote resources necessary for new growers to sustain their operations (Garcelon, 2015).

Though this is not directly a partnership with food hubs, it is an example of how food hubs and FPCs can work towards the same goal.

The New London County Food Policy Council takes an even more removed approach.

The feasibility report, conducted by a Project Team of the FPC lays out a plan for a food hub to be incubated by an entirely separate nonprofit. It seems they concluded that the New London FPC should not be involved in any direct way (except through the making and communicating of the feasibility report) (New London Food Policy Council , 2015). There are limits to the FPC and food hub relationship, not every FPC lines up directly with food hubs. However, even in this case, there is a certain alignment of interests as it was the FPC that conducted the food hub report in the first place.

The two FPCs directly involved in food hubs are both nonprofits, unassociated with any branch of government. Feast Down East runs their food hub along with running local food campaigns and food access programs. San Luis County Food Policy Council runs the Valley Roots food hub more distantly through a DBA run by the nonprofit. Both projects have only

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been in business for 1-2 years so it would be premature to come to any conclusions about the success of the partnerships.

Mount (2012) emphasizes how conventional agriculture in the US has erased much of the infrastructure that would make small- and mid-sized farms able to scale their operations (eg. local processors). By helping initiate food hubs, FPCs are contributing directly to overcoming this infrastructural barrier.

Farmers Markets One result that should be analyzed more closely is the percent of priorities and achievements that included “farm”. It should be noted that the majority of these instances were about efforts to improve or initiate farmers markets. When FPCs talk about farmers market they are often talk about them in the context of increasing local food access for consumers at the retail level. The Community Food & Agriculture Coalition in Misoula “launched a Double SNAP Dollar program at area farmers markets” which incentivizes the use of food stamps at farmers market. The Davidson County Local Food Network worked on “improving farmers market visibility to local residents”. Palmer, Frattaroli, Scherb, and Pollack found the use of grants and incentives to farmers markets in their FPC research as well. This work is on the retail side of local food while food hubs tend to stick to supporting the wholesale side.

However, I decided to include the “farmers market” instances in the overall count because historically farmers markets have performed the same aggregation and distribution services that food hubs do. For example, the Eastern Market in Detroit, MI a now thriving farmers market was first and foremost a center for wholesale distributors. While it is now a thriving retail market where Detroiters can shop for local produce and good, it continues to be a center for aggregation and distribution for local producers in Southeast Michigan (Deeb, n.d.).

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By prioritizing policy that supports farmers markets, FPCs are building up the local food market at multiple levels.

Traditional farmers markets that participate in direct marketing only are not enough to scale up local food systems, they account for only 2% of the market (Mount, 2012). FPCs should work to reach farmers that have customarily not been involved in local food initiatives that focus on the consumer, especially mid-sized producers. Food hubs and farmers markets that provide aggregation and distribution services are examples of flexible infrastructure that accommodate the retail and wholesale side of local food. One way FPCs do this is by expanding programs that help small scale producers navigate food safety regulations. The survey shows that FPCs in the past have helped famers market vendors comply with food safety regulations. This is really important because similar to how as subsidy policy has aided the industrialization of agriculture, safety regulation shows a bias towards large scale conventional producers, making it very hard for small- to mid-sized farms to get their product to market (Mount, 2012). Working with food hubs on new food safety regulation policies will be crucial to the future of food hubs and farmers markets that offer aggregation and distribution services.

Procurement Policy One common goal of FPCs is supporting local food procurement by private and public institutions. The Cleveland-Cuyahoga County Food Policy Council partnered with the local government to achieve a local purchasing ordinance adopted by the City of Cleveland. Many FPCs boasted accomplishments in supporting farm to school programs. According to the Farm to School website, the programs “enrich the connection communities have with fresh, healthy food and local food producers by changing food purchasing and education practices at schools�

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(Main, n.d.). The program has gone from grassroots to mainstream with the Farm to School Act of 2015 through which Congress allocated $10 million annually to a Farm to School grant program (Main, n.d.). The USDA estimates that farm to school programs nationwide spent $789 million on local food in the 2013-2014 school year alone (USDA, 2017).

FPC procurement policy work and food hubs are not distinct or isolated. As Lakind, Skipper, and Morales (2016, p. 62) argue through their research of Farm to School programs, “conventional supply chains in the United States pose a serious threat to the values of the movement as they are designed to prioritize profit and efficiency over regional economy and transparency”. For local procurement policies to work, infrastructure needs to be put in place to meet procurement demands. Food hubs offer an alternative to the “conventional supply chains” that favor the large commercialized farms that have come to dominate the US and Canadian food systems.

This overlap is between two organizations supporting the local food economy from two opposite sides. A healthy local food economy requires healthy demand and healthy supply. FPCs garner demand for local food through institutions and schools, while food hubs provide the infrastructure needed to make sure small local farmers can meet the demand. A real life example of this is in the case of Vermont Farm to School program. Vermont FPCs like the Vermont Food to Plate Network, partnered with four food hubs to increase local food purchasing 58% in just one year of collaboration (Vermont Agency of Agriculture, 2014). In this partnership, food hubs worked between schools and producers. The participating food hubs were able to step outside of their simple role as the distribution infrastructure and became facilitators and educators, working with stakeholders to strengthen the connection between food producers and schools. In the report about this project, it was noted that food hubs “offer a valuable network within their community”

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(Vermont Agency of Agriculture, 2014). In addition to their generally extensive network of producers and buyers, food hubs hold knowledge of local food that can be valuable to FPCs as they move forward in their goals to support local food systems.

Conclusion The weakness of my content analysis lies in the fact that it is surface level. A keyword search into self-reported priorities and achievements of FPCs summed up by prevalence statistics can only take us so far into understanding how food hubs and FPCs fit into each other. Food hubs are not simply hubs for food, but for people. They are run by people with a wealth of knowledge about the local food system in which they operate and generally have an extensive web of producers and clients who know about local food. In this way they are similar to FPCs, which are also composed of people who work in food. The results may not represent the full extent of the current relationship between food hubs and FPCs because I didn’t have data about the personal overlap between organizations. While there is no formal network between the organizations, one could imagine that food hub operators and FPC council members may interact at a personal and professional level. Personal overlap could facilitate successful future collaboration in a way distinct from ideological overlap. Future research could investigate the extent to which food hub operators overlap FPC Council members.

The content analysis did reveal a snapshot of FPCs and, although it includes FPCs across North America, it is only a snapshot of one point in time. Further research should continue to examine the changing nature of both food hubs and FPCs as the demand for local food in many North American communities increases. To make up for the superficiality of the content analysis, I have tried to back up the statistics with detailed accounts of past and current

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relationships between FPCs and food hubs. This is in hopes of informing future relationships between the two organizations. There is ideological overlap between FPCs and food hubs and there is, though relatively small and rare, a precedent of FPC and food hub collaboration.

Future relationships can come in many forms. It seems that with the relatively varied and volatile nature of FPC interests, FPCs standing as long-term managers of food hubs doesn’t seem sustainable. However, it’s clear FPCs have much to offer in the way of helping developing food hubs navigate local policy obstacles as well as financial obstacles. I do not wish to present food hubs, at least as they exist now, as a one size fits all solution to scaling up local food systems.

While it is easy to focus on the environmental and economical impacts of scaling up local food systems, it’s important to remember the “intangible goods” that come from the reconnection of consumers and producers in local food systems. As food systems are scaled up risk succumbing losing the intangible goods like consumer food autonomy. Mount (2012, p. 117) points out “the collaborative nature of [food hubs] shows the potential for open, responsive governance while delivering the efficiencies of scale and direct relationships”, however, they “deserve intense scrutiny” to maintain this potential. FPCs have the resources, knowledge of local policy landscape, and influence to enforce this scrutiny. They can help food hubs make land use policy and food handling and producing regulations work for them.

As stated previously, most Food Policy Councils are in their first years. In these formative years, it will be important to make organizational decisions informed by research paired with local knowledge. Research can help continue to smooth out some of the “lumps” of the food movement and help find connections between seemingly incompatible sectors. A sustainable North American food system is going to require integration, collaboration, and systems thinking.

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