Increasing farm income and local food access: A case study of a collaborative aggregation, marketing, and distribution strategy that links farmers to markets
Open accessAbstract
As consumer interest in locally grown food increases, farmers and organizations are working on inventive ways to supply fresh and affordable local food to residents. The Intervale Center, a nonprofit in Burlington, Vermont, partnered with small and midscale farmers to create the Intervale Food Hub, a collaborative of staff and farmers that aggregates, markets, and distributes local products through both a multifarm community supported agriculture (CSA) program and wholesale. Informed by surveys conducted to assess supply and demand in the region, the Food Hub provides businesses, restaurants, retailers, institutions, and individuals with year-round access to a diverse mix of fresh and value-added local food. The Intervale Center serves as a local distributor, purchasing products from up to 30 farmers and coordinating packaging, marketing, distribution, and business operations. Year-round, shared space is available to conduct business operations, including packaging and short-term storage. After three years of operation, the Food Hub has begun exploring ownership structures and geographic expansion. Using a participatory action research approach, this case study reviews the enterprise's development and outcomes. We provide a qualitative assessment of farmer and staff perceptions of successful practices and limitations, and conclude with recommendations for future research.
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SB farmers lack the necessary resources and expertise to go alone in mounting a real challenge to the conventional food system.
“similar to previous studies [28,31,33,65], SB farmers lack the necessary resources and expertise to go alone in mounting a real challenge to the conventional food system.”
From Agroecological Transition: A Territorial Examination of the Simultaneity of Limited Farmer Livelihoods and Food Insecurity (2022) · cites this paper as [31]
The “Collaborative Marketing and Distribution Strategies” section says small-scale farmers can share resources and expertise and reach larger markets that they cannot supply alone. The discussion of farmer barriers also identifies limits in labor, storage, and management and marketing capacity. The paper supports the need for collaboration to access markets, but does not establish that SB farmers generally cannot mount a challenge to the conventional food system. (LLM, conf=0.83)
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- Authors
- Schmidt, M., Kolodinsky, J., DeSisto, T., & Conte, F.
- Affiliations
- University of Vermont (US)
- Venue
- Journal of Agriculture Food Systems and Community Development
- Published
- 2011-08-25
- Pages
- 157-175
- ISSN
- 2152-0798 (ISSN-L)
- 2152-0801
- OpenAlex
- W2318808921
- Cited by
- 44
- References
- 30
- Citations by year
- 2026: 3 · 2025: 3 · 2024: 1 · 2023: 3 · 2022: 2 · 2021: 1 · 2020: 5 · 2019: 4 · 2018: 2 · 2017: 3 · 2016: 5 · 2015: 6 · 2014: 4 · 2013: 1 · 2012: 1
- FWCI
- 2.31
- Type
- journal article
- Language
- en
- Open access
- gold
- doi.org
- Licence
- cc-by
- Locations
- Journal of Agriculture Food Systems and Community Development (publishedVersion, cc-by)
- AgEcon Search (University of Minnesota, USA) (submittedVersion)
- DOAJ (DOAJ: Directory of Open Access Journals) (submittedVersion)
- Funders
- U.S. Department of Agriculture
- University of Vermont
- Topics
- Life Sciences › Agricultural and Biological Sciences › Plant Science › Organic Food and Agriculture
- Life Sciences › Agricultural and Biological Sciences › Plant Science › Urban Agriculture and Sustainability
- Physical Sciences › Environmental Science › Management, Monitoring, Policy and Law › Rural Development and Agriculture
- Keywords
- food hubs, local food access, farm income, community-supported agriculture, food distribution, food marketing, nonprofit partnerships, farmer perceptions, ownership structure, geographic expansion, Burlington, Vermont
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