New Features at Direct Market Price Reporting System

Posted on May 11, 2012 by Women's Agricultural Network

With farmstands opening and farmers markets starting this month, it’s also time to start reporting your produce prices to UVM Extension’s bi-weekly, direct market farm price report.  The goal of the reporting system is to help direct marketing farmers share information about what they charge at direct markets (farmstands, farmers’ markets, etc) in order to set fair prices that support farm profitability.  

New this year: The price reporting site is mobile compatible! Enter your prices from the farmers market or right at your farmstand.

The first report will be generated and posted to the Farm Pricing Website on May 21. Please submit your first round of produce prices anytime between now and May 19! As we did last year, reports will be downloadable pdfs with the max, min, average and median price for produce sold directly to consumers around the state.

As a farmer reporter, you will also be able to create custom reports over the date range of your choice. If enough farmers participate in the reporting, you will be able to create custom reports by region and type of market.

We’re also offering free training for farm apprentices! We think price reporting would be a great job for a farm apprentice. If you would like your farm apprentice to take on the job of reporting your prices, we’ll take on training them. Just have your apprentice contact Jessie Schmidt, jessica.a.schmidt@uvm.edu or 802-223-2389 x203.

The more farms that report, the more useful it will be for everyone.

If you are already registered you’ll be able to use the pricing information you submitted last year to create your report this year. After logging in, just look to the right for the “Time Saving Tip” that allows you to copy a report from last year and edit it as needed. The data will auto-fill, and you only need to update prices that have changed for 2012 or delete the products you are not selling yet. Has your farming situation changed? You can edit your information after logging in by clicking “Manage Your Account” on the right side menu.

Having other trouble? Don’t hesitate to contact Jessie Schmidt, jessica.a.schmidt@uvm.edu or 802-223-2389 x203, for help logging in or entering your farm prices into the system. Thanks for joining this community effort to create a useful and relevant report for farmers throughout our region!

Posted in Marketing, Resources for Beginning Farmers | Comments Off on New Features at Direct Market Price Reporting System

The Biggest Hurdle to the Local Food Movement…?

Posted on May 4, 2012 by Mary Peabody

Amid all the debate surrounding local foods, consumer health and preserving our regional agriculture the biggest hurdle of all might be the issue that we are not talking about–time! All the locally produced food in the universe will only be valuable if people have the time to buy it, prepare it and eat it.

To turn these apples into muffins, pie, or even applesauce would require more time than we apparently have in an average day.

According to the USDA Economic Research Service’s publication, How Much Time Do Americans Spend on Food?, we spent just 33 minutes/day in food preparation during 2006-2008. Oh, and that includes cleanup! Even more discouraging, apparently almost half of our population is spending no time at all on food preparation.

In contrast, most studies from the mid-twentieth century estimate that Americans (read women) were spending between 2.5 and 3.5 hours/day on food preparation. The additional 2-3 hours would make quite a difference in the average weekly menu. I consider myself a pretty sophisticated cook with above-average kitchen skills and I could certainly pull together one simple meal in 33 minutes  but 3 meals starting from raw, local ingredients in just half an hour would certainly challenge my abilities especially if I tried to maintain it for seven days a week.

To roast a squash requires some knowledge on how to cut and peel a squash…not to mention the tools to do the job and about 10-15 minutes of prep time in addition to the baking time.

In thinking through the demons of our current, much-maligned, food system — prepared foods, fast foods, foods high in fat, sugar and salt–most have come about because of consumer demand. It is easy to fall into the habit of speaking as if manufacturers created these foods and then created the demand when, in fact it was actually consumers demanding foods that were cheap, easy to store and fast to prepare. Of course now we have ramped-up marketing firms that are seeking to continue, and grow, the sales of these foods.  Still, we consumers must be held accountable for the foods that find their way into our shopping baskets and dinner tables.

So while there is enough blame to go around for our country’s poor eating habits the elephant in the kitchen might well be that we are so busy earning a living that we’ve lost touch with what it actually takes to have a life. Consider the following:

The one bit of good news is that older women spend more time cooking because they are working fewer hours outside the home and have more time and disposable income. Since the baby-boomers are just entering the early years of retirement we may see a uptick in the hours spent on food preparation. Unfortunately these same boomers will have smaller families to cook for and there is only a small window of time before their financial security will diminish that disposable income.

So, the question for all of us invested in the local food movement might well be, “Who does have time to cook?”

Posted in Facts & Figures, General info, Quality of life | Tagged , , , | 2 Comments

Food with a Story

Posted on April 25, 2012 by Linda Berlin

I didn’t grow up on a farm, but my mom did, and I spent plenty of time there during my childhood.  It was a Midwestern farm with hogs, cattle, and fields of grain as far as the eye could see.  My uncle, who was the primary farmer during my formative years, was one of my favorite people in the world, so there wasn’t much I would rather do than ride around on the tractor with him, or get lost in the fields of corn. When I went to college and decided to study agriculture, my uncle was delighted.  As for others who saw me as a city kid, there was likely a bit of skepticism about the chance that I would stay engaged in farming into my later years. But here I am, as the Director of the UVM Center for Sustainable Agriculture, recognizing how valuable my early life exposure to farming really was.

Senior Farm Share participants

My own experiences help me to understand the importance of the “know your farmer” strategy that is permeating the current discourse in the local food movement, and is at the heart of one of USDA’s major initiatives.  The belief is that closer connections to farms and farmers can bring deeper meaning to the ways that both children and adults relate to, and choose, the foods we eat.  Anecdotally speaking, this seems to be true. And it also appears to be true when I examine recent program evaluations in which UVM has been engaged.  Following a series of nutrition education classes taught by UVM Extension over the past couple of years, program participants stated that visits to local farms were the highlight of their multi-session experiences.  Similarly, Farm to School evaluations have identified a correlation between school children’s reported consumption of fruits and vegetables and whether they ever visited a farm.  This possible relationship between farm visits and food choices is quite encouraging.

So what exactly does this mean for Vermont farmers?  So many of you are already engaged in your communities in multiple ways, be it through going to the farmers’ market, having school children visit the farm, participating in programs to link underserved neighbors to locally produced foods, or something else of your own creation!  For those of you who are enjoying these activities, the payoff may be worth the time.  But let’s be realistic, such activities can be time consuming!  How can we help you facilitate these important connections in ways that do not unduly burden you?

These days, many people seem to want food that comes with a story.  Providing these stories through websites, packaging or something else that allows you to reach many people in one fell swoop may be a worthwhile expenditure of time.  But it doesn’t need to happen farm by farm. Currently, the Farm to Plate working group that is focused on consumer education and marketing is plotting ways to help farmers tell the Vermont farm and food story, writ large.  We see such stories offering an important way to further strengthen the critical link between producers and consumers.    Stay tuned!

Posted in General info, Marketing | 2 Comments