Driftless Region Food & Farm Project

Charlene Elderkind at the Viroqua Food Co-op tells the story of her community’s efforts in “The Good Food Revolution” .  Charlene has participated in both Driftless conferences to date.

We suggest a full perusal of the co-op’s website which features a blog that gives some insight into the development of co-op and other Driftless-related posts.

The USDA Economic Research Service just launched a site where one can easily access data that describes a county’s food environment.   There are some bugs in the system but this looks like a valuable tool: http://ers.usda.gov/foodatlas/

The link below will take you to a table of data for the Driftless Region counties that I created.  ( Ignore that the map link is broken – I can’t seem to fix it.  Scroll down and you can see how the counties in the Driftless stack up on any number of food-related indices.

ERS food environment data

Hopleaf Bar featured 7 Driftless farms at it’s first ever Locavore Dinner this week. Check out the menu and farm descriptions! (click on link below)

Menu for Locavore Dinner at Hopleaf – 17May2010

I’m not sure how I missed this in my post from last week, but a few people associated with Driftless Food and Farm were quoted in an AP article last week on the economic benefits the Midwest could realize if more of the region’s produce was grown here.  UW-Madison CIAS’s Michelle Miller, and the Leopold Center’s Rich Pirog were both interviewed for the article,  which you can find here.

For more information on the report, including a link to download it in its entirety, visit the Leopold Center’s website.

The recent issue of Choices, the online magazine of the Agricultural and Applied Economics Association, features an impressive selection of articles on local food worthy of your attention.  In particular, the final article on regional food systems by Kate Clancy and Kathryn Ruhf is particularly relevant to our efforts.  In it, they  explore the differences between ‘local’ from ‘regional’ as it pertains to food systems. They also examine how a regional viewpoint is often preferable when attempting to address environmental and economic sustainability.

The challenges of scaling up local food systems were in the national news in the past few weeks.  NPR broadcast a segment on the challenges connecting small- and mid-sized growers with the institutions who want to buy their products.   Featured were Wisconsin’s own Sauk Prairie Memorial Hospital and their recent partnership with Local Dirt.  The two organizations were brought together by Dane County’s Institutional Food Market Coalition.

Speaking of the IFMC, the organization is hosting its annual meeting on May 19 at the Alliance Center in Madison.  The theme is “Local Food Delivers: Which Distributor is Right for You?”.  Here’s the agenda.

Although there’s no Driftless point of view represented, the New York Times recently hosted an online commentary on “Making It Easier to Eat Local Food.” It’s nice to know that what we’re engaged in is attracting national attention.

On a housekeeping note, we hope to start adding more partner organizations and events to the calendar in the days ahead.  If you are hosting an event that might be of value to folks throughout the region, please email us and let us know.  We’d be happy to share your work.