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Farm to school links Michigan growers with local bulk buyers

By SHELLY STRAUTZ-SPRINGBORN
Michigan Correspondent

GRAND RAPIDS, Mich. — Michigan’s Farm to School program provides institutions a link to local food. During a session at the 2009 Great Lakes Fruit, Vegetable and Farm Market Expo, participants learned about the program from growers, buyers and Michigan State University extension officials who are program leaders.

The goal of Farm to School is to link the state’s agricultural producers with food service directors throughout Michigan who are interested in purchasing local foods to serve at their institutions. The program applies to a variety of initiatives in Michigan, including efforts to offer local foods in school cafeterias, school garden programs, fundraisers that take advantage of local products, farmer visits to school classrooms and cafeterias and field trips to nearby farms.

Michigan Farm to School is coordinated by Colleen Matts, Farm to School Outreach Specialist with the C.S. Mott Group for Sustainable Food Systems at MSU. Matts said there are a number of reasons to purchase and highlight locally-grown foods in school meal programs.

“Farmers can tap new markets and schoolchildren can gain access to fresher foods and increased variety in school meals,” she said. “The program helps schools buy from farmers and helps farmers be ready to sell to schools.”

The program has really taken off in the last year, Matts said. It has about 50 partnerships between schools and growers and continues to expand.

Jim Bardenhagen, a fruit and vegetable grower in the Suttons Bay area near Traverse City in the northern part of Michigan’s Lower Peninsula, has carved out a market for his commodities through partnerships with schools and restaurants in his area. He provides fresh food such as apples, potatoes and grapes to schools in the Benzie area.

“They have a real active cook-from-scratch program. The food service director is excited about using local foods. The kids love the food they are getting and buy more lunches as a result of that,” he said.

Although Bardenhagen said there is much work to be done to build an infrastructure that makes it more economical to deliver small quantities to a variety of locations, he plans to continue working on the program.

“I want this to be a big component of my market mix,” he said. “I’m a big believer in doing things for my community.”

Harry Norconk of Honor opened up a new market for his asparagus through the program. In 2001, he said “the asparagus industry was taking a dive” and he needed to get creative in marketing his crop if he was going to stay in the asparagus business.

So, in 2002 he began direct marketing his product to restaurants in the Traverse City area – a business venture that has grown to include about 50 restaurants. By 2005, he was selling asparagus to Traverse City Public Schools and other area schools. Finally, his farm landed a deal with Munson Hospital.

“We weren’t sure how asparagus and the kids would work together,” Norconk said.

But creative food service directors experimented with blending asparagus into recipes such as pasta salad, sandwich wraps and other dishes. They even let the children vote on their favorite dishes to gain their support before adding the food choices to their school menu.

Another partnership has brought fresh Michigan produce into 13 Michigan Department of Corrections (MDOC) kitchens in nine prisons in the state’s Lower Peninsula. The partnership between Durussel Farms in Manchester, owned by Pat Durussel, and Denise Worden, MDOC food service administrator for Region 3, has grown to include a wide variety of fresh foods.

Worden said incorporating fresh vegetables and fruits into prison menus allows the MDOC to meet various nutritional requirements with more flexibility in menus. “I prefer buying all fresh,” she said.
The partnership started out with potatoes, but has quickly grown to include greens, cabbage, onions, apples, radishes, cucumbers, cilantro, dill and other items. Worden has streamlined ordering by running the same menus in all facilities. She said communicating with the producers is key to a lasting relationship.

For example, the MDOC buys in bulk, so explaining the use of each commodity makes it easier for the grower to package the product and for the MDOC kitchens to use it.

“I really like bulk packaged greens. I don’t need to take off all those strings from smaller bunches. That’s where communication is so important with your growers,” she said.

Durussel said the partnership “has just been a real positive for us. We have a customer that wants our product instead of us begging them to take it.”

Visit www.mifarmtoschool.msu.edu for more information about the Farm to School program.

12/16/2009