HomeMy WebLinkAbout2016 02-07 How popular is ‘local’ food? It now might top organic PIONEER PRESS 2/8/2016 Main
How popular is `local' food? It now might top organic
> Local food
Consumers are willing to pay more for food produced closer to home, growers say
By Bob Shaw
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A local-food revolution is happening on your dinner plate.
"Demand for local food is going off the charts," said Steve Shrump, master grower at J& J Distributing
of St. Paul, a leader in the new local-food movement.
Shrump and an emerging generation of farmers are moving farms into cities, malls and abandoned
buildings. They are boosting yields by making their farms more weatherproof and pioneering ways to
market their food.
This means mushrooms from Minneapolis, mint from Maplewood, rosemary from Roseville, carrots
from Como Avenue and greens from Grant Township.
Grocers say the "local" food label is poised to dethrone even the "organic" label as the ultimate sign of
quality.
The farmers say their food is fresher and more nutritious. And it usually comes with a resume an
account of how it was grown, the environmental impact and the farm's treatment of plants, animals and
workers.
Local food seems to have only one drawback
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Mike Stoick clips tomato plants to trellising strings hanging from the ceiling of a 35,000square-foot
greenhouse at J&J Distributing in St. Paul last month. The company uses computer-monitored systems to
grow organic tomatoes and other produce year-round. PIONEER PRESS: SCOTT TAKUSHI
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the relatively high cost. Cost control and profitability will be the next challenge for local farmers, said
Paul Hugunin, program coordinator of Minnesota Grown, a state agency that promotes local food.
"Sustainability means financial sustainability," said Hugunin.
WHAT IS LOCAL FOOD?
According to Minnesota Grown, there is no standard definition for "local food." Some stores define it as
food produced within 500 miles; others say it must be processed only by a local company.
But Minnesota Grown tracks the number of the state's local growers and local-food outlets. Over the past
10 years, the number of local-food growers has surged 52 percent, to 1,300.
Meanwhile, farmers' markets have nearly tripled to 182. At the same time, there has been a nine-fold
increase in community-supported agriculture groups (CSAs). Today, about 90 of them deliver local food
to subscribers.
"That is one of the areas where you have to go, `Wow!' " Hugunin said.
But why is the local-food movement ripening now?
Demand for all produce is peaking, said J& J's Shrump, amid the continuing drumbeat of doctors'
recommendations to eat more fruits and vegetables.
At the same time, he said, food is becoming a pop-culture phenomenon. "There are probably 20 cooking
shows on TV now," Shrump said.
According to University of Minnesota horticultural science professor John Erwin, local-food sales also
are being boosted by:
• Well-publicized food scares. With every new E. coli outbreak in a fast-food chain comes more demand
for food safety and local food is usually perceived as safer, he said.
• News stories about global warming caused by greenhouse gases. Those gases are emitted from the
fleets of produce trucks traveling thousands of miles. "We are weaning ourselves from California and
Florida," Erwin said.
• Concern about other foodrelated issues mistreatment of immigrants, low salaries for workers, abuse
of farm animals, GMOs, hormones and antibiotics in meat.
The latter is why local farmers say they proudly answer questions about their food.
"Consumers want to know the food's carbon miles, and if it's GMO-free. They want to know where it
comes from," Shrump said.
MOVE OVER, ORGANIC
Anne O'Gara has seen the change in the three stores that Mississippi Market operates in St. Paul.
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As the co-op's development specialist, she surveys members annually. This year, she noticed most
members said they wanted food that was "local." For the first time she could recall, "organic" came in
second.
The "local" label has eclipsed "organic," she said, because organic food is sometimes produced by huge
corporations in distant places.
"With big agriculture, you are not sure of the conditions for the workers and the overall quality," O'Gara
said. "Local food not only allows you to be closer to the source of your food, but it adds value to the
local economy."
Some of the new farmers are raising plants and fish indoors, all year round.
Dave Haider, co-founder of Urban Organics in St. Paul, puts thousands of fish into tanks, then siphons
off the dirty water to feed his potted plants.
Haider can bathe his basil plants with 14 hours of light each day, cutting the growth time in half.
"Demand is high," he said.
Haider plans to boost production tenfold next summer, adding 87,000 square feet in the former Schmidt
Brewery building in St. Paul. That will allow him to harvest spinach, lettuce and kale year-round.
The fish-to-plants facilities minimize the waste of water and fuel, said Dave Roeser, owner of Garden
Fresh Farms, which produces fish and produce in its Maplewood headquarters.
"We now have 80 percent of our lettuce grown in the high desert in California," he said. "Hello? Can we
figure this out? How can anyone do that and think we won't have problems?"
Some of the new farmers have found creative ways to market food.
MARKETING LOCAL
Ron Costa owns the thirdgeneration Costa Farm based in White Bear Lake.
"Everyone wants local, local, local," Costa said. "They want to know where it's coming from. They want
it to be 2,000 miles fresher."
He said his local-food business is exploding because he has found three ways to sell it: At some Cub
Foods stores, his produce is sold next to a photo and a description of the farm.
In summer months, he sells produce at 10 farmers' markets.
His biggest growth area is his CSA program. Last summer, he delivered boxes weekly to 500 customers;
next summer, he plans to deliver 1,000.
Other new farmers have developed entirely new businesses.
Last summer, Jeff Block of Forest Lake sold his grandfather's locally raised meat at farmers' markets.
He was barraged by requests for more.
So he started Meat Healthy a CSA for carnivores. It home-delivers local chicken, beef and pork to
customers, all year long.
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Block delivers 6 pounds monthly for $70. He sells freerange chicken eggs for $5 a dozen.
His accountability, he said, is the reason he can command higher-than-normal prices.
"Consumers see meat in the grocery store, and there is no background information," Block said. "There
is nothing on how the animal was raised, nothing about the chemicals used or what the animal ate."
CLIMATE-CONTROLLED
Other farmers have turned to science.
J& J's Shrump recently walked into a new high-tech greenhouse on Como Avenue in St. Paul and
immediately squinted.
It seemed as bright as the inside of a sun-tanning booth. He greeted a scientist who had just tweaked the
wavelengths of light to fit exactly what the thousands of tomato plants needed.
Workers glided on rail cars down the rows of plants. Computers, Shrump said, monitored the level of
carbon dioxide in the air and automatically adjusted the temperature with self-closing windows and
doors.
This greenhouse, Shrump said, will be the highest-density indoor tomato farm in North America and
make J& J the first company to sell a metro Twin Cities-grown organic tomato year-round.
The new local-food industry is hitting a tipping point, said professor Erwin.
That's because he is seeing restaurants brag about local ingredients. Some national food chains also tout
their use of local ingredients.
And local food is becoming more mainstream because supermarkets are embracing it.
Kowalski's Markets, for example, buys all of its herbs from a farm in Maplewood and also sponsors a
CSA with a farmer in Stillwater.
The new apostles of local food have big dreams.
"I want to be able to buy a tomato," said J& J's Shrump, "and then be able to throw a rock and hit where
it was grown."
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