Hello EVAT team members,
Its been a long while since I was actively involved in the team meetings.
I wanted to let EVAT members know that with the South Corvallis Food Hub Grant funds being awarded that much of the grant is going to help with Economic Development. My farm, Flicker & fir, is honored to be one of the awardees!
A couple projects that Flicker & Fir will be developing this year include:
1) An online ordering program for produce and value-added food items. This will alone individuals to order online from multiple farms at a time with a pick-up in South Corvallis (our farm to start). It will start with vendors from the Tuesday Farmstand and Market and some from the Corvallis Wednesday Market and expand to others to create diversity in the offerings. Delivery will be available to some areas as well.
There are currently 3 goals of this project: 1) To help food producers (farmers or value added businesses) who want to grow more to sell more food and make viable businesses. 2) Have more food grown in our area with less food waste. Pre-orders and memberships help businesses know what to make. 3) Help time-strapped shoppers shop locally with ease.
NOTE: Ten Rivers Food Web (TRFW) also was awarded monies from that Food Hub Grant and is doing a wholesale Aggregate version of it so restaurants and larger facilities can buy from multiple farms at a time. Our South Corvallis Food Hub will likely also be buying wholesale from TRFW to create weekly farm share boxes.
2) Later this month, we are partnering with the Foundry to host a Food Systems Interest meeting as a way to connect various people in the food world to improve food businesses and support for their economic viability in our area. This includes business start-up knowledge and also addressing the certified kitchen question and needs, and more. This is to help our Tuesday Market Food Vendors meet the food safety rules while scaling their food business.
What I'd like to know from EVAT is whether any of these initiatives fit into any programs EVAT is currently doing so we can synergize the efforts in our community.
Also, please let me know if you have interest in learning more or contributing to these projects.
In Cooperation,
~~Cheryl