Although the Northeast leads the nation in farm-direct sales to consumers, direct sales in our region account for only 3.4% of total farm sales.  This means that nearly all our agricultural products go through longer supply chains.  Many N.E. producers are looking for more lucrative markets - beyond direct, and as an alternative to conventional wholesale.  As energy costs and food safety concerns escalate, demand and appreciation for regionally produced food grows.  We have a unique opportunity to develop and support regionally focused, appropriately scaled food supply chains of differentiated products.

N.E. producers cannot scale up from direct marketing or shift from undifferentiated commodity markets without strong buy-in from other players in new supply chains and the larger community.  What will it take?  What's already in place?  What are the unique challenges in developing regional value chains (RVC) for the N.E.?  The Northeast Regional Lead Team (RLT) project will address these questions.

What is the RLT project?

Who's involved?

Parlez-vous regionalism and value chains?

What is the RLT project?

Successful RVCs form the core of our Northeast Regional Lead Team (RLT). They will learn from one another and foster other RVC enterprises.  Drawing from concepts of regionalism, business clusters and "communities of practice", the RLT will oversee research, inventorying, mapping and analysis to examine existing conditions and evaluate the capacity for RVCs in the Northeast.

The RLT will tap into existing expertise, identify infrastructure and other gaps, and build leadership and capacity to advance RVCs.  They will evaluate policies at the state, inter-state, and state-federal levels that hinder or foster the aggregation, processing, distribution and/or purchase of regionally sourced, differentiated food products. They will share findings and successes with the National Good Food Network, the NESAWG community and others.

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Who's involved?

RLT members are:

·        The Center for Agricultural Development & Entrepreneurship (NY) -- Chris Harmon

·        Red Tomato (MA) -- Michael Rozyne

·        Farm Fresh Connection (ME) -- Martha Putnam

·        Chesapeake Fields (MD) -- John Hall

·        Tuscarora Organic Growers (PA) -- David Robb

·        Whole Foods Market's North Atlantic "forager" -- Susan Phinney

·        Northeast Regional Center for Rural Development -- Stephan Goetz

·        Northeast Sustainable Agriculture Working Group -- Kathy Ruhf

Project director is Kathy Ruhf, NESAWG coordinator.  Consultants are Kate Clancy and Annie Cheatham. For further information, please contact Kathy Ruhf, 413-323-9878 or [email protected].

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Parlez-vous regionalism and value chains?

Region: A region may be defined by political or administrative boundaries, watersheds, bioregions or culture. Regions are composed of sub-regions; they overlap; they "nest" in larger regions. All regions can be characterized by physical characteristics, political dynamics, socio-economic factors, and socio-cultural features.  For this project, RVCs operate at various regional scales within the twelve-state Northeast.

Regionalism: A framework for policy analysis and development that: 1) responds to

regional differences and needs; and 2) encourages regional approaches and solutions.

Food supply chain: A network of business enterprises through which food products move from production through consumption. Typical links in the supply chain are:

inputsà producerà processoràdistributoràwholesalerà retailerà consumerà

Value chain:  There are several definitions of value chain.  Most commonly:

"Value-added" value chains feature food products that are converted from raw product through processes that give the resulting product an "incremental value" -- higher price or expanded market -- in the market place.

"Value-added" value chains can also be also used to characterize food products that obtain incremental value in the marketplace by differentiating them based on product attributes such as: geographical source; environmental stewardship (production practices); food safety; or functionality. 

Values-based supply chains: are characterized by business relationships among interacting food business enterprises that are expressly based in an articulated set of values, rather than any conversion or attribute of the product itself. Values-based value chains exhibit attributes of both value chains and values-based supply chains. 

Regional value chain (RVC): For this project, a regional value chain:

Features a significant volume of food product differentiated by conversion from raw product, or by product attribute(s);  Consists of at least three functionally different but linked partners (enterprises) that are regionally located and/or focused, and appropriately scaled; and

Emphasizes or strives for business relationships based on articulated values such as strategic partnerships, equitable distribution of rewards, etc.

Community of practice: A group of people who share a concern, set of problems or passion about a topic and who deepen their knowledge and expertise in the area by interacting on an ongoing basis (Wegner, McDermott and Snyder (2002)).

Business cluster: A geographic concentration of interconnected companies where location is a competitive advantage.  A cluster may consist of "horizontal" (like or competing) companies, firms connected by one or more elements or interests in common, or companies in a supply chain.  

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