Moving Healthy, Local Food into Local Institutions
Sue Noble, Vernon Economic Development Association, Wisconsin
Cross posted from the White House Rural Champions of Change website:
Sue is the Executive Director at the Vernon Economic Development Association in southwest Wisconsin. She’s spearheading a remarkably comprehensive effort at economic development around local and regional food systems that has included both USDA and EDA support.
In the past year she’s established a cooperative consisting of both producers, distributors, and buyers that are moving more healthy, local food into local institutions (UW-La Crosse, a local hospital) and is also in the beginning stages of refurbishing an abandoned industrial park into a food hub, providing a foundation for entrepreneurialism and innovation, and enterprise development. To find out more, go to the Vernon Economic Development Association website.
It’s great to see someone fighting for the local food. With so much food imported, it’s so tough for the small local farmers to compete. Local food is so much fresher and buying local produced food supports your local community. We have a small local farmers market every weekend outside of our city hall and it’s fantastic to see all the fresh produce. Although it may cost more, you know exactly where it came from and was likely just picked a day or two ago.
Jeff