Mapping North Carolina's Local Food Infrastructure

NC Local Food Infrastructure Inventory <p>Strengthening local food economies can be viewed as an important part of a holistic approach to community development. Local food can be a positive contributor to social capital, public health, environmental preservation, and overall quality of life. It also can be an important component of local economic development. In thinking about the development of robust local food economies, a lot of attention is given to the poles of local food supply chains: namely, local farmers and farms on one end, and outlets for distribution on the other, such as farmer’s markets, co-ops, and CSA operations. But for many local farmers, too little attention is given to the intermediary steps in the supply-chain. The intermediary steps together constitute a critical infrastructure for local farmers that can make a huge difference in making a local food operation viable or not.</p> <p></p> <p>In 2013, the North Carolina Growing Together project, working with the North Carolina Cooperative Extension Service’s Local Foods Flagship Program, created a mapped inventory of businesses that contribute to these intermediary steps in the local food supply chain. The product is called the North Carolina Local Food Infrastructure Inventory. This is a great resource for anyone interested in local food in North Carolina, especially local food producers and those organizations (e.g. local governments, CDCs, economic development agencies) that seek to support them.</p> <p>The inventory is set up as a customizable map (you can zoom in and out and filter for categories such as “meat processing” or “cold storage”). The data is also downloadable. And while the data [...]</p>