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Copper Communities Food Hub Project Draws a Crowd

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Superior —

Almost 40 people gathered Thursday, Aug. 31, evening to learn more about an initiative to encourage more production and consumption of locally produced foods in the Copper Corridor.

The crowd meeting at the Superior Chamber of Commerce got an update of information from a series of polls taken the past several months in the communities of Globe-Miami, Kearny-Superior, Mammoth-Oracle and Young. The data indicates that residents of these Copper Corridor communities have a significant and growing interest in expanding access to local food and the local food economy throughout the study region.

The Food Hub project is being coordinated cooperatively by three organizations: the Southern Gila County Economic Development Corporation, Copper Corridor Economic Development Coalition and the Local First Arizona Foundation.

Karalea Cox, director of the Southern Gila County EDC, said the communities in the region would benefit from the development of a production node within each sub-region and development of a hub for the entire region. She explained that a production node is a small cluster of production and light processing that can assist in the development of an interconnected local food economy.

This could consist of such things as a County Health Department-approved commercial kitchen where people could use locally grown goods to prepare jams, jellies or canned food; bake cakes, cookies, pies and other pastries. Or a mobile approved slaughter vehicle for local ranchers to prepare grass-fed beef for local consumption.

At the present time, producers and consumers are able to get together only at Farmers Markets in Globe-Miami, Superior, Payson and Oracle. Back yard gardeners and a few mini-farms are the main producers for these Farmers Markets and have attracted quite a few loyal customers. The Globe-Miami Farmers Market has been going for seven years.

There are several challenges in developing a viable local food economy, said Kate Radosevic, representing the Local First Arizona Foundation. These challenges include geography, climate, regulatory policies, marketing challenges and education. She said recommendations include developing value-added facilities like commercial kitchens and processing facilities, cold storage and transportation infrastructure as well as other distribution related activities that support individual small-scale farms and ranches in selling direct-to-consumer markets and into aggregated opportunities.

Mila Besich, director of  the Copper Corridor Economic Development Coalition, conducted a short interactive program involving some of the audience members in which a number of questions were addressed: How can we get our produce to market? How can I put in a request for something I can’t find in the local supermarket? How do I know this produce really is locally grown?

     Dinner after the program was tacos garnished with locally-grown vine-ripened tomatoes, soft drinks and wine from the Bruzzi Vineyard in Young.