Kellogg Foundation Conference on Creating Food Hubs: Day 2

This week, Scott is out in Kentucky for the Kellogg Foundation Conference on Creating Food Hubs. He will be sharing tidbits he learns from each of the 3 days of this conference.

Today was jam-packed with workshops on the logistics of how to start and run a food hub. They got to the nitty-gritty of it. From understanding how much it costs to deliver vegetables PER MILE, to understanding the break-even number for something like Roots CSA to stay alive. In case you are wondering, according to national numbers, 70% is really the max amount of income from CSA veggies that should go back to the producers/farmers. The other 30% needs to go to a LOT of different things, including things such as staff, supplies, and insurance. Liability is a very daunting thing, but as long as CSAs and food hubs are smart and pro-active, you’ll be fine.

In the late afternoon, we had a panel discussing the role of academia in activism. It was a really interesting conversation, because some of those there from academia shared that there is this collective fear of rocking the boat and doing things differently, especially when one is a young, up-and-coming academic. One person shared that things such as community-based participatory research are just too risky to throw out there. The panel brought some good folks working in academia, who really understand what the needs of the community are, and they have been able to utilize their positions to best help fight for racial equity (especially in the food justice space). My takeaway from this panel is that it really is about luck. Not only do you need to put your feelers out there to try and work with academia, sometimes you just have to be lucky enough to connect with the person who is willing to take that next step with you.

It’s getting late. Here are a few pictures from the Muhammed Ali Museum I visited on a break. It is a 5-story building, and I only got to see a fraction of it. Definitely one of the more interactive museums I have ever been to, and I would highly recommend checking it out if you are ever in the area!