Vermont Farm to Early Childhood Local Purchasing Guide

Vermont Farm to Early Childhood Local Purchasing Guide Created by Vermont FEED, a parternship project of NOFA-VT and Shelburne Farms, and the Vermont Farm to School & Early Childhood Network.

Getting Started with this Guide What is Farm to Early Childhood?

Farm to early childhood (FTEC) programs seek to connect the "Three C’s": the classroom, the cafeteria (or kitchen), and the community. In the classroom setting, connection may mean conducting hands-on, food-related learning activities such as gardening or cooking. In your cafeteria or kitchen setting, it might look like serving more local or regionally produced foods, or highlighting those you’re already serving. And you can build FTEC connections within the community by visiting a nearby farm, farmers’ market, or farm stand, creating rich opportunities for place-based learning.

Research shows that children who experience healthy, local food at daily meals, through cooking activities in the classroom, and/or through hands-on learning in a garden, may not only develop healthier bodies, but may also increase social emotional and self-regulation skills—and so much more.

Implementing FTEC supports high-quality child care and can assist programs in meeting licensing regulations and even moving up in STARS.

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In addition, farm to early childhood promotes equity by: • increasing the quality of early childhood education (ECE) settings and access to nutritious food, thus helping to address health and educational inequities in communities of color and other historically marginalized or underserved communities; • embedding racial equity training in FTEC professional development initiatives; • leveraging FTEC local food purchasing to support producers of color; • increasing availability of FTEC training, tools, and curriculum resources that are trauma-informed, healingcentered, culturally responsive, and relevant.

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Local Food Purchasing While local food purchasing is an important component of a robust farm to early childhood program, there is no one-sizefits-all way to do it. This guide will help you: • define what local means to you • find local food throughout • assess your starting point Vermont (and the year!)

• identify your program’s food • consider the various logistics related values related to purchasing and • embrace seasonality of incorporating local foods available produce into your program This guide also aims to challenge the misconception that local food always costs more. We include strategies to help you conserve costs, such as embracing seasonality and enrolling in a community supported agriculture (CSA) share.

Every early childhood nutrition, snack, and education program has a unique set of values, priorities, and challenges. These determine what food will be purchased (and how much), where it will come from, and how it will be used. Incorporating local foods into your programs may at first seem daunting, but the benefits should far outweigh any challenges you might experience. When your students eat fresh, skillfully prepared foods from local producers, your program may see improved student nutrition, increased engagement in educational activities, and stronger connections to the community.

We also know that local food purchasing generates additional economic activity within communities. Research conducted by The UVM Center for Rural Studies shows that for every dollar spent on food for child nutrition programs, an additional 60¢ circulates within the local economy. Now that’s what we call a win-win-win!

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Defining "Local" Before going any further, let’s talk about how to define local.

As with local purchasing itself, there is no one-size-fits-all definition. Notably, for those of you who operate the Child and Adult Care Food Program (CACFP) or any other federal child nutrition program, there is no federal definition of local.

The United States Department of Agriculture (USDA) allows programs to define local for themselves! If your program does not operate CACFP, you may create your own definition of local, too. A few popular examples of how programs define local include: • within a certain mile radius of your program • within your county • within your state • within your multi-state region (e.g., New England or the Northeast) Programs may choose to define local differently for different types of products, or even at different times of year. For example, your program might decide that, because there are so many fruit and vegetable producers within your county, local fruits and vegetables must come from within county lines.

However, if your county does not have a dairy producer or processor to meet specific product needs (such as pasteurized skim and 1% milk served in 8 oz. cartons) then local milk, cheese, and yogurt might come from somewhere else in the state or region.

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So You Know...

While the State of Vermont has a legal definition of what’s considered local to Vermont, early childhood programs are not required to adopt it. Still, you may want to take a peek at the summary and include some (or all) of the language in your program’s definition. That way, you will be more prepared if the state were to offer a financial incentive to early childhood nutrition programs for local purchasing in the future, as it does now for K-12 schools! More information is available from the Vermont Agency of Agriculture.

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Assessing Your Starting Point It may be overwhelming at first to think about shifting your food purchasing routines to incorporate local foods.

Fortunately, there are resources to help you! Here are two of our favorites: • GO NAP SACC TOOLS (Nutrition and Physical Activity Self-Assessment for Child Care) help you determine where you are with creating a nutritionally purposeful environment and what role local food might play within it.

• FARM TO EARLY CARE AND EDUCATION LOCAL PURCHASING GUIDE DECISION TREE, developed by North Carolina State University Extension, helps you determine your starting point and best next steps toward more local food purchasing.

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Defining Your Program’s Food Values We all decide what food to purchase using conscious or unconscious values. Some common examples include: • Cost • Convenience • Quality (freshness, ripeness, shelf life) • Family engagement, equity, family inclusion

• Source of origin (where it comes from) • Production practices (organic, no till, rotational grazing) • Labor and safety standards for farmers and farmworkers

Taking the time to develop and communicate the values that motivate your program’s food purchasing decisions will: • create a shared vision and facilitate communication among child nutrition staff, directors, boards, teachers, parents, and children • simplify daily decisions • guide decision makers sifting through multiple purchasing options • frame your food program decisions for the broader community to understand

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ACTIVITY: Creating a Local & Values-Based Purchasing Action Plan This worksheet will help you develop a Local and Values-Based Purchasing Action Plan. The plan is designed to help you to articulate your food values, identify program considerations and logistics that might impact purchasing, and understand how these factors determine goals related to local and valuesbased purchasing.

The first step in creating a successful plan is to articulate the values of your program. We recommend convening diverse groups of stakeholders (e.g., your staff, families, and children) to help fill out the worksheet because their input is important.

The different groups may have shared, similar, different, or even conflicting values – there are no wrong answers! Look at where each stakeholder group’s values intersect or align as well as where they diverge. Then, craft a statement that encompasses your shared values. Don’t get too caught up in wordsmithing­­—bullet points are fine.

Complete the activity by following the worksheet prompts.

You’ll consider program logistics next, then move on to identify your local purchasing goals. Once you’ve completed this worksheet, you will be able to make informed and supported food purchasing decisions and better communicate the good work your child care program is doing to purchase local and values-based products. Voilà!

We're here to help! If you'd like assistance with this activity, please contact info@vtfeed.org. We’ll put you in touch with our local procurement specialists.

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Embracing Seasonality Vermonters are quite familiar with seasons. Sometimes, it seems like we go through three or four in a single day! And while we all enjoy the bounty of fresh produce available throughout the summer and early fall, many believe that local food is only available during those times of the year. In fact, Vermonters enjoy an abundance of local food throughout the year, including eggs, dairy, meat, maple syrup, honey, grains, and baked goods. You can also find frozen, canned, and pickled produce year-round, as well as other value-added or locally processed products such as tomato sauce or salsa.

The seasons primarily influence the availability of fresh produce.

When in season, fruits and vegetables are at their peak of flavor and nutritional value, so try to feature and enjoy them as much as you can then. The difference between a Vermont-grown, vine-ripened tomato in August and a store-bought tomato from who-knows-where in February is night and day! Added bonus: foods purchased during their peak season often cost less than at other times of the year because they are abundant and don’t have to be transported or stored.

But you can still enjoy a lot of produce out of season, so don’t despair! Many fresh fruits and vegetables can be safely stored to extend their shelf life through proper refrigeration, freezing, or even dry storage in cool, dark settings.

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Pro Tip! Freezing blueberries is a quick and easy way to start storing your own peak-season local produce. Simply harvest them when they are in season (generally late July and August), wash them in cool water to remove any debris, and freeze them in a single layer on a sheet pan. Once they’re fully frozen, transfer the berries into a plastic freezer storage bag. Make sure to label the bag with the farm of origin and harvest date!

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Seasonality Resources THE VERMONT HARVEST CALENDAR presents the diverse array of farm products available throughout the seasons at local farmers markets, farm stands, and retail stores. Find out when your favorite fruits and vegetables are freshest and which products are in season now.

VERMONT HARVEST OF THE MONTH provides ready-to-go materials for the classroom, cafeteria, and community to promote the use of local, seasonal Vermont foods. The resources include recipes, lesson plans, posters, shelf tags, and more.

THE NEW HAMPSHIRE INDIGENOUS HARVEST CALENDAR was developed by New Hampshire Farm to School in collaboration with the New Hampshire Indigenous Collaborative Collective and the Cowasuck Band of the Pennacook-Abenaki People. The resources celebrate traditional indigenous foods, including many familiar products like maple syrup, blueberries, and wild Atlantic salmon, as well as less common foods, such as fiddlehead ferns, milkweed, grouse, and acorns, which have been cultivated, foraged, hunted, or caught in the region since time immemorial.

THE FRUIT & VEGETABLE STORAGE GUIDE is a colorful guide developed by the City of Seattle that includes some great tips on proper fruit and vegetable storage techniques to ensure your food lasts longer and does not go to waste.

CELEBRATING SEASONALITY was developed by our colleagues in Wisconsin (a state that has a similar climate and growing season to Vermont’s). This collection of twelve fun, childfriendly breakfast, lunch, and snack recipes features seasonal fruits and vegetables appropriate for all ECE settings. Recipes are scaled for 8 and 25 servings and include serving sizes for different age groups and CACFP crediting information.

Celebrating Seasonality also includes information to help find more local foods, a seasonality chart of Wisconsin crops, interviews with Wisconsin farmers, and stories from Wisconsin ECE sites serving local foods. Available in both English and Spanish.

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Where & How to Find Local Food in Vermont If Possible, Buy Direct!

Since many early childhood nutrition programs in Vermont operate on a smaller scale than K-12 schools or other institutions, it’s often easier for them to buy directly from small, local producers. This has many benefits. First, by cutting out intermediaries, the producer (a.k.a. your hardworking neighbor!) gets the full value of each product you buy.

On your end, you and your students can potentially develop a personal relationship with the producer. The producer may even be willing to drop by for classroom visits, host field trips at the farm, or send a video greeting!

If a larger program plans to buy directly from a local producer on a regular basis, it may want to set up a contract in advance of the growing season. This is known as forward contracting.

This helps the farms because the farmer knows they have a secured market for their products, which, in turn, helps them plan how much food they will need to grow or raise. It helps your program by setting agreed-upon prices and ensuring the farm you contract with will have what you need when you need it (barring any production shortfalls, of course).

We're here to help! If you'd like to learn more about setting up and managing a forward contract, contact info@vtfeed.org.

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And don’t worry, if forward contracting isn’t right for your program (it’s often not for smaller centers and family child care providers) you may choose to purchase directly from a local producer occasionally, based on what you need that week, what’s available, what’s affordable, or many other factors.

If you decide not to set up a forward contract (remember: that’s totally fine!), here are some ways to purchase directly from local producers in your area: 1. SHOP AT THE LOCAL FARMERS’ MARKET. 2. SWING BY A LOCAL FARM STAND WHEN IT’S CONVENIENT. Some farms even offer “you pick” for some products, like berries and apples, during peak seasons. (Pro tip: fun field trip possibility!)

3. PURCHASE A COMMUNITY SUPPORTED AGRICULTURE (CSA) SHARE. CSA shares are essentially buying a subscription to a farm. Typically, members sign up at the beginning of the growing season and then enjoy a season’s worth of fresh farm products distributed on a regular schedule. CSA members get to share in the season’s bounty and the farm’s success, and they also accept some of the risks of the unpredictable nature of farming. For example, you may enjoy a bumper crop of tomatoes from your CSA one year, but perhaps potato beetles really got to the potato crop, so you’ll have fewer of those in your share in the fall. Generally, CSA memberships are paid in full when signing up in the late winter or early spring, but many farms offer flexible payment plans to make it easier for customers. Many CSA farms now offer a “free choice” model, which allows members to choose some or all items each week, or even a “farm stand” or “spend down account” model, where you pay up front and spend down your credit on whichever products you want throughout the season. And a number of farms now offer several different CSA seasons throughout the year. Check with your local farm to learn about their seasons, enrollment options, payment schedules, and membership seasons.

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Another thing to consider when buying direct from local producers is that some may be able to deliver your products straight to your site on a set schedule. However, others won’t have that capacity, and you’ll need to work out a pick-up schedule. It’s worth a conversation with your farmer to figure out what will work best for both parties.

Resources & Tips for Reaching out to Your Local Farmers For help finding local producers in your area, check out these searchable directories maintained by NOFA-VT:

• FARMERS’ MARKET DIRECTORY • FARM STAND & PICK YOUR OWN DIRECTORY • CSA DIRECTORY Vermont FEED has developed Tips for Buying from Local Farmers & Producers to help child nutrition professionals build relationships with local farmers. Some tips will only apply to programs operating CACFP or other federal child nutrition programs, but many will be relevant to any setting.

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Food Hubs & Producer Co-ops Food hubs and producer co-ops are business entities (non-profit or for-profit) that aggregate, sell, and distribute products from multiple local producers. This allows a customer (you!) to order a wide variety of local products from several different producers within one ordering system and pay just one invoice.

Many food hubs and producer co-ops offer delivery services, and the products they sell are usually source-identified (meaning, you’ll know which products come from which farms).

Keep in mind they often have minimum purchase requirements.

Vermont has a robust network of food hubs and producer coops, though not every community is served by one yet. (They are working on it!)

Retail Stores There are lots of local products on the shelves at your local retailers, whether that’s a country store, co-op, or large supermarket chain. Local products are often labeled with shelf tags for quick identification. Note that each retailer may have a different definition of local. Feel free to ask a manager what local means to their store and consider how that lines up with your definition.

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Get to Know Your Vermont Food Hubs & Producer Co-ops Green Mountain Farm Direct Intervale Food Hub

greenmountainfarmdirect.org

intervalefoodhub.com

Center for an Agricultural Economy ACORN

hardwickagriculture.org

acornvt.org

The Vermont Farmers Food Center vermontfarmersfoodcenter.org

Food Connects foodconnects.org

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Broadline Distributors Some larger programs may work with broadline distributors like Reinhart/Performance Foods Group (PFG) or SYSCO; these often carry some local and regional products. You may indicate a preference for local products when first establishing a contract or with your sales representative later on. This approach is an easy way to bring local products into larger programs without creating separate distribution channels, though the local product offerings may be more limited.

The Vermont Foodservice Directors Association (FDA) conducts a competitive bidding process among qualified broadline distributors to establish a group contract (and group pricing!) for its member K-12 schools. CACFP operators are also eligible to join the Vermont FDA to take advantage of potential cost savings. To enroll, contact Vermont FDA Co-Director Doug Davis at ddavis@bsdvt.org.

Onsite Gardens Depending on how green your thumb is, you may feel that we’ve saved the best (or worst) for last! If you have a garden on site, you may be able to grow enough food to meet some of your nutrition program’s food needs. The USDA both allows and encourages the use of produce grown in onsite gardens in your meal program. And, while we already know that gardens produce fresh, healthy food, they also offer endless opportunities for hands-on learning. Now, before you go adding gardening and food production to your long list of responsibilities (along with everything else you already heroically do), just remember this is simply an option. You may decide that it’s best for your program to keep any garden produce for occasional hands-on activities or snacks, rather than rely on it for your meal program.

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Fun Fact for CACFP Operators: You can use CACFP funds to purchase items for gardens such as seeds, fertilizer, watering cans, rakes, etc., and to pay for other costs of running the garden (plot rental, etc.), if the garden produce will be used as part of the reimbursable meal and for nutrition education activities. Programs using garden produce in their CACFP reimbursable meals should document the weight and/or volume of the produce they are using. For questions or more information, contact Agency of Education Child Nutrition Division: 802-828-1626.

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Tips & Logistical Considersations for Successful Local Purchasing As you begin to integrate more local food purchasing into your program, keep in mind the following tips and logistical considerations: START SMALL AND SLOWLY. Identify a few products you use most often and know your program can afford. Carrots are a great example of a commonly used, widely available, affordable product that also stores well, reducing the risk of waste. Other such products in Vermont are apples, potatoes, and winter squash.

INTRODUCE NEW MENU ITEMS SLOWLY AND, WHEN POSSIBLE, CONNECT THEM TO EDUCATIONAL ACTIVITIES. Studies (and real life!) have shown that children (and adults!) need multiple exposures to new foods to accept those foods into their regular diets. If you take the time to highlight the new food or menu item by talking about it during the meal or offering a related educational activity, the new item will be more readily accepted.

PLAN AHEAD. If you operate a large early childhood program and plan to make large or frequent purchases from local farms throughout the year, it’s best to reach out to the producer in advance to discuss whether they will have the quantity of products you seek, and if so, when, and for how long they will be available.

Produce farmers do most of their planning and seed buying in the winter, so that's a good time of year to reach out. If 20

you are considering purchasing a CSA share, remember that most farms open their enrollment for the spring and summer seasons in what feels like the dead of winter here in Vermont (sometimes as early as late February or early March). Each farm will have a different enrollment schedule, and many offer several different enrollment periods throughout the year (yes, there are even winter and year-round CSAs!). Check out the website of any farms you may be considering. You can also give them a call, or even drop by to meet the farmers and inquire about their enrollment schedules.

THINK ABOUT THE LAST MILE. How will the local products get from the farm to you? Some farms deliver to regular customers, but many do not. If you or a food program employee/volunteer regularly shops for your food program, could you add an additional stop at a farm stand or local grocery store that carries more local products? Build adequate time into your regular schedule to do so. We don’t want you to burn out by schlepping food around.

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WHERE WILL IT GO? Make sure you have adequate and proper storage available for your local products. Consider the amount of fridge, freezer, and dry storage space that is available to you for storing local products until you prepare and serve them.

HOW (AND WHEN) WILL YOU PAY? For small, one-time, or infrequent purchases, it’s best to simply pay in full at the time of sale. However, if you plan to make regular purchases or enroll in a CSA program, ask the farmer if they allow alternative payment schedules. Many small farms have self-service farm stands where you simply write down which items you took and place your payment in a box or deposit slot, but this makes it difficult to get receipts to document your purchases. Some farms allow customers to set up spend-down accounts. For example, you might pay the farmer $100 up front, they provide you with a receipt, and then you document how much you spend at each visit until you spend down all the credit. Every farm business operates differently and has different abilities to accommodate these kinds of requests. Your best bet is to reach out to them and ask.

It’s highly likely you’ll be able to arrive at a system that works for both you and your local farmer!

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USDA Procurement Rules

(for Operators of CACFP or Other Federal Child Nutrition Programs) If you’re operating the Child and Adult Care Food Program (CACFP) or any other Federal Child Nutrition Program, you are required to follow proper procurement procedures. The Vermont Agency of Education Child Nutrition Programs team has developed a CACFP Procurement Procedures document that reviews the rules and methods for proper procurement.

The Harvest Because local food purchasing is an important component of a robust farm to early childhood program, we hope the ideas and resources shared in this guide help you in your local food purchasing journey. When children are served fresh, skillfully prepared foods from local producers, the result is often improved child nutrition, increased engagement in educational activities, and increased connection to their community—not to mention the economic benefits to our hard-working local farmers!

Need help? For general procedural and technical questions, please contact Vermont's Child Nutrition Programs team.

For help developing bid solicitations and product specifications to target local products, email Vermont FEED's local procurement specialists at info@vtfeed.org.

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The Vermont Farm to Early Childhood Coalition appreciates funding and support provided by the ASPHN 2020-21 Farm to ECE Implementation Grant, which helped support this Vermont Farm to Early Childhood Local Purchasing Guide.

Published by Vermont FEED, a farm to school partnership project of Shelburne Farms and the Northeast Organic Farming Association of Vermont (NOFA-VT), and the Vermont Farm to School & Early Childhood Network.

vtfeed.org • vermontfarmtoschool.org v1|2022. Faune, Alice Savoie/Cnap. Photography: Vermont FEED, Shelburne Farms, Rutland County Parent-Child Center, Children Nature Network, USDA. Design: Sarah Webb.