This article has been reviewed according to Science X's editorial process and policies. Editors have highlighted the following attributes while ensuring the content's credibility: To get locally grown food onto a schoolchild's lunch tray, communities need supply chains that sort, process and package local farm products. Becca Jablonski, visiting associate professor at the Charles H.
Dyson School of Applied Economics and Management, part of the Cornell SC Johnson College of Business, contributed to a new report from the U.S. Department of Agriculture's Economic Research Service (USDA ERS) that analyzed farm-to-school food procurement pathways. As part of Climate Week NYC, Jablonski will also present an interactive dashboard illustrating food procurement trade-offs to administrators, researchers and policymakers from 2:35–3:35 p.m.
Schools participating in the USDA ERS report spent an estimated $1.8 billion on local food in 2022 and 2023. More than half of U.S. schools participate in farm-to-school activities, making the practice the most frequently enacted regional food policy. This practice has shown economic benefits to farmers, schools and the communities surrounding them, but research is still limited.
"We do have evidence that locally owned businesses tend to reinvest more heavily in their regional economies," Jablonski said. "So, when schools spend a larger portion of their inputs in the local economy by purchasing from those local farmers, those local farmers tend to spend money in the local economy. For example, they may hire local labor or purchase inputs locally.
All of those things collectively have important spillover effects." But even if local farmers and schools both want to enter a food procurement deal, many factors can keep schools from committing. Schools are highly regulated and have limited food budgets. They often don't have the labor capacity or necessary infrastructure in school kitchens to take fresh, whole produce and turn it into school lunches.
Canned, frozen and premade products offer better convenience and storage options, making products more accessible to school food administrators. But if there are no midscale supply chains that offer those differentiated products and identify their local sources, administrators have no way to meet their needs with local options. "Many times, we think about the importance of supporting farmers, so we focus on policies that directly support farmers in some way," Jablonski said.
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