We are in the NE as well, and struggle with the same issues with fruits and veggies not being in season during the school semesters.  What we do is focus as much as we can on what we can get when we can get it.  We do not deal with the individual farmers directly--we use a produce broker who deals with the farmers.  We lean 0n them to purchase as much as they can from NY state, and we are able to see what is from NY state when we place our weekly order.  While it is difficult to change our menus to incorporate local produce with so little notice, we can predict what will be in season in our area when and create menus with that info so that we can take advantage of local produce.  

We also focus on more that fruits and vegetables when we talk about eating local--many people stop there and do not consider their dairy, meat and other food items.  We purchase all of our milk and most of our dairy product from Upstate Farms, a local dairy coop and have several bread, ice cream and other food vendors that are local.  

Good luck in your search for local foods!

Several years ago, I went to the Farm to Schools/Colleges conference at Kenyon College that was put on by the  Community Food Security Coalition.  It was phenomenal in large part because of the participation of a sizeable number of managers and staff from institutional cafeterias and eateries.  In particular, I was pleased to have the opportunity to speak with passionate staff from many of the major food service vendors about ways they had found to work around the very issues you are running into.  I must say it was too many years ago for me to remember any specific solutions, but I would highly recommend checking out the next Farm to Schools conference or gathering in your area because you will find many of the same food service organizations involved in those programs.  (I could be wrong, but it appears that the Farm to College component of the Community Food Security Coalition's work has been eclipsed by the incredibly fast pace with which the Farm to Schools movement has taken off.  I think it has something to do with PTA parents being a little more agitated about the nutritional value of their childrens' diets than college students tend to be about their own diets.  Pizza, beer, carrots, anyone? ;)

I will say that a major part of our success in local-sourcing at Duke when I was there (I can't speak to their keys to success today) was the recent formation of a product distribution coop that was formed by local organic farmers right around the same time we were launching our green dining program.  Eastern Carolina Organics provided our institutional eateries to purchase in quantity on in a format fairly similar to what they were used to.   I'm not sure  exactly how, but I believe that ECO also helped distribute the costs of liability insurance and safety regulation compliance.  ECO was started with the help of a relatively small grant, became self-sustaining very quickly and has been growing ever since.  Higher education actors can probably play a role in helping duplicate that model around the country.

Related Links:
Farm To College Program
Farm To School Program
Community Food Security Coalition
 

The Community Food Security Coalition's National Farm to College program is alive and well! In fact we just revised our website (www.farmtocollege.org) to make it easier to navigate through the plethora of resources now available on these issues. I would encourage you to peruse through all of the pages of this site.

I oversee the farm to college program but also work closely with the farm to school program. There is defintely more attention and support on farm to school, but the farm to college movement is also growing exponentially. It is a challenge to keep up with everything that is going on!

Our next National Farm to Cafeteria conference is scheduled for May 2010 in Detroit. Stay tuned to www.farmtocollege.org for details. I would strongly encourage your participation in order to network and exchange ideas with others around the country facing similar struggles.

Also feel free to contact me regarding issues you are struggling with.

-Kristen Markley

National Farm to Institution Program Manager

Community Food Security Coalition

I am happy to see that operators are now beginning to look beyond produce in their  local purchasing.  Here at foodprint, we assist our clients in sourcing both food and non-food items locally and regionally.  Also, we encourage clients to not discount distributors--even the large ones.  Distributors routinely  purchase from small, family owned farms and producers, but until lately, never thought to talk about it in their marketing. We are routinely successful in working within prime vendor relationships to help our clients procure locally produced food (and non-food items), with food safety oversight and third party verifications of "certified" (answering the question: "is that really USDA organic?").

We completely embrace purchasing directly from producers as well, but for the operator that's up againast a short growing season and high production volume,  buying direct makes the goal of 20%-30% local purchases unsustainable for most operations.

Janine Oberstadt

Principal

foodprint

Sustainable Foodservice Solutions

www.foodprint.biz

Marian,

  I work for the Office of Sustainability Initiatives at Emory and we have set a sustainability goal to procure 75% of our food from local and/or regional sources.  We define local as the state of Georgia and regional as an 8-state surrounding region.  We also currently contracted with Sodexho and have had some struggles, but a lot of success in getting their cooperation with our sustainable food initiatives.   I would suggest you contact Julie Shaffer, Emory Dining's Sustainable Food Education Coordinator ( julie.shaffer@emory.edu) to find out more, since I am not directly involved in the Food Initiatives.

Jessica