FINDING LOCAL PRODUCE IN SUPERMAKETS

Mike McCagg

ccSCOOP News

06-13-10 - 4:30 p.m. - You can buy local produce at farmers' markets and farm stands, but how about in the venues where most Columbia County residents do their shopping: supermarkets?

For the most part, Columbia County residents looking to buy locally grown corn on the cob or lettuce at a supermarket are out of luck. That’s because, despite there being numerous Price Chopper, Shop Rite and Hannaford stores in the county, only Hannaford’s regularly carries locally grown products.

Perhaps even more frustrating for county residents who divide their time between New York City and Columbia County is the fact that on any given day you may be better able to purchase county produce at a greenmarket in the city—where county farmers and orchard owners routinely market their wares—than in many areas of Columbia County. Adding to the conundrum is that the organization charged with increasing the availability of locally grown produce for the masses has not targeted supermarkets as a way of reaching the county’s population.

“The approach so far has been to work with the chefs, restaurants, caterers, and institutions,” said Todd Erling, a member of the Columbia County Bounty’s executive board. “For Columbia County to maximize efficiency, we had to target these audiences as a priority.” Erling said the organization has not reached out to any of the three major supermarket chains that operate in the county to seek their support for selling county produce. “Have we done enough? No. Is there a market for improvement? Absolutely,” he said.

Erling said that lobbying the supermarket chains to carry county produce “does fit into our long-term approach” but added that there are no plans to do so at the present time. He also said that the job of getting food into the supermarkets falls into the hands of county residents. "People will support local produce if it is there, but they have to get the message across to the retailers that there is a demand,” said Erling. “Columbia County Bounty’s mission is to "promote and support networking connections between local agricultural producers and culinary businesses,' as well as to 'educate our community about the preservation of our local farms through the purchase and use of local and regional sustainable foods from Columbia County and the entire Hudson Valley.'”

While Columbia County Bounty has helped local farmers make inroads into restaurants, institutions, and even institutional suppliers like Ginsberg’s Market, there is still only a limited availability of local produce at the county’s major grocery stores. Erling said local farmers have a difficult time competing with the national suppliers to get their products into the supermarkets because of the cost. “If a grocer can get lettuce from Hunts Point at a price point which is at a global produce level, our farmer is at a major disadvantage,” said  Erling.

Located in the Bronx, Hunts Point is the world’s largest food distribution center and boasts the largest wholesale Produce Market and Meat Market, as well as the largest and most modern Fish Market in the world outside of Japan. The center supplies food to more than thirty million people in and around the New York City area.

Erling said having such a major distribution center so close to the county places the local farmers at a competitive disadvantage.“They often just can’t compete against the prices,” he said. “You have to be able to secure a fair price for the local farmer and given the global competition Hunts Point brings, that is often difficult.”

That is not to say there isn’t some local produce available in local supermarkets. Hannaford has a corporate policy encouraging local stores to buy produce from their area, and as a result, the Hannaford store in Kinderhook buys produce from three local farms, said Hannaford spokesman Michael Norton. He said apples and strawberries are purchased in season for the supermarket from Greenport-based Yonder Farms. Corn, squash, potatoes, pumpkins, gourds, turnips, cabbage come from Gem Farms in Schodack, and Better Nature Produce, also in Schodack, supplies hydroponic lettuces: green and red leaf lettuce and and romaine.

“Most Hannaford stores have direct relationships with local farms,” Norton said. “Currently, 206 local farms participate in direct delivery to Hannaford stores in New York, Massachusetts, New Hampshire, Vermont, and Maine.” He said that while the supermarket chain has been pursuing its buy local campaign for years, the locavore movement and the recent popularity of the 100-mile diet have increased the demand for local produce.

Erling said other major retailers—including the world’s largest, Walmart—have taken note of the trend and are starting to implement similar "buy local" policies.

Representatives of Price Chopper parent corporation, the Golub Corporation, did not return calls for comment.

In May, Congressman Scott Murphy hosted a buy local conference in Union Vale and will host another such event in June in Washington County. The idea behind the conferences, Murphy spokesman Joshua Scherwin explained, is to ensure that all New Yorkers have access to healthy, home-grown food and to help local farmers.

Despite the efforts, the lettuce a shopper buys in a supermarket in Hudson or Chatham is more likely to be from California than Copake. “The bottom line is that if you are a shopper and want locally grown produce [in your supermarkets], talk to your grocer,” Erling said. “If the demand is there, the grocers will meet it.”  

Asked if he believed that Columbia County Bounty's focus on chefs and caterers alienated the county’s working class and/or the poor, who principally rely on supermarkets for their shopping, Erling said no. “The Hudson Farmers' Market participates in the public assistance program accepting food stamps, so I don’t see that marketplace as being missed out on,” he said.

Still, he bemoaned American society’s reliance on supermarkets for food. “We have been brainwashed into thinking you can go one place and get food 24 hours a day, seven days a week. Only Americans truly find it an inconvenience to shop at more than one location to find good food,” he said.