02-7-2008

200 farmers, buyers and food lovers attend Local Food Forum

Food Forum 2008Rhode Island’s largest business-to-business local food gathering was heavily attended this Tuesday in Providence. The Local Food Forum, now in its fourth year, drew a record number of farmers, chefs, grocers, school food service buyers, students and food lovers. Morning discussion centered around the theme, “Local 365: Growing the Year-round Marketplace” and then opened to broader conversations and networking in the afternoon.

The Food Forum is a collaboration between Farm Fresh RI and Brown Dining to spur relationship-building between local food system players in the Ocean State. The Food Forum also facilitates discussions of the challenges and successes of local food in RI, since it is rare to get farmers and chefs under the same roof. In order to strengthen the local food system, all of these folks need to know each other. Having the Food Forum in February and early in the week thereby (mostly) accommodates otherwise busy schedules, and even gives farmers enough lead time to plan their next growing season. We’ll post about some of the announcements and revelations from the 2008 Local Food Forum in this space in the coming days.