In the mid 1980s, a pair of wheat producers, Karl Kupers and Fred Fleming, became convinced that the conventional dryland wheat farming they were practicing was not sustainable in the Palouse region of eastern Washington. [...more]

In 1988, a small group of organic vegetable growers in Wisconsin formed a cooperative to provide stable and fair prices to its members. It evolved into Organic Valley, the largest organic, farmer-owned cooperative in North America. [...more]

Co-op Partners Warehouse was established in 1999 by the Wedge Natural Foods Co-op in Minneapolis, Minnesota. This certified organic wholesale distribution warehouse serves retail stores, food service businesses and buying clubs throughout the Upper Midwest. [...more]

Idaho’s Bounty was founded in 2007 as a cooperative with both customer and producer members. It provides logistical support for a direct-to-consumer, Internet-based food buying club. [...more]

For a wide variety of economic, environmental and social reasons, it makes good sense to regard the practice of managed grazing as an effective system for strengthening dairy and livestock farming in Wisconsin. The UW-Madison Center for Integrated Agricultural Systems (CIAS) partnered with GrassWorks, Inc. to develop a statewide, participatory discussion about managed grazing that they called “Blue Sky Greener Pastures” (BSGP). [...more]

Is there a legume that establishes and yields well, persists and is cost effective? Through on-farm research, Wisconsin beef grazier Jim Munsch set out to answer this important question on his Deer Run Farm. [...more]

The national Agriculture of the Middle initiative has produced three sets of curricular resources on value-based food supply chains for university-level business and economics courses. [...more]

The Driftless Region Food and Farm Project is a coalition of farmers, consumers, institutions, agencies and organizations. Together, they aspire to meet the growing demand for local food by scaling up the production, aggregation, processing, distribution and marketing of food in the Driftless Region of Wisconsin, Minnesota, Iowa and Illinois. [...more]

Raw milk for human consumption that has not been pasteurized is a controversial product. Unpasteurized milk may contain pathogens that can lead to serious illness. Nonetheless, a study led by researchers Özlem Altıok and Michael Bell of the UW-Madison Department of Community and Environmental Sociology found that customers cite improving their health among the top reasons for drinking raw milk. A growing number of consumers feel that pasteurization robs milk of some of its nutritional and health benefits. [...more]

Michael Rozyne, one of the creators of the international fair trade company Equal Exchange, founded an organization called Red Tomato in 1996. The goals for Red Tomato were to develop a dual purpose non-profit to market sustainably grown fruits and vegetables in the Northeast, and to provide consulting services for regional food system development nationwide. This research brief focuses on the first goal. [...more]