By Lizzy Cooper
NYS Farm to School Definitions
School food authority (SFA): the entity with the legal authority to purchase food. The SFA is usually synonymous with the school district.
Board of Cooperative Educational Services (BOCES): Shared educational services provided for school districts in NYS. The often manage collective bids.
Local food: The USDA defers to each school district to set their own definition of a local food.
New York State school districts spend hundreds of millions of dollars each year on food, and around 1.59 million students eat school meals daily. However, only a small fraction of these dollars are currently spent with local farmers. There is growing interest across the state in the Farm to School movement, and understanding how schools purchase food is key to selling your products to a school district in New York State and beyond.
How do schools purchase food?
Schools get funding to purchase food from federal and state dollars, which means they must follow specific procurement guidelines. The method a school food authority (SFA) uses to procure food is tied to a procurement threshold. The total dollar amount of the purchase will determine which of three procurement methods an SFA must use. SFAs adhere to federal and state thresholds unless a municipality or district has a lower, more restrictive threshold. The most restrictive threshold must always be used when choosing a procurement method. In most cases, awards are made to the producer or distributor with the lowest price for each item.
Can SFAs ever pay a higher price for a local product?
An SFA or BOCES can release a bid with “geographic preference.” This weighs a local product, so price is not the only criterion that is considered when awarding the bid. Geographic preference bids are allowable for unprocessed or minimally processed foods.
What motivates schools to purchase local food?
There are a number of different factors that encourage schools and other institutions to purchase local foods. Many school districts are deeply rooted in their communities and want to support the local economy whenever possible by keeping their federal and state dollars local. Schools may also like the variety of locally available products, exposing students to foods like candy-striped beets or bison meat stew, which are products they may not have tried before. Other districts may strongly value teaching their students about the origins of their foods.
What are local purchasing incentives?
In order to support school districts in their efforts to purchase local foods, some states have introduced local purchasing incentives. In New York State, when schools purchase 30% of their lunch foods from local sources, they are provided an additional $0.19 per meal the following year. This financial incentive can help to offset extra time spent on logistics of working with local farms, additional equipment needed to prepare local foods or higher costs of the products themselves. The 30% initiative has seen $26.2 million spent on NY foods since the program’s inception in the 18-19 school year, with a 27% year-over-year increase in spending for the last two school years.
What types of local products do schools buy?
Schools are looking for all types of local products, including fruits, vegetables, proteins, grains, and dairy. Some school districts do not have the equipment or staff capacity to process whole, fresh produce items or raw protein products. Therefore, building a relationship with the institutional customers you hope to work with is important to understand better which products they can use. Taste tests can help a school district introduce an item to the students before putting it on the menu. Connect with the organizations working on Farm to School in your state or even the district’s Parent Teacher Association to see if the district can get volunteers to assist with taste-testing new local products.
How much of something do I need to produce to participate in Farm to School?
The minimum amount is typically one serving for each student. However, it could be smaller if it is an item that could go on a salad bar. If you know you will not meet demand on your own, you could explore aggregating with other producers through a co-op, food hub, or distributor.
Do I have to go through a food hub or distributor to sell local food to schools?
You can sell directly to a school or through a third party. When working directly with a school, you will get more immediate feedback about your products as well as keep more of the food dollar, but you will also have to fill out bids or provide price lists, get registered as a vendor, and work with net 30 or beyond payment. When you work with a distributor or food hub, those logistics would be taken care of, but you would receive less of the food dollar and possibly less feedback from the school.
What certifications do I need to sell to school districts and institutions?
The certifications will vary depending on the product you are selling. In NYS, meat products must be USDA-processed. The USDA does not require that SFAs purchase produce from GAP-certified farms. It may be more common to find GAP requirements when selling to hospitals or higher education institutions. If you choose to sell through a distributor to a school, they may have their own food safety requirements you must follow.
Is the school food market right for me?
Schools and institutions pay wholesale market prices. Your product should not be considered a donation or charity for the sustainability of your operation and the school district’s local food purchasing program. Selling into the school food market requires creativity and an understanding of which products are well-suited for institutional markets. When filling out bids or talking to district food service departments, know the minimum price you are able to accept for your products with the cost of delivery factored in. Schools will often promote the farm where the food is coming from on menus or posters, which could lead to increased name recognition and indirect sales through your other market channels. Schools are consistent, large purchasers of food and should be considered as an option for scaling up or exploring new markets for your operation.
How can I get started?
Contact a Regional Farm to School Coordinator who can put you in communication with a school district or group of districts that are interested in purchasing local products or a local food hub that may have existing relationships with SFAs.
VT: Vermont FEED, a partnership of NOFA-VT and Shelburne Farms
ME: Healthy Communities of the Capital Area, backbone organization for the Maine Farm and Sea to School Network
Lizzy Cooper is the Central New York Farm to School Coordinator for CCE Harvest NY.
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