By Andi Anderson
Midwestern farmers often miss out on a key opportunity to increase revenue by processing surplus crops into shelf-stable products.
Without access to processing facilities, many specialty crop farmers let their excess produce go to waste. However, a partnership between local farmers and Glass Rooster Cannery in central Ohio is changing this.
Jeanine Seabrook, the founder of Glass Rooster Cannery, received two North Central SARE Farmer Rancher grants to help local farmers process their excess produce into value-added products like sauces, relishes, and canned goods.
With the help of these grants, Seabrook was able to purchase the equipment necessary to process over 40,000 pounds of excess produce, creating a new revenue stream for farmers during the off-season.
The second grant expanded the cannery’s capacity to work with even more local farmers, which boosted the economic sustainability and production efficiency of the farms involved.
Through this collaboration, participating farmers reduced waste on their farms and began selling shelf-stable products year-round.
According to Seabrook, this partnership has had a significant impact on local farmers. “Each year this farmer brings me their apples. We make apple butter, and they sell it for a 50% profit.
That has allowed a single-parent family to have additional income through the winter,” she explains. “It's not going to make or break our businesses, but it helps enough to feel free to extend ourselves.”
The project’s success was also highlighted in a recent evaluation of SARE projects, which showed that enhancing leadership skills, marketing knowledge, and processing capacity was key to its success.
Photo Credit: gettyimages-zoran-zeremski
Categories: Ohio, General