Food hubs mean veggies for all

GrowNYC, with a mission to ensure that all New York City dwellers eat their veggies, is a small example of a community business model with with big potential.

The nonprofit has had to snub requests from dozens of the city’s food pantries and soup kitchens because it couldn’t move enough produce through its 5,000-square-foot warehouse. Now it will be operating out of the new 120,000-square-foot New York State Greenmarket Regional Food Hub being built in the Bronx.

The $20 million project, funded largely by the state, will expand the market for hundreds of farmers upstate and create 95 permanent jobs.

Just as important, the project will get fresh produce to senior centers, retirement homes and other venues too big to buy from farmers’ markets and too small to win low bulk pricing from wholesalers.

TRENDPOST: The myth that poor folks don’t care about fresh, nutritious food has been busted. The Greenmarket Regional Food Hub is a model for the next step in linking farmers and urban consumers, building markets for one and better health for the other.