Vol. 126 (2013): Proceedings of the Florida State Horticultural Society
Natural Resources

Developing Regional Food Hubs in Central Florida

John Rife
East End Market, 3201 Corrine Drive, Orlando, FL 32803

Published 2013-12-01

Keywords

  • source identified,
  • localized,
  • food system

Abstract

This paper provides a survey of organizations, businesses, and initiatives engaged in building capacity for Central Florida’s localized food system by developing regional food hubs. Regional food hubs aggregate food system services like procurement, processing, distribution, warehousing, marketing, and retailing of localized and source-identified food products. The results of the survey show that, while no single entity vertically integrates all of these services, the handful of existing initiatives in Central Florida are nonetheless building noticeable capacity for the region’s sourceidentified food products.