FoodLogiQ leadership will be offering their industry expertise this week at the National Good Food Network’s 3rd Biennial Food Hub Conference, a gathering of nearly 500 growers hosted by the Wallace Center at Winrock International. FoodLogiQ Co-Founder Andrew Kennedy will help lead a session on pursuing GroupGAP certification during a half-day training event on Tuesday, March 29th. During the GroupGAP Intensive Workshop growers attending will receive a hands-on session to map out their path to certification using results from a national pilot.
“We are excited to present the results of our work with The Wallace Center National Good Food Network on the USDA GroupGAP pilot,” said Kennedy. “The feedback from the groups participating in the pilot helped us refine the FoodLogiQ Connect solution to better meet the quality management and communication needs of food hubs in a cost effective way.”
Under the traditional “Good Agricultural Practices” – or GAP – programs, the USDA audits individual farms, but this process can be time consuming and costly for many small-to-medium sized farms. Under the GroupGAP approach, groups of farms come together under a central entity and participate collectively to address food safety concerns and achieve third-party food safety certification as a group.
FoodLogiQ is currently working with the Wallace Center on the joint pilot program to support an online community for growers, packers, processors, shippers, restaurants, consumer product companies and food retailers to manage their food safety practices. Via the cloud-based software, participants in the GroupGAP program will be able to manage their communications, safety documentation, internal audits and product traceability.
The Food Hub conference is the only conference in the U.S. with a central focus on the success of food hubs – the critical middle of the Good Food value chain. Over 500 food hub managers, staff and supporters will participate in informative tours, substantial trainings, insightful workshops, and inspiring plenaries complemented by networking and peer learning as well.
About the National Good Food Network
The National Good Food Network brings together people from all parts of the rapidly emerging good food system – producers, buyers, distributors, advocates, investors and funders – to create a community dedicated to scaling up good food sourcing and access. The challenge presented by the food system is our opportunity—to revolutionize business models, develop new market relationships, and add value to traditional supply chain infrastructure, so that the growing business of good food is sown in the values of good food – all the way from farm to fork.
