Mobile Poultry Processing Unit Planning Meeting

Research Services Bldg. Room 130

OARDC Wooster Campus

I just came acrossed this website this morning www.buylocalpa.org It is a listing site like local harvest but just for PA. I was wondering what others opions were on starting something like this or if there is something out there already that could be expanded. This could be a nice start for those in Ohio that are looking for local products but are not sure where to start.

 Brian

On May 31 a meeting of folks devoted to the growth of Value Added Dairy in Ohio took place at OARDC in Wooster to determine resources, network and support the development of established and up and coming VAD producers. This project is volunteer driven and an initiative of the Leap Into Local Foods Workshop of the Ohio Local Food Systems Collaborative.

The purpose of the workshop was to:
•Share experiences.
•Identify efforts underway that show promise.
•Develop, target and commit to advance specific innovative solutions

OSU Extension in Ashtabula County will offer the workshop Nov. 19-21. "Hands-On Basic Cheese Making -- Enhancing Dairy Profitability with Cheese," is packed with information on a milk quality, ingredients used in cheese making, cheese-making processes and techniques and tips for establishing a cheese-making business.

Registration is $425 per person and includes course tuition, resource materials, all workshop supplies, lunches and refreshments. Registration is limited to 15 people and is on a first-come, first-served basis.

JEFFERSON, Ohio -- Enhance your dairy operation with a farmstead cheese business with the aid of an Ohio State University Extension cheese-making workshop.

OSU Extension in Ashtabula County will offer the workshop Nov. 19-21. Hands-On Basic Cheese Making -- Enhancing Dairy Profitability with Cheese, is packed with information on a milk quality, ingredients used in cheese making, cheese-making processes and techniques and tips for establishing a cheese-making business.

Henry and Iva Miller's farm at TR 110, Millersburg, Ohio will host the 4th Family Farm Field Day in Holmes County, Ohio. The focus of the field day is to provide an educatinal format for grass-based agriculture; suppporting low energy and non-industrial way of farming; promoting living skills for families in healthy and economical way; and builidng morale and enthusiasm in the farming community.

Context: Local foods producers often find themselves producing/processing food to fill un-serviced voids and needs, which often requires specialty equipment. The post that this poll links to discusses the possibility of creating a site that will allow users to post listings of specialty equipment, and rank and give feedback, adn genrally co-analyze the market and prices for this equipment. The goal is to getr a better idea about what is a fair market price, what is the availablity, etc

Proposal:

At the recent value-added dairy processing group meeting, a request was made for an anonymous way to compare used equipment prices. Small-scale processing equipment apparently can be difficult to come by and once found it's hard to know what a reasonable or going price is because so few sales are being made. Our site administrator is working on adding a rating tool to the site for things like proposals and ideas, much like the 1 to 5 star ratings that you are asked to give on travel websites. ...

From the first meeting with LEAP, the Value Added Dairy committee had 3 main points that they wanted to work on. On May 31st we held a strategy session to determine where to go from there. After much discussion and lots of comments the group decided to concentrate there efforts on two areas, for a presentation at the Stinner Summit in September.

1) A list of vendors, suppliers, resources for those who are making, planning, or who are thinking about doing some kind of value added dairy.

The Strategy Session will be held at the OARDC Wooster Campus in room 130 of the Research Services Building. We hope to share experiences of established and up and coming VAD producers, identify needs to stimulate the growth for value added dairy in Ohio, network and sample some Ohio cheeses. Questions? Contact Abbe Turner at luckypennyfarm@verizon.net, phone (330) 527-0548 or Brian Schlatter at cjcheese07@yahoo.com, phone (419)399-2350. We hope you can join us-Abbe

One of our students sent this article from Dairy Today. You might be interested in following the associated research, particularly with respect to value-added enterprises.

Dairy industry launches sustainability initiative

We have a tentive date scheduled for May the 31st @ 10:00. We are looking at holding the meeting in Wooster. I am working on a list of those to invite. If you have any suggestions please let me know. It will be posted where and when for sure when we have it in concrete.

Thanks

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From what we discussed at the Ben Stinner Summit we are going to be having another meeting to help determine what direction to take for the September summit. Abbe and I were thinking around April, May, and the first part of June sometime. If anyone has any dates that will work or not work for them let me know as I am looking at getting a place reserved for the meeting. Also we need to start compiling a list of those that we feel need to be at the meeting. If you have any suggestions let me or Abbe know.