NatureFresh Farms is developing a 180-acre greenhouse facility just off I-80 in northwest Ohio, while Ontario-based Mastronardi Produce has greenhouse operations in Coldwater, Michigan. Even receivers are getting into the game.
“We have 11 greenhouses on our property in Milwaukee,” points out Maglio. “They’re farmed by Will Allen of Growing Power, and we’re working together to prove the viability of locally grown produce in normal commercial distribution channels,” he notes, stressing the difference between crops grown for commercial use and not for farmers’ markets or local CSA (community supported agriculture) subscription programs.
Organic production
Consumer demand for locally-grown fare, including organics, continues to increase across the Midwest. The region does not ship significant fresh volume, however, due to its climate challenges, a focus on organic processing vegetables, and the prevalence of small growers selling direct to consumers, and not through the region’s wholesalers.
Wisconsin dominates the small but active organic produce industry, harvesting more than 4,000 acres of organic fruits and vegetables according to a USDA census in 2014. The Badger State has more organic produce acreage than all the other states combined, and beans bound for processing make up a quarter of its organic output.
Wisconsin and Iowa combined for 1,400 acres of organic green peas in 2014, most also bound for processors. This cropaccounts for much of Iowa’s 1,500 organic fruit and vegetable acres; Ohio harvested about 1,000 while Missouri and Indiana combined for 400 acres, according to the USDA.
Population Growth
For four of the five Midwestern states, population growth ranged from 4 to 7 percent over the last decade and a half, though Ohio was less. In our metro areas, it was a multifaceted story as a few experienced an overall slowdown as others had pockets of growth.
For example, educated, young professionals are flocking to Milwaukee, and there’s booming growth in both Indianapolis and Des Moines, where total population growth has surged 5.3 percent and 9.4 percent respectively in the five years from 2010 to 2015 according to the U.S. census.
Cleveland showed a slight population contraction from 2010 to 2015, but numbers can be misleading. “Cleveland’s coming back,” enthuses Joe Cavalier, president of Cavalier-Gulling-Wilson Company, Inc., on the Cleveland terminal market. Cavalier, whose family has been in the Cleveland produce business since 1929, cites the city’s redevelopment projects such as a new Heinen’s Fine Foods store, which opened in early 2016. “It’s kind of neat to see the redevelopment,” he confides.
