Schools are more likely to buy food directly from farmers when they have grant support, part-time farm-to-school staff and nearby storage or processing infrastructure, according to a new U.S. Department of Agriculture report co-authored by a Cornell University economist.
The study found that rural school food authorities were 10 percentage points more likely than urban authorities to purchase directly from individual producers, but limited supply, thin staffing and kitchens not equipped to handle whole ingredients continue to restrict local purchasing.
Becca Jablonski, a visiting associate professor in Cornell's Charles H. Dyson School of Applied Economics and Management, contributed to the Economic Research Service report with researchers from USDA, Virginia Tech and Western Washington University. The report examined how schools participating in farm-to-school activities sourced food during the 2022-23 school year.
USDA defines a school food authority as the governing body responsible for administering food programs for one or more schools. Those authorities are often school districts, but the report's data also included public, private and charter schools and residential child-care institutions participating in the National School Lunch Program.
Farm-to-school participation reaches nearly three-quarters of authorities
The analysis used the 2023 Farm to School Census, which received responses from 12,559 of 18,833 invited school food authorities, a 67% response rate. The restricted dataset used in the study contained 11,803 responses from all 50 states, U.S. territories and Washington, D.C.
USDA found that 74.1% of school food authorities participated in at least one farm-to-school activity in 2022-23, up from 65.4% in 2018-19. Activities included serving local food, school gardens, agricultural education, farm visits, local-food promotions and procurement planning.
Participating authorities reported spending an estimated $1.8 billion on local food during the school year. Local products accounted for nearly 20% of total food purchases by participating authorities, and more than 75,000 schools served local food.
The definition of local varied. Twenty-eight percent of respondents defined it as food produced within their state, while about 20% reported having no fixed definition and others used distance-based standards such as 50, 100, 200 or 400 miles.
Most local food still moves through programs and distributors
The USDA Department of Defense Fresh Fruit and Vegetable Program was the most commonly reported local-food source, used by 53% of participating authorities. Forty percent used USDA Foods, 37% used produce distributors and about 25% bought directly from individual producers.
Overall, 65.3% obtained at least some local food through government programs, 56.2% used at least one direct marketing channel and 46.7% used broadline or produce distributors. Direct channels in the report included individual producers, food hubs, local processors or manufacturers, producer cooperatives and grocery stores.
Among authorities that bought directly from individual producers, an average of 22% of their local-food spending went through that channel. Those using the DoD Fresh program and USDA Foods directed averages of 36% and 31% of their local-food spending, respectively, to those programs.
The study also found that smaller authorities were more likely than larger systems to use direct channels. Compared with authorities serving fewer than 1,000 students, medium systems were 6 percentage points less likely to use direct marketing channels, large systems were 8 points less likely and systems serving at least 25,000 students were 12 points less likely.
Supply, cost and kitchen limits shape what schools can buy
More than 42% of participating authorities reported local-food availability problems. The most common were limited supply, cited by 30.8%; lack of access through primary vendors, 16.9%; difficulty identifying local producers or distributors, 15.9%; limited access to precut or processed products, 14.1%; and insufficient variety, 14%.
About 35% reported cost barriers, including 27.3% that said local food was more expensive than conventional choices and 13% that cited unstable pricing. Twenty-nine percent reported procurement or delivery problems, while 18% identified staffing or kitchen limits and 14% said they lacked enough staff time to prepare local food.
Those barriers help explain why processing and storage matter. The researchers found that higher densities of meat-processing facilities and refrigerated warehouses were associated with a greater likelihood of buying directly from producers, while refrigerated warehouse access was also tied to greater use of direct marketing channels.
Grant support was another strong factor. Authorities with grants or other outside funding were 9 percentage points more likely to buy from individual producers and 10 points more likely to use direct marketing channels after researchers controlled for other variables.
Part-time farm-to-school staffing was associated with more direct purchasing, while larger numbers of full-time staff were associated with less. The authors said that result may reflect the centralized wholesale purchasing used by larger school systems rather than a negative effect from staffing itself.
Findings show associations, not proof of cause
The report used logistic regression models to identify factors associated with direct purchasing. Its main models included 6,433 school food authorities that bought local food in 2022-23 and incorporated census data, local-food infrastructure measures and state policy information.
Higher farm-to-school engagement was linked to more direct sourcing. Each one-unit increase in USDA's farm-to-school intensity index was associated with a 2-percentage-point increase in buying from individual producers and a 3-point increase in using direct marketing channels.
The authors cautioned that those relationships do not establish cause and effect. The study covers a single school year affected by post-pandemic supply disruptions and elevated food inflation, and researchers could not determine whether stronger food networks caused schools to buy more locally or whether strong school demand helped those networks develop.
Jablonski is also scheduled to present an interactive food-procurement dashboard during Climate Week NYC on Sept. 24. Developed with the New York City Mayor's Office of Food Policy and Colorado State University researchers, the tool is intended to help officials compare economic, social and environmental tradeoffs in food purchasing decisions.
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