ST. LOUIS — Carolyn Anderson likes to chat up the growers at her local farmers market in Missouri, at times hanging out behind the beds of pickups brimming with ears of corn.
For Anderson, 29, it’s all about keeping it “local.” And there’s fresh evidence of just how big of a deal that word can be for farmers’ finances.
A new U.S. Department of Agriculture report says sales of “local foods,” whether sold direct to consumers at farmers markets or through intermediaries such as grocers or restaurants, amounted to $4.8 billion in 2008. That’s a number several times greater than earlier estimates, and the department predicts locally grown foods will generate $7 billion in sales this year.
While there’s plenty of evidence local food sales are growing, it has been hard to say by how much because governments, companies, consumers and food markets disagree on what qualifies as local. The USDA report included sales to intermediaries, such as local grocers and restaurants, as well as directly to consumers.
It found that farm sales to people have just about doubled in the past two decades, from about $650 million, adjusted for inflation, in the early 1990s to about $1.2 billion these days. The $4.8 billion figure came when sales to restaurants, retailers and regional distributors were added in.
