NWCT Regional Food Hub

The Northwest Hills Council of Governments and Partners for Sustainable Healthy Communities, Inc., with financial support from the CT Department of Agriculture, explored the development of a regional food hub as a way of supporting local farms and connecting them to new and expanded sales channels.

Visit our Information page for updates – the most recent is: ​NWCT Regional Food Hub, October 2017 UPDATE: In July 2017, the NWCT Regional Food Hub began its official operations…Click to READ MORE.
We'll share our progress as well as useful and interesting updates from the leaders in this area on our Food Hub Headlines  page. If you are interested in learning more or engaging with us on this project, reach out through our Contact Us page.

What is a food hub?

As defined by the National Food Hub Collaboration, “a food hub is a business or organization that actively manages the aggregation, distribution, and marketing of source-identified food products primarily from local and regional producers in order to satisfy wholesale, retail, and institutional demand.”

The goal of a food hub is to provide a source of healthy, locally produced food for consumers in a particular region, in a way that is economically sustainable for the farmers, distributors, and retailers that participate in the food system.

The Hub supports farmers by connecting them with larger and more consistent wholesale and niche markets for their farm products. Currently, the Hub aggregates locally grown food from 20 farms in our region and has the capacity to both pick up and deliver produce. The Hub also has an online ordering and billing system. The Hub is operated by the local non-profit organization, Partners for Sustainable Healthy Communities.

​For lots of resources and examples of food hubs that are already operational, head to the National Good Food Network. For more information on food hubs in general, take a look at the Healthy Food Access Portal.

Why is this important?

Our current industrial agricultural system makes it difficult for local farmers to compete without the logistical advantages of scale, and hard for consumers to access healthy, locally produced food.

Food hubs can play an important role in solving these issues. Check out the video below from Red Tomato, a food hub in MA, that does a good job highlighting the opportunity for local farmers.