Conferences
University partnerships to improve farmers market price transparency
Mallory Rahe, Matt LeRoux, Brian Moyer, Kevin Burkett, Will Culler, Brett Wolff, and Luca Rigotti
Summary
Ambiguity in the pricing of local farm products increases marketing and financial risk decision making among specialty crop growers and lenders. This ambiguity limits access to capital and complicates customer discovery, which in turn hinders smaller scale local food production. While the Agricultural Marketing Service collects and reports wholesale and retail trade data for specialty crops and livestock products, these prices reflect the marketing efforts among large scale farms and are generally less useful for smaller farms selling in direct markets. Increasing access to price information of specialty crop and livestock products in direct to consumer marketing channels improves a producer’s budgeting process, market channel selection, loan applications and more informing financial and marketing risk management decisions.
In response, a group of University Extension personnel from five states have begun to meet and discuss Farmers Market Price Reporting methodologies. In this session, we’ll share the methodologies used by each University, the price report and related tools created for farmer audiences, and producer feedback from educational efforts. People currently creating price reports or interested in beginning to create price reports are encouraged to attend.
Details
| Conference | 2026 Extension Risk Management Education National Conference |
| Presentation Type | 30-Minute Concurrent |