North-Central Ohio Farmer Survey

This survey aims to gather information from farmers operating in North-Central Ohio (including Lorain, Medina, Erie, Huron, Medina, and Wayne counties) who either currently supply food or products to northeast Ohio markets or are interested in growing and supplying food to local markets.

The information that you share will be utilized initially to identify opportunities within the city of Oberlin to purchase more foods or locally produced products from area farmers and businesses. At present, Oberlin College and several restaurants in Oberlin purchase more than $1 million from local farmers and locally-owned food businesses through targeted local food purchasing initiatives. This represents about 6% of the estimated $16 million in annual food purchasing in Oberlin. There is great interest in the Oberlin community to increase the percentage of food purchased from local farmers to support stronger local farm enterprises, opportunities for new farm or food businesses, and job and enterprise creation in the local community. While initially focused on Oberlin, which has a 20 year history of local food purchasing, the hope is to expand the model to other communities.

Your responses to the survey will be utilized for analytical purposes only and will be kept confidential. However, you can elect to have your information shared with potential buyers should you elect to do so.

Should you have any questions about this survey or the larger effort to expand local food purchasing efforts in Northeast Ohio, contact Brad Masi with Northeast Ohio Food Web at bradmasi@earthlink.net or 440-935-3106 or Heather Adelman with the Oberlin Project at hadelman@oberlinproject.org or 440-775-6177.

Thank you for your participation!