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Kawartha Region Local Food Wholesale Project

The Kawartha Region Local Food Wholesale Project 

Local food producers and wholesale food buyers are invited to participate in an exciting project to support expanded production, wholesale marketing and purchasing of local food within Kawartha Lakes, the City of Peterborough and Peterborough County. This is a collaborative partnership between Peterborough & the Kawarthas Economic Development (PKED) and the City of Kawartha Lakes (KL). This project is funded in part by the Ontario Ministry of Agriculture, Food and Rural Affairs. 

During this two-year project, participating Local Food Producers and Local Wholesale Food Buyers will receive, at no cost: 

  1. Aligned streams of group training for producers and buyers to better understand effective wholesale production and marketing practices and wholesale purchasing possibilities.

  2. One-on-one coaching to adapt training materials to their businesses.

  3. Facilitated coordination for aggregation and distribution of locally produced foods. Specifically, to local food buyers in restaurant, retail, food service, and institutional businesses in the region, from local food producers.

Food delivery to restaurant

Project Timeline:

  1. Interested producers and buyers signed up to participate in the project (November to December 2023).

  2. Discovery discussion with the trainer/coach to obtain a better understanding of each business. (November to December 2023). Following this discussion, individual interviews were held to discuss how to best assist each business throughout the project.

  3. The team of trainers/coaches used the information obtained to create specialized Guidelines and Toolkit content (October 2023 to January 2024).

  4. A number of weekly group training sessions were held to work with the trainers/coaches. The sessions were formatted using the Guidelines and Toolkit (February to March 2024).

  5. One-on-one coaching is available to participating producers and buyers at no cost for the duration of the project (April 2024 through December 2025).

  6. The project will include facilitated coordination for the establishment of a local food aggregator and distribution pilot. This will be organized with input from participating producers and buyers (June 2024 to December 2025).

Benefits of Participation:

  • Participating local food producers and food buyers will build mutual understanding, lasting relationships and identify wholesale models that work for both sides of the relationship. By doing this together, with the assistance of a team of trainers/coaches, the group can expand access to networks that offer collaboration and support and create greater availability and use of locally produced foods obtained through local wholesale channels.

  • The trainers/coaches have decades of experience working with producers and buyers of local food, providing them with extensive knowledge regarding effectively marketing local food. 

  • One-on-one coaching that offers practical tools to establish or expand the local food wholesale of participating business operations. 

  • Participating businesses will have an active role in shaping the facilitation of the project, allowing the provided services to fit each business’ unique needs.

Click to read more about participating:

Local Food Producers

Wholesale Food Buyers

To register for this project, complete this short Expression of Interest Form. Tell us why you are interested in this project and what you hope to achieve by participating. Please note spaces are limited. The preliminary training and evaluation is complete, but new participants are welcome to apply. 

For additional information contact:

Kelly Maloney, Economic Development Officer – Agriculture, City of Kawartha Lakes
(888)822-2225 extension 1208, kmaloney@kawarthalakes.ca

Erika Inglis, Project Coordinator, Kawartha Local Food Wholesale Project 
einglis@investptbo.ca

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