Need for Mid-Sized Farms

Although declining in numbers, mid-sized U.S. farms are needed to meet increasing consumer demand for speciality food products, says the head of the largest U.S. supplier of foods prepared outside the home. With farm programs encouraging production of commodities, he says, unique products are either not supplied or are being imported. “The food service industry requires a constant flow of unique, highly differentiated products, and those kinds of specialty products are generally not raised on 2,000-acre farms,” Richard Schnieders, chairman, CEO and president of SYSCO Corporation told the Tenth Farm Journal Forum last month. “We desperately need the mid-sized farms and the products they can produce in food service.”

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