Hawai’i Island Agriculture & Food System Study
Food Resiliency and Sustainability Sub-Team Meeting
February 4th, 2021 - Discussion Summary
The purpose of this meeting was to better understand Hawai’i Island’s food system by:
Examining the island’s ability to supply its own food;
Determining the problems in the food system to address; and
Identifying the underlying causes of those problems.
1) Self-Sufficiency: What does the data tell us about the island’s capacity to meet local food demand with local food production?
Findings:
****Data showing that while we can produce, processing continues to be the challenge
**Need for aggregation of the small farms outputs - so many under 1k and under 3 acres.
**Production is happening but not always clear where it is getting directed (i.e. tourist and export markets vs local markets for local consumption) and at what kinds of price points
*Lack of local slaughter capacity
*Larger operations outperform smaller operations.
*Not enough marketing channels for farmers to sell their products. Need to offer easier and simpler ways for farmers to sell to consumers without too many middlemen.
*Aggregation of small farm outputs, and being clear about the story of what’s being exported vs eaten.
*Capacity there but processing, aggregation, and distribution need support, and, devil is in the details. What the data gives us about the details will be an important driver moving forward.
Lack of adequate cold storage
Need for increased aggregation and distribution networks
Need for more certified kitchens, value-added infrastructure
Few small farms are generating most of the revenue, but not most of the food consumed here.
We produce a lot more nut and specialty crops vs. vegetables & melons (10% of farms)
Data is validating opinions and concerns that people have about the food system. One thing to bring up also is an environment and system that existed pre-COVID, and this makes historical numerical data a little less useful in the sense that we don’t know if and how we will go back to these systems moving forward.
Capacity is there to produce a lot of food but it’s more about processing, aggregation, distribution pieces need support. Also informal food sharing networks are not represented in the data and that is an important piece in the food system and should be fostered as well.
In self-reported data, it sets limits on who participates because of trust about how data is going to be used. If we want adequate data we really need to communicate to the farming community why this data and process is important. Good to keep in mind who is represented in this data. Also ‘ulu production, want to know where trees are planted - going to have a huge impact moving forward, which will have food security impact.
Inputs with respect to increasing scope of Korean Natural Farming; aggregating food producers through hubs and being able to disaggregate data to be able to highlight food that is produced locally for local consumption. Also being able to highlight how federal programs are being used and how efficacious they are in COVID-19 era.
What jumped out most is what is missing. Like data on informal food sharing. Also there weren’t many kitchens listed in the data, but the actual number of certified kitchens on the island is something like 1,500. So who is willing to be open to renting to the public and willing to be listed isn’t necessarily representative of what’s “out there.”
We need to recognize the liability insurance necessary to start a new farm. To lease land you need to carry insurance limits of about a million dollars in order to use that land. For farmers, this is an added expense not covered by DLNR (or the landlord) and is an added weight on producers.
There’s a lack of market signals - producers don’t have information about demand, supply, and price. With those types of signals more producers might be able to plan businesses with confidence and address asymmetries. Large producers have a sense of need, of their own market. This is not necessarily data that is available to smaller producers, and therefore can be useful for producers at the small scale (i.e. less than $1000).
Studying the data leads to more questions. In the breakdown of crop data, only 10% are doing veg and melon crops. There seems to be a gap (in production) in the vegetable area and that could have big impact on our import replacement.
We need to look more closely at the staple food crops and understand what actually feeds people here. There is a need to shift from rice to other starches. Sweet potatoes, ‘ulu information is important.
Likely that whatever we return to isn’t going to look exactly like where we came from. Question: Even though we don’t have the most recent data, where is there space to refine the market in Hawai’i given that new systems might help to exploit the comparative advantages that Hawai’i has.
Further Queries:
**What is exported and what is actually eaten here?
*Data on community sharing would provide further input.
*We need to get Food Hub purchase data into this process showing their impact on bringing the smaller sized farms into the market.
*Can we get data from KTA on pre and post-double-up bucks fruit and veg purchases, and data from food hubs about purchase, processing and distribution? We need to see how these hubs can bring small producers into market.
We need data on the “smaller” growers.
There is more data needed on starches and staples.
2) Food Resiliency and Sustainability: What does the data indicate are the most important problems in Hawai’i Island’s food system that need to be addressed to make the system more resilient and sustainable?
Findings:
*The answers to this question are cultural, ancestral, and consider land use, public health, education, gendered labor, intergenerational knowledge. I don't know which are most vulnerable, but mitigating vulnerability can come through education of keiki, building critical consciousness into kids in underserved communities, with recognition that living in Hawai'i means you have a relationship and obligation to place, that can manifest in consumptive practice” ie food choice habits, understanding the depth of history and native intelligence, native practices that already exists here and uplifting that.
There is a need to Increase/solidify food distribution channels, Increase storage, gather consumption data, have measurement tools like having families fill out a google form in order to track use and need.
Cost of inputs is limiting food production to small niche markets. Need to build new market niches that broaden opportunities for more farmers to benefit from.
The data indicates a general lack of understanding as to what it takes to produce our food. There needs to be a better interface between urban populations and the agricultural producers who feed them.
The self-centeredness in people is too pervasive. To change values is a really hard thing. We see all these factions; ethnicity, nationality, politics, factions who protect themselves rather than doing what is best for community. Something is wrong with the whole system. If we look at the factions here, people there is a replicated system of power and control.
There is a need to develop the human resources - who is farming, who wants to farm, etc. People want to buy a particular product but don’t know where to buy it from. Consumers don’t know who is farming what. Equally, farmers don’t know where to ship, where their product might be wanted and needed.
There is a lack of connection and visibility to each other (who has what, who is doing what, etc.) that impedes the building of resilient systems. We need to increase connections through multiple layers and channels within the system.
Native intelligence is inherent to this place. Honoring those food system practices; facts about “used to be” self-sustaining is often put out there without honoring the practices and ways of being that made this possible. Uplifting those folks who are practicing these practices still is an important piece to incorporate.
Connection - “we have the parts” echoes what we’ve been talking about. We have the pieces to the system, and there’s formal and informal connections, and by formalizing the informal, strengthening those connections, we have a more resilient system. Some of the pieces seem obvious, and how they seem to connect is more nuanced.
Values. We don’t seem to value food sustainability and resilience enough. There’s been two decades of pushing farm-to-school initiatives. Top-down directives, legislations about what needs to be taught which guides what we are teaching, and what students are learning even though the parents and teachers want to learn to grow food. Even that whole disconnect within the value system, education system, that becomes a limiting factor in resilience.
There are confusions around terminologies and questions. Self-sufficiency vs food import reliance vs. household food in/security, etc. “Local” carries with it assumptions, is used as a catch-all that has within it environmental sustainability, social justice, climate benefits, etc. but there is nothing inherent in local production that would inevitably yield those manifold outcomes. So it’s important for us to distinguish between our desires for reducing import dependence and other goals about social justice, environmental management, etc.
In the history of food crises, our ability to respond is often in our export crops. Often we malign export productivity but it is what our supply lines can draw upon when we have crises. The role of export crops in a resilient food system is important.
To say we are in a food crisis is too extreme. We could live on noni in a crisis. Noni can grow on lava rock without any soil. But what we are lacking is flavor. So it’s not just farming to be resilient but also about knowing the history of the island and preservation of island as well. It’s also about knowing preparation methods for these foods that are easy to grow and on which we can sustain ourselves in times of crisis.
Behaviors and choices of consumers - so many non-price factors that we need to take into account if we’re going to understand consumer food choice in the future. Because we have choice, we are accustomed to being able to access whatever we want, and we don’t have to change our purchasing choices so much. Any effort to make the food system more resilient and more secure will need to involve education, to see and understand the values of food resiliency and sustainability. The demand side of the equation is critical and we shouldn’t let the production side garner all of our attention.
Resilience and behaviors of consumers - networking, educating, what we leave out is the educating that our retailers pass along to the consumers. The culture of wholesale and retail needs to change. The current template needs to change. Retailers need to play a much larger role than they have been over the past 100 years. They are the bridge between the consumer’s behavior and the farm production. Also, retailers want to drive down the price of producers. If retailers could be educated that investment is worthwhile for them, they might see long-term positive gains and we might see a positive shift on the production side.
Consumer familiarity with products and culture-building through farm-to-school, garden-to school cafeteria programs increase familiarity to students and parents about what grows here. Cultivates a palate and a culture around local food. And this is huge towards building a system we want to see. Building that familiarity to products through youth, community education, retail education, there’s work being done towards that and we need to build familiarity and develop a taste for local foods.
Sales of local products are often not limited due to a lack of production but a lack of retail marketing. The support system isn’t allowing for sustainability and resilience, and so we rely on export. The culture of retailing needs to change to educating and building a line of information to consumers on behalf of the local producers.
Further Queries:
Human resources - who is farming? Who wants to farm? Why should we farm? we did not make much comment on the “who is farming” data.
What are we actually eating and need/want to eat - back to the staples/starches/carbs issue?
3) Systemic Constraints: What does the data tell us about the root causes of the system’s problems described above?
Findings:
*****We are victims of our own logistics success. We have a diverse population with a lot of visitors and a food system well organized to supply us all that leaves little incentive to be self-sufficient or change our tastes to suit local supply.
****Lack of connections between groups of informal sector farmers - they might have connections among themselves, but lack the distribution and logistics to get their products to wider markets on-island (goes back to the connection issue)
****There is a historical and continued breakage of trust between people and groups that impedes relationships and connection.
***It takes a lot of resources and effort to effectively organize and aggregate local production for better efficiency. The government has not invested sufficient resources in that kind of organization and support for small local farms.
*The willingness to face the reality that establishing a sense of community is really hard without a shared commitment to land and each other. From the data: “deep histories of resilience that manifest in spaces where communities must rely on each other to survive.
*There are several layers of constraints here. 1. Value/philosophical layer: We are complacent. We have not gotten hungry enough to all do something. Someone else can fix this issue. COVID is shining a light on the inequities. 2. Political layer - laws, regulations, etc. that are not conducive to island systems or small farms or farming in small areas. 3. Infrastructure layer - arable land, lack of processing. 4. Economics layer - farming industry must make us all a living wage.
Connection of investors in the agriculture community. Farming would be so much part of Hawaii culture if initial support were to bring back practices that may have been utilized in past era but discontinued due to costs but could be today with the developed innovations that have been researched and implemented per economic factors. .
The messy middle of supply chains continues to be an issue. The transportation, distribution, and all of the logistics getting local food from farmers to consumers remains tough on an island that’s primarily rural.
Farming organizations need to become more politically active. The politicians are the ones that can affect rules and regs to protect local farmers (protectionism). Farmers need to understand which representatives represent their interest and values.
The lack of trust and understanding of the benefits of cooperation are limited amongst many small farms. There aren't enough opportunities for stimulating better cooperation, aggregation and joint marketing efforts amongst the large number of small farms on the island.
There is little cohesiveness and coordination of government policy and regulation surrounding ag and food. The government is not aligned enough internally to achieve a shared and sustainable vision of food security.
Hawai’i used to be self-sufficient. The global marketplace meant historical investments in food products such as sugar and pineapple provided jobs, but food security had been diminished. When the sugar and pineapple market crashed, we were left not only without an ag industry but the diminished food security. It remains a great challenge.
At one point Lipton tested Hawai’i for economic viability of tea, and pulled out because it was not considered viable. I think it is possible but needs networking, educating, confidence, risk management. We can bring back larger agriculture and create jobs on a scale that fits with local needs and values.
History - different senses of history between groups of people - and some of the people that are key to understanding how native practice created resilience and some who have come in at other points in history have a very conflicting sense of that history. And without coming to a common understanding it is hard to establish dialogue to move forward. And this lives in people right now.
The effects of commodity farming and the cultural value of farming has an implication for the way we count and value ag systems - how does this impact our metrics for the productivity of systems? Shifting metrics from “how many tons did you produce” to “how many people did you feed” shifts our perspectives, and has cultural, social and operational implications.
*We only manage what we measure, and the metrics are a reflection of culture and what is valued
*There needs to be a will amongst convening bodies to set the metrics differently that will drive evolution in behavior.
*We cannot solve island ecology issues with a continental lens. Provide an international context on top of a very specific island ecology. Imposition of that given the existing policies and structural and systemic biases that exist because of that. Raises questions about what actually has to fundamentally shift and what momentum that is necessary for the kinds of cooperative, systemic solutions that we desire.
It will always be inappropriate to manage an island ecology using a continental perspective. A lot of what we have to deal with, USDA and NRCS, is with policies that are created, and are getting better but are still outdated, especially in terms of land management.
Between 1859-1865 Hawai’i was exporting food to west coast during gold rush in CA. There was not only self-sufficiency but abundance. Abundance happens under different political system, and that political system governs land differently. Ahupua’a system is not just a land management system, it is part of a larger political system (and philosophy).
The Jones Act and international politics remain systemic constraints to our food system.
We need to look well-beyond the economics of the equation and look to culture, values, what people feel is important in terms of what they buy, grow, eat that suits this place. We need to look at a model that suits us here, recognizing that a lot of the models that have been implemented here have not worked--including plantation. Many of the efforts have tried to revert to an old model, business model for farming. It’s not just about how do you make a profit farming, but why are you farming, who is farming, there’s a lot of different purposes.
So many of these issues around food security and resiliency comes down to the effective organization of people. Underlying cause of so many of these issues, which is unfortunately the messier part of the equation: How do you get people to build up their trust, to build up their connections, and to understand that there is one lived system that we’re all in, and to be able to do that is critical to be able to solve these challenges.
*One lived system but not one lived experience. Because of that difference, there needs to be differentiated recognition of that experience, but always looking through the common lens, the right pair of glasses to understand what is meaningful.
*We need greater connection, coordination, and organization. But it’s fairly clear that if we think of it as a puzzle, some of the pieces are big and visible and real, and potentially more tractable than others. In the world of collaboration and trust-building, momentum matters. You cannot build trust from nothing and have to find a gear that gives you momentum, whether that’s a distribution center, enhancing processing, creating better avenues of information about markets and prices, whatever it might be. But if you don’t get that momentum started, the whole thing can’t congeal. That takes time, because it’s actually culture evolution, which is a high-energy requirement. So you need small gears. Everything matters, and you need those top line recommendations that will give momentum and will build coordination, trust, and coherence around it.