Why it’s Important

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Making Improvements

Minimizing and Managing Overproduction

Forecast – Forecasting sales from year to year is the best way to reduce overproduction. The Community Shared Agriculture model has customers pay at the beginning of the growing season, so you know exactly how much to produce. Let market demand lead your production. According to The Lean Farm, there are three basic steps to successful forecasting:

• Precisely track week to week sales
• Track production inputs
• Track seeding and harvest dates to time output with projected sales

Value add – With consumers demanding ready-to-eat products more than ever before, further processing meets this demand, adds value, and will help reduce waste.  Dehydration, cold pressing, slicing, and peeling, are examples of further processing that add value to primary agricultural products.  Along with adding value to the end product, economic activity is generated at each stage.

Small scale processing and direct sales provide the potential to reduce waste and reap the economic benefits of value added activities.

Harvest precisely – harvest only what you plan to sell. Get orders from customers ahead of time so you know how exactly how much to harvest. This is more efficient than harvesting everything and then trying to find markets for product.

Get creative – Finding markets for bulk product can be another way to generate income from overproduction.

Goal Setting

¹https://www.fcc-fac.ca/en/ag-knowledge/ag-economics/to-stay-competitive-use-the-5-per-cent-rule.html