National Direct Agricultural Marketing Summit

MarketMakers Partners Virtual Annual Meeting

This year’s meeting convened current partners and organizations who were potentially interested in collaborative efforts. Because of the pandemic the entire event was conducted on Zoom.  https://drive.google.com/file/d/19w4KcAL6P3BZMkdi8x6k2xwPUGCdEdh4/view?usp=sharing

The agenda included a technology reveal for the new MarketMaker plug ins as well as the new and improved MarketMaker suite of websites which will be released in early 2021. Gary Matteson, SVP Beginning Farmer Programs and Outreach with The Farm Credit Council was introduced as the new chairman of the MarketMaker Policy Advisory Committee (PAC). He replaces Ray Hansen, Iowa State University, who is stepping down from the PAC after serving 14 years.

At the conclusion of the meeting, the winners of the 202O Farm Credit MarketMaker Innovation Awards were announced. Congratulations to this year’s winners:

• Winner(s)- Illinois Farm Bureau, Illinois Specialty Growers, and Illinois Farmers Market Association; “Engaging Partners to Expand Impact and Grow Farms and Food Business in Illinois”,
• First Runner Up– National Buy Fresh Buy Local, “Buy Fresh Buy Local MarketMaker Plug-Ins”

About the FDRS 2020 Virtual Conference

 Please visit the FDRS website to view resources and stay tuned for more information on our 2021 conference in the New Year.

In 2020, Food Distribution Research Society  gathered online (Zoom) for our first ever virtual conference. The conference theme, “Food supply chain resilience and COVID-19” focused on understanding and addressing the unique challenges the COVID-19 pandemic has created for our food distribution system.

Congratulations to Food Marketing Challenge (student case competition) winners:

• Lincoln University in New Zealand (1st place),
• Massey University in New Zealand (2nd place),
• National Chung Hsing University in Taiwan (3rd place),
• University of Kentucky (honorable mention).

Our keynotes were followed by a recognition of our 2020 award winners. Along with our student award winners, mentioned above we announced the following award recipients of our service and leadership awards:

• Patrick J. Byrne Emerging Leadership Award — Dr. Margarita Velandia (University of Tennessee, Knoxville)
• Frank Panyko Distinguished Service Award — Dr. Patricia McLean-Meyinsse (Southern University and A&M College)

We also honored the winners of our Richardson-Applebaum Outstanding Graduate Research awards and our Outstanding Undergraduate Research award:

• PhD Dissertation: Dr. Shannon Allen, University of Alberta (Dissertation title: Improving the Diets of Children: Understanding the Decision-Making of Parents, Children, and Food Manufacturers; Dissertation advisor: Dr. Ellen Goddard)
• MS Thesis: Aaron J. Staples, Purdue University (Thesis title: Consumer Willingness-to-Pay for Sustainability Attributes in Beer: A Choice Experiment Using Eco-Labels)
• MS Case Study: Isabella T. Sanders, Georgia Institute of Technology (Case Study title: Strategic Market Deployment Planning: Farm-to-Table Logistics Platforms)
• Undergraduate: Faith Parum, Texas A&M University (Thesis title: U.S. Consumers’ Intake of Food at Home and Food Away from Home as a Complex Economic System)

Congratulations to all of our 2020 winners and thanks to all those whom participated to support the engaging conference