HAWAII ROOTS FOOD SAFETY OUTREACH PROJECT

• Sponsoring Institution: National Institute of Food and Agriculture
• Project Status: COMPLETE
• Funding Source: OTHER GRANTS
• Reporting Frequency: Annual
• Accession No.: 1010612
• Grant No.: 2016-70020-25790
• Cumulative Award Amt.: $60,000.00
• Proposal No.: 2016-07325
• Project Start Date: Sep 1, 2016
• Project End Date: Nov 30, 2017
• Grant Year: 2016
• Program Code: [A4182]- Regional FSMA Center

Recipient Organization
Kokua Kalihi Valley Comprehensive Family Services
2239 North School St.
Honolulu,HI 96819

Performing Department
(N/A)

Non Technical Summary
This project will work towards the goal of enabling Hawaii's small and beginning producers, processors, and wholesalers to enhance the safety of their food products (including complying with FSMA regulations), while maintaining profitability, sustainability, and equity. Activities will help to build the capacity of our local food system to disseminate best practices through robust knowledge sharing networks and culturally-tailored outreach strategies. Project obectives include:• Assess the specific food safety training needs, learning preferences, and knowledge sharing networks of Hawaii's ethnically diverse, small and beginning farmers, processors, and wholesalers.• Develop a community-based, FSMA-consistent food safety curriculum and pilot its delivery to 80 individuals through on-farm training sessions facilitating peer networking and knowledge exchange.• Disseminate 5 new food safety education/training materials and culturally-tailored delivery methodology to 10 local stakeholder organizations and 300 individuals for broader implementation throughout Hawaii.The project will be lead by Kokua Kalihi Valley (KKV), a community-based and culturally competent organization with vast experience in public health, community navigation, and participatory methodologies. Project Director Sharon Odom has been fostering a more vibrant local neighborhood food system for the past five years, including the development of a food hub currently involving 19 participants. Advising and technical assistance will be provided by a Project Consultant with a degree in Food and Agricultural law and expertise in food safety, food sovereignty, and their application in tribal communities. Collaborative involvement of a local Extension Agent will ensure that project activities are coordinated with agricultural extension efforts of the University of Hawaii system.

Animal Health Component

(N/A)

Research Effort Categories

Basic

(N/A)

Applied

(N/A)

Developmental

(N/A)

Classification

Knowledge Area (KA)	Subject of Investigation (SOI)	Field of Science (FOS)	Percent
903	6210	3020	100%

Knowledge Area
903 - Communication, Education, and Information Delivery;

Subject Of Investigation
6210 - Farmer cooperatives;

Field Of Science
3020 - Education;

Keywords

hawaii

food

safety

outreach

community-based

pilot

project

Goals / Objectives
Project Goals - Kokua Kalihi Valley (KKV) Hawaii Roots Food Safety Outrach Project will work towards the goal of enabling Hawaii's small and beginning producers, processors, and wholesalers to enhance the safety of their food products (including complying with FSMA regulations), while maintaining profitabiity, sustainability, and equity. Additionally, project activities will help to build the long-term capacity of our local food system to disseminate best practices through robust knowledge sharing networks and culturally-tailored outreach strategies.ObjectivesAssess the specific food safety education/training needs, learning preferences, and knowledge sharing networks of Hawaii`s ethnically diverse, small and beginning farmers, processors, and wholesalers.Develop a community-based, FSMA-consistent food safety curriculum and pilot its delivery to 80 individuals through on-farm training sessions facilitating peer networking and knowledge sharing.Disseminate 5 new food safety education/training materials and delivery methodology to 10 local stakeholder organizations and 300 individuals for broader implementation throughout Hawaii.

Project Methods
MethodsStakeholder Involvement - KKV will be accountable to diverse groups of stakeholdrs for this project, beginning first and foremost with our target audience of Hawaii's ethnically diverse, small and beginning farmers, processors and wholesalers. In order to develop effective, culturally-tailored knowledge dissemination strategies that have a far-reaching impact, this project will begin with an assessment of the target audience's food safety education/training needs, learning preferences, and knowledge sharing networks. Methodology will include individual/group interviews and a survey of growers, which are to be designed and implemented by collaborating CTAHR Extension Agent Fred Reppun. Mr. Repun has committed to a collaborative role in the project in order to align activities with on-going food safety extension activities of the University of Hawaii system. Additionally, Mr Reppun will work with KKV's Mobile Market Manager to survely local food retailers (e.g. grocery stores, retaurants, farmers markets) in order to understand the market forces impacting food safety issues faced by our target audience and invite participation from retail stakeholders in this project.KKV will host a gathering of its food hub that will be open to the public in order to announce the project and facilitate dialogue of target audience needs, social networks, and learning preferences. This event will also serve as a way to initiate input and participation form other stakeholders throughout the life of the project, including local farmers unions and associations, consumers in our community, and Hawaii enforcement agencies such as the Department of Agriculture and Department of Health. A particularly strong source for target audience engagement are KKV's 19 food hub vendors supplying our cafe, catering, and farmers market operations. These are all small and/or beginning businesses run by individuals from a range of educational levels and ethnicities, including indigenous Native Hawaiians and other Asian/Pacific Islander immigrants. Included in this group are many produce farmers utilizing organic agricultural systems and providing access to culturally-important foods, processors of local value-added products, and suppliers of local eggs, fish, beef, and venison. KKV's close relationships and regular contact with its food hub vendors will provide access to a reliable sample target audience that can be engaged on an on-going basis to provide valuable qualitative feedback during all all needs assesment, planning, implementation, and evaluation phases of the project. This project's participatory process will also be ensured through the reporting of needs assessment results back to stakeholders, soliciting coments on the outline of the new curriculum, and incorporating feedback from participants of pilot food safety training/networking sessins into curriculum modifications on and on-going basis.Proposed Activities and Techniques - Project activities will focus on developing a comunity-based, FSMA-consistent food safety curriculum and piloting it through four training sessions emphasizing culturally-tailored strategies for faciltating dialogue, peer networking and knowledge exchange around food safety.Recent studies have found that farmers consider social and exeriential learning pathways to be more useful than formal approaches and traditional extension activities involving one-way transfer of knowledge from experts/universities to pracitioners (Hoffman e al., 2015). Growers value information shared interpersonally by their peers, prefer learning grounded in practical experience (and thatis preferably on-going), and develop knowledge through specific application of principles rather than being provided with uniform concepts and generalizations (Wood et al., 2014). As a result, delivery of customized food safety curriculum through a networked approach is promising and this project's methodolgoy will emphasize the following areas:Understanding knowledge sharing networks among the target audience, including who/where to go for information, and potential strategies for activating individuals who have a high number of networking/knowledge sharing relationships (e.g. train-the-trainer, engaging early adopters, incentivizing sharing knowledge with peers.)Creating spaces and opportunities for relationship-building and peer exchange that are culturally appropriate and responsive to the social learning preferences of the target audience. In Hawaii, this may mean following cultural protocols to introduce ourselves to one another and open and close any training/networking sessions, sharing food and stories in an informal family-friendly atmosphere, or other appropriate opportunities to initiate dialogue and reciprocity.Exploring experiential learning activites for potential incorporation into food safety curriculum training sessions, such as conducting education on-farm/on-site, hands-on training on relevant FSMA compliance responsibilities (e.g. labeling, record-keeping, testing of agricultural water or refrigerated trucks), mock food safety audits, encouraging peer visits to one another's operations, etc. Since all of these options cannot be tested through this small project, those learning activities most preferred by the target audience and feasible within the parameters of this project will be selected for piloting.Evaluation of Outreach and Education Activities - At the end of each of the four pilot food safety training/networking sessions, written surveys will be administered to collect participant demographics, qualitative feedback, and self-reported evaluation data in a variety of areas. For example, the latter may assess knowledge gained about FSMA compliance requirements applicable to their business, increases in access to peer knowledge sharing networks, ratings on the usefulness of training on food safety practices received, etc. The project team will aslo debrief together after each of the four pilot sessions in order to guide continued refinement of the curriculum and documentation of best practices/lessons learned. Lastly, collaborating CTAHR Extension Agent Fred Reppun will conduct follow-up interviews with participants to gather more in-depth, qualitative feedback for the evaluation of the project.Dissemination of Results - Project results, including curriculum materials, documentationofpiloted delivery methodology, and lessons/best practices learned will be open to the public and disseminate as widely as possible to stakeholders.Potential Challenges and Limitations - Several challenges and limitations may arise due to the short, one-year period of this project. Timely and accurate curriculum devlopment activities for this pilot project depend, in part, on finalizing standardized FSMA training curriculum materials and launching of the Produce Safety Alliance's training program. We plan to engage in a participatory process to guide the design and development of the new curriculum, which may call for multiple, time-intensive iterations of dialogue and requires flexibility to respond to needs/opportunities identified by the target audience needs and consider stakeholder input previously not foreseen. Recruiting small farms, processors and wholesale operators to participate in training/networking sessions is typically challenging due to their already heavy workloads.Tracking actual changes in behavior among participants is not feasible during this short one-year performance.

Progress 09/01/16 to 11/30/17

Outputs
Target Audience:We were able to reach projected numbers of our target audience. We began our project by assessing the base knowledge of the farmers in our food hub, suppliers to our local farmers markets, and suppliers to the cafe in our Wellness Center. Staff visited the local farmers markets across Oahu and talked with the vendors. Our extension agent reached out to his colleagues on the different islands. Results showed that there was not just a lack of knowledge on the FSMA guidelines, but a fear of the unknown. Many were very apprehensive onhow the guidelines would affect them. Some were wary of attending our sessions. Our target number was 80. We estimate about 87 attended our sessions. We held five trainings with four of them being on farms or agricultural sites. Some of the attendees chose not to fill out our short evaluation form and/or not sign in. We did not push them. Our attendess were; Ethnically diverse, small and beginning farmers, including native Hawaiian and other Asian/Pacific Islander immigrants. Many of our farmers are utilizing organic agricultural systems and indigenous knowledge in the planting, harvesting and preparation of their produce. A handful of farmers are producers of our culturally relevant foods, many of which are hard to find in the local supermarket. One local hatchery Backyard aquaponics growers Producers Community organizations vested in the products and/or the producers Extension agents Our culturally modified FSMA curriculum booklet was sent electronically to individuals and organizations. Our progected goal was 300 and we estimate that it will reach a minimum of 900 people. Following are the organizations that received and are passing on the their members and organizations that they work with. University of Hawaii Cooperative Extension - with offices on 5 major islands Hawaii Farm Union United Hawaii Farm Bureau Soil and Water Conservation District Oahu Resources Conservation and Development Kamehameha Schools - sent to all of their land managers. They are one of the largest landowners in Hawaii and lease out agricultural lands on several islands Ulupono Initiative Ma`o Organic Farm Go Farm Native Agriculture Foos System Initiative - consists of 86 Native Organizations Link included on our website at rootskalihi.com Changes/Problems: Nothing Reported What opportunities for training and professional development has the project provided?Considerable time was spent listening to the farmers and producers we worked with and trying to develoop FSMA trainings that would work in our island culture and economy. Many of those we spoke heard about the FSMA guidelines, but they did not know much about them. A large percentage were worried that the guidelines may adversely affect their ability to continue their style of farming and/or adversely affect their income. In addition to interviewing members of our food hub, and suppliers of our cafe and local farmers markets, staff members visited farmers markets around the island informing and inviting the famersl vending at these sites. We held 5 trainings on three of our islands that make up the chain of Hawai`i; 3 on Oahu, 1 on Kaua`i and 1 on Lana`i. We had 87attendees total although we were able to collect only 81 survey sheets. Several attendees needed to leave before the surveys were handed out and a couple of them chose not to complete surveys. Our training team consisted of our curriculum developer, extension agent, native American Food Safety lawyer, project director, water expert, outreach staff. At least 4 members of the team were at each training. Each training started with a dinner of locally sourced ingredients. We tried to use produce from farmers that would be attending, and farms that we were hollding the trainings at. Attendees really enjoyed having their food items featured and appreciated the time to socialize with others in the same or related businesses. O`ahu is our most developed island. While there are still rurual and agricultural lands, we have over 1 million people living on this island. We have have a range of farms, from big corporate to small and local . Our first training was held at Roots Cafe in Kokua Kalihi Valleys Wellness Center. This location is centrally located and was attended by 19 people (18 surveys completed) Our second training was held at Kahumana Organic Farm inWai`anae on the West side of the island which is considered more rural and of a lower socioeconomic stratus. We were hoping to reach farmers out there who do not regularly engage in these types of events. We had 21 attendees with 15 surveys completed. Our third training was held at Mohala Farms, another rural areaon the North side of the island. There were 15 attendees with 13 surveys filled out. Kaua`iis our 4th largest island and is the northenmost in the Hawaiian island chain. Over 90% of the island is used for conservation and agriculture. This training was held at Kilauea Ag Park Complex. It is a 75 acre parcel that houses community farm plots. Participants were a mix of long time residents and newer arrivals not originally from Hawaii. There were 16 attendees with 12 surveys completed. This was our hardest audience, with a large number who were very skeptical of government guidelines. Lana`i- is the smallest inhabited island in the Hawaiian chain. It is avery tight knit community with a population just over 3,000. It is the only island that is 97% owned by a private individual, Larry Ellison. He purchased the island in 2012. Our training was held in a tent in the backyard home of island pig farmers. It was attended by 16 individuals with diverse involvement in the lana`i food system. Fourteen surveys were completed. Overall results Learned something new Yes - 71 No - 1 Willing to share information with other farmers Yes - 72 No - 0 How much produce sales do you make a year Under $25,000 - 51 Over $25,000 - 17 N/A - 4 How much food sales do you make a year Under $500,000 - 60 Over $5000,000 - 3 N/A - 9 Q + A period and discussion After the formal training section, we held a question and answer period that included our indigenous food safety and water rights experts along with our extension agent and curriculum developer. There are the questions and topics that cam up. Access and regulations around water, especially taro as a significantly important cultural crop that is grown in running water and always cooked before eaten. This topic came up at every training. Accessibility of animals on the prperty. Soil Testing Compost usage Land access Large percentage of GMO crops in Hawai`i Organic certification There were really good and robust discussions after every training. Many told us that they were glad they attended and they were appreciative that the guidelines were presented in a very understandable way.. How have the results been disseminated to communities of interest?Our curriculum has been very well received and many have volunteered to help disseminate and to continue to disseminate even after the projects end.Our culturally modified FSMA curriculum booklet was sent electronically to individuals and organizations. For many, it was the first time they saw the guidelines simplified and written specifically for a local audience. We projected dissemination to 300 and we believe it will reach at least 900 individuals based on the feedback and plans of those who have received. Following are the organizations that received and are passing on the their members and organizations that they work with. University of Hawaii Cooperative Extension - with offices on 5 major islands Hawaii Farm Union United Hawaii Farm Bureau Soil and Water Conservation District Oahu Resources Conservation and Development Kamehameha Schools - sent to all of their land managers. They are one of the largest landowners in Hawaii and lease out agricultural lands on several islands Ulupono Initiative Ma`o Organic Farm Go Farm Native Agriculture Foos System Initiative - consists of 86 Native Organizations Link included on our website at rootskalihi.com Following is a response we recieved - "I am sharing it with all of our GoFarm Coaches - to share with their site network of students (including past participants and present participants all the way up through Agincubator), and will also be incorporating it in to our AgSchool Food Safety lesson. As for # of potentially reached people, I would offer an estimate of 200 people, which will continue expanding into the future as it reaches coming students." What do you plan to do during the next reporting period to accomplish the goals? Nothing Reported

Impacts
What was accomplished under these goals? Interview with Produce Buyers- We began our work by visiting a variety of produce buyers. We interviewed 3 grocery stores, 4 distributors, and 1 food processor. Summary and Conclusions -The food safety practices of produce buyers on O'ahu are somewhat dictated by what their customers want. Large food distributors and processors must pass stringent audits of their own facilities to secure the large contracts that sustain their businesses, and are often pressured to conduct some form of supplier verification. Grocery stores vary more in their attention to food safety, depending on their size and the kind of customers they cater to. Many buyers feel helpless to change the momentum in the market toward more stringent food safety standards, but they still have some control over how they negotiate food safety practices with their farm suppliers. Most do site visits, but checklists are used loosely. They tend to look for the most obvious signs of risk, such as poor chemical storage, pest infestations, and general lack of cleanliness and organization. More attention is focused on the packing facility than the field. Although most buyers predict increasing food safety requirements for their suppliers in the next five years, the demand for certain products will probably influence how strictly buyers enforce their requirements. Buyers are largely unconcerned about FSMA, as they feel their own requirements are already more strict, and that they will turn to mainland suppliers if local farms are unable to comply with FSMA. Buyers have a wide range of opinions about what the State government should be doing regarding food safety, from setting and enforcing minimum requirements to bearing the entire burden of training farmers as a way to keep agriculture competitive in the State. The buyers mentioned the following values, which seemed to have a major impact on how the company interacted with its suppliers,(number of buyers mentioning each theme is given in parentheses);consistency of supply (5),produce quality (5)time from harvest to delivery,liability (3),concern for customer health (2),local (1),organic (1). Legal liability relating to food safety was a major concern for certain buyers. Some buyers talked about their large customers not wanting to be the "deep pocket" in lawsuits, and that this was the motivation behind the food safety certification programs being passed backward along the supply chain. Four of the buyers preferred that their suppliers show some form of food safety plan, policies, or product flow diagram. In addition, one grocery store asked its suppliers to submit their organic certification plan if they had one. Curriculum Development -The process of developing our curriculum involved; attending FSMA training interviewing local farmers,processors and wholesalers researching specific food safety needs in Hawaii recent outbreaks of rat lungworm disease culturally important foods with unique growing conditions year round growing season invasive species such as mongoose animals considered domestic elsewhere but wild here (cats, chickens) developing visuals for better retention and understanding developing prompts to promote dialogue and knowledge sharing This information was used to develop two sets of curricula; A 30 page FSMA Guide for Hawaii Growers incorporating local issues, visuals and prompts 12 page Food Safety Guide. Each page could be a stand alone handout for trainings if needed. 1. Food Safety and Best Practices 2. Workers and Visitors 3. Raw Manure 4. Animals 5. Rat Lungworm Prevention 6. Agricultural Water 7. Packing Area 8. Tools and Equipment, Transportation 9. Record Keeping 10. Writing a Food Safety Plan Trainings- We held 5 trainings reaching 87 members of our target audience. These will be explained in detail in the next section. Dissemination- We were able to disseminate to approximately 900 individuals. Our dissemination strategy will also be explained more in a following section.

Publications