UC Santa Cruz Center for Agroecology Champions Strong Regional Food Economy with CA Food Hub Convening

The Issue

Through the Southwest Regional Food Business Center (SWRFBC), we have initiated a statewide effort to support and connect food hub stakeholders across California. Improving coordination among California’s food hub stakeholders is critical to advancing a sustainable, equitable, and resilient regional food system. As the landscape of food hubs continues to evolve—with innovative models, diverse economic strategies, and growing demand for regional supply chain infrastructure—effective coordination ensures that these efforts are aligned, efficient, and impactful. Current challenges, such as fragmented communication, duplicated efforts, and limited shared infrastructure, often hinder the scalability and long-term sustainability of food hubs. By strengthening coordination, we create opportunities for shared learning, resource pooling, and strategic partnerships that better serve farmers, enterprises, and communities alike.

Our Response

In alignment with the SWRFBC’s core goals of building stronger regional food economies, increasing market access for small and mid-sized food producers, and strengthening the middle of the supply chain, we organized the CA Food Hub Convening, with over 30 food hubs from across the state of California that are currently operating—or are in the process of developing. This event also brought together over 100 stakeholders including NGOs, CDFA, UC ANR and cooperative extension, individual farm businesses, as well as some institutional and wholesale buyers.

This convening is a timely and essential step toward unifying stakeholders across the state. It provides a space to share lessons from recent regional efforts—such as those from the Central Coast gathering at Stanford—and to build a collective foundation as CDFA prepares to release the California Food Hub grant in the coming months. Through intentional collaboration, we can foster innovative solutions that bridge gaps in the middle of the supply chain and ensure that food hubs continue to serve as engines of local economic development, food access, and climate resilience.

Our Impact

The CA Food Hub Convening served as a platform for collaboration, knowledge sharing, and strategic planning to address the common challenges and opportunities faced by food hubs statewide. These efforts required multiple months to plan with our SWRFBC CA based partners to bring together a diverse group of stakeholders to:

• Engage directly with the operational challenges faced by food hub practitioners.
• Share timely updates and efforts across food hub market partners.
• Foster ideation, communication, and planning to advance the development of California’s food hub ecosystem.

By bringing key stakeholders together in one place, this convening supported collective planning around CDFA’s Farm to Community Food Hubs Program, which is offering up to $13.75 million in competitive grant funding. In Fall 2025, many regional food hub affiliates from the Central Coast convened at Stanford University to deepen their understanding of these emerging models. Building on that momentum, this statewide convening ahead of the CDFA RFP release in Winter 2025 elevated strategic efforts and encouraged knowledge sharing to support the next phase of food hub development across California.

This event’s efforts leverage SWRFBC’s regional network to support food hubs not just locally, but statewide. By convening stakeholders from different regions, we are promoting a systems-level dialogue that has rarely occurred at this scale. The collaboration also builds on prior gatherings, such as the Fall 2025 Stanford convening, and extends that momentum to align with upcoming state funding awards through CDFA’s Food hub grants.

Moreover, we are fostering cross-sector partnerships between food hubs, community-based organizations, and government agencies—all with the shared goal of building a more sustainable, equitable food system in California.