November 20, 2016 (Hawaii Tribune-Herald)—Farmers, even farmers-in-training, operate on different schedules. On a sunny morning late last fall in Honokaa, downtown Mamane Street was quiet. But up the road on Plumeria Street, a group was filing into a small room of the North Hawaii Education Resource Center.
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October 20, 2016 (Big Island Now)—A no-interest loan program created for Hawai‘i Island-based farmers and food producers is now available for qualified applicants throughout the Hawaiian Islands.
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October 4, 2016 (UC Food Observer)—Clare Gupta is a recent addition to the University of California academic ranks. She works as an assistant public policy specialist for the University of California. UC specialists like Clare hold dual appointments with a campus (in her case, UC Davis, where she’s on the faculty in the Department of Human Ecology) and UC’s Agriculture and Natural Resources Division Cooperative Extension Service.
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September 6, 2016 (West Hawaii Today)—How to increase food security and support local food production in Hawaii is a topic that’s on nearly everyone’s plate these days. In a state that can grow 365 days a year with favorable weather, water and soil, Hawaii grows only about 10 percent of what its residents and visitors eat. And an estimated 85 percent of all the food available in Hawaii’s supermarkets and restaurants at any given time is imported from 2,300 miles away or more.
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July 1, 2016 (West Hawaii Today)—As part of a three-day conference on the Kohala Coast this week, dozens of statewide representatives and Big Island partners gathered to brainstorm on local food production and how this key component of The Aloha+ Challenge can best be implemented statewide over the next 14 years.
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May 23, 2016 (Big Island Now)—Entrepreneurs striving to make a positive impact in communities on the Big Island and Moloka’i may be eligible for the Kahiau Rural Business Development Microloan Program, which is administered by the Kohala Center.
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May 2, 2016 (Honolulu Star-Advertiser)—Darren Strand, president of Maui Gold Pineapple Co., sells fresh and frozen pineapple to customers as far away as Japan, but getting Hawaii’s emblematic fruit into local public school cafeterias is a tougher order.
“It’s really frustrating to see how much pineapple they eat in the schools and none of it’s from Hawaii,” said Strand, whose company has 1,000 acres in cultivation. “So we’d like to fix that.”
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April 11, 2016 (West Hawaii Today)—Some brought leafy cuttings in gallon buckets, while others laid out baggies of tiny hot peppers and boxes of roots and tubers. Most brought seeds: squash seeds, pepper seeds, carrot seeds, herb seeds, and beans of all sorts, to name a few.
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October 14, 2015 (Maui Now)—The Kohala Center is offering a two-day workshop at Maui at the University of Hawai‘i Maui College on Nov. 6 and 7. to train new and seasoned fruit and vegetable growers to meet food-safety standards and the needs of wholesale markets. Register by Nov. 2.
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July 20, 2015 (West Hawaii Today)—It’s no surprise that participation in the federal Supplemental Nutritional Assistance Program increased after the recession began in 2008. But at the same time, more people have also chosen to use their food stamp benefits outside of the grocery store.
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