"Latino Grower Cooperatives"

The Center for Latino Farmers has been instrumental in the facilitation of the development of two fruit cooperatives in the Pacific Northwest and plans to continue the facilitation of the cooperatives through the development of direct marketing relationships to ensure survival for Latino farmers in the marketplace.

Since most of the Latino farmers in Washington state are small and do not have the leverage to negotiate prices or means to sell their years harvest because they don’t have a packing facility, they have no choice but to hand it over to a large packing house for processing, packing and marketing. Due to the distortion in economic scale the risk is not shared equally as the packing facilities commonly secure their return on investment and then distribute the remnants to the farmers.

The process of fruit packing and distribution within large warehouses of the region reduces the marketability of the quality fruit produced by small farmers. That is why the step in evolution of the new and emerging Latino farmers is the understanding and participation in cooperatives as a marketing tool to maximize product revenue.

The Center is looking forward to working with Latino producers who want to participate in forming part of an Organic Cooperative in the Yakima area…

If you are interested in forming part of this new project, give us a call and get more information and/or answers to your questions…

(509)453-3157