Iowa Secretary of Agriculture Mike Naig made a trip to a local school in Dallas County to celebrate “Iowa Local Food Day,” on Wednesday. 

Students at Meadowview Elementary were served a lunch that consisted of lasagna, salad and a scoop of apple crisp that was made from scratch and used locally grown or raised ingredients. Naig says the meat in the lasagna was locally raised and cheese from the state of Iowa, the apple crisp was served with locally grown apples and the salad was sourced within 20 miles of Adel. Naig tells Raccoon Valley Radio that more school districts should look local for their meals to help local farmers and the economy. 

“What you need is we can produce it, but who’s going to buy it? And if a school district is an institutional buyer, they buy in quantities that you can start to contract for. You can plan for it. You know, if I know a district wants a particular product, I can then plan for that in subsequent years. And so everybody wins in that scenario. So really what we’re trying to do is elevate the awareness about this that, yes, look local and then have our farmers know that, hey, you should be thinking about your school district and how you might be able to supply them.”

Naig says that 30 other locations including schools, childcare centers and universities celebrated Iowa Local Food Day by serving at least items with locally grown ingredients. Iowa Governor Kim Reynolds has proclaimed September 27 to be Iowa Local Food Day.