The Covid-19 pandemic has brutally exposed weaknesses in our food chain. Problems existed before, but the coronavirus pandemic has revealed vulnerabilities that continuously threaten to collapse our food supply chains. This is the time to take a look at the entire food system upon which we rely. There are problems to consider at multiple levels in the food chain. Producers (small and medium size) are at the very bottom of the supply chain, trying to run a profitable business to survive. They have to market and sell their products through the two main channels that exist; producers can sell products either to distributors, or directly to consumers through farmer’s markets and community-supported agriculture (CSA). In some regions, direct producer-to-institution sales have been increasing, but this usually requires the producer to take on additional tasks.
