HarvestHub App Revolutionizes Supply Chain and Mitigates Food Insecurity

Food Safety Information

Introduction

The HarvestHub app, developed by NCSA’s team of genomics experts and visual analytics group in collaboration with Google and MarketMaker, aims to optimize food distribution and significantly reduce food insecurity by efficiently connecting farmers with food banks.

Main Summary

The COVID-19 pandemic infiltrated nearly every aspect of society and life in 2020, even in ways people might not have immediately expected. Stores that normally have no trouble stocking shelves struggled to keep up with the sudden demand for cleaning supplies, plus everything from toilet paper to Sriracha chili sauce.

While these issues are not as devastating as the broader health ramifications, they did shed new light on supply chain weaknesses and how that system adapts to rapid and broad market changes. Factory closures and reduced production, increased demand for specific types of goods, labor shortages, and transportation hurdles were just a few of the many obstacles manufacturers faced as they tried to get their products into the hands of consumers during one of the most challenging times in world history.

These supply chain issues highlighted the importance of creating more resilient, flexible and diversified strategies to better withstand unforeseen disruptions.

HarvestHub, a mobile app developed by a team at the National Supercomputing Applications Center within the Center for Digital Agriculture, will repair COVID-damaged supply chains, help farmers increase production and get food to families in need. The app was recognized at the Farm Credit MarketMaker Innovation Awards ceremony during the 2023 National Agricultural Marketing Summit in Arlington, Virginia, which honored the outstanding efforts of state and local MarketMaker collaborations across the country that contribute to the development of local and regional food systems and help farmers connect with new market opportunities.

In collaboration with Google and MarketMaker, NCSA helped develop HarvestHub to make it easier for farmers to donate or sell surplus produce to local food assistance programs. The app will serve as a tool to support a Farm to Food Bank pilot project led by Farm Bureau in Illinois and, ultimately, for all MarketMaker affiliate partners.

“Our team designed HarvestHub to serve as a tool to help with the complex landscape of food safety,” said Christina Fliege, director of genomics at NCSA. “By connecting consumers and producers directly with each other, we enable them to conduct these negotiations directly to streamline this process.”

With HarvestHub, food producers can move their surplus and secondhand products at a price they set. Food assistance programs—from major food banks to soup kitchens, pantries, and more—can coordinate directly with them.

The NCSA team interviewed farmers and food bank representatives to discuss initial parameters of the app to ensure the functionality would be useful to all stakeholders.

“We use a bottom-up approach where we work closely with users (in this case, community members) to understand their daily lives, the problems they face, and the needs that are not being addressed by the current system. We continue to work with community members throughout the design and development process, gathering feedback and integrating it into the digital product.” – Jessica Saw, NCSA Research Scientist.

While the recognition is certainly a valuable acknowledgement of the team’s efforts, Fliege is primarily focused on the potential impact HarvestHub could have on local communities and beyond.”

“It was really exciting to receive the Innovation Award and meet the other finalists and their projects,” Fliege said. “There’s a lot of really interesting work being done in this space right now. We’re all very grateful that our work has been recognized and very excited to see its potential impact come to fruition.”

Center for Digital Agriculture (CDA)

The Center for Digital Agriculture (CDA) leverages the historic pillars of Illinois land-grant agriculture and engineering to shape the future of the agricultural industry. The center brings together researchers, educators, agricultural and industry producers to transform how we feed and support a growing global population through innovative approaches. CDA also features a Master of Engineering in Digital Agriculture and six certificate programs that address the deep workforce shortage in this field by providing graduates and practicing professionals with deep knowledge and technical skills.

CDA is a multidisciplinary effort at the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign between the Grainger College of Engineering, the College of Agricultural, Consumer and Environmental Sciences, the National Center for Supercomputing Applications, and the Institute for Genomic Biology. CDA also leads the Artificial Intelligence Institute for Future Agricultural Resilience, Management and Sustainability (AIFARMS), which is supported by the USDA National Institute of Food and Agriculture and the National Science Foundation.

Attribution/Source(s):

This peer-reviewed publication was selected for publication by the editors of Disabled World due to its high relevance to the disability community. Original author: National Center for Supercomputing Applicationsand published on 13/07/2024, the content may have been edited for style, clarity or brevity. For further details or clarifications, National Center for Supercomputing Applications She can be contacted at uillinois.edu. NOTE: Disabled World does not offer any warranty or endorsement related to this item.

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Cite this page (APA): National Center for Supercomputing Applications. (July 13, 2024). HarvestHub app revolutionizes supply chain, mitigates food insecurity. Disabled worldRetrieved July 15, 2024 from www.disabled-world.com/fitness/nutrition/foodsecurity/harvesthub.php

Permanent link: HarvestHub app revolutionizes supply chain and mitigates food insecurity: The HarvestHub app aims to streamline food distribution and significantly reduce food insecurity by efficiently connecting farmers with food banks.

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