Community Food Enterprise: Local Success in a
Global Marketplace is the result of a partnership
between the Wallace Center at Winrock
International and the Business Alliance for Local
Living Economies (BALLE), and is jointly funded
by the W.K. Kellogg Foundation and the Bill &
Melinda Gates Foundation.
The study draws on detailed analyses of 12
U.S. and 12 international CFEs which include
food-related producers, processors, grocers,
restaurants, training programs and other
businesses. Each in-depth profile offers insight
into successes, challenges, and replicability,
as well as economic, social, and environmental
impacts.
Our research demonstrates how community food enterprises have transformed factors that
once stymied their performance and profitability—for example, smaller scale, modest ambition,
limited local ownership, and high social standards—into powerful competitive advantages vis-ŕ-vis
multinational food businesses. The final report identifies critical ways in which CFEs serve as
invaluable tools for economic development and anti-poverty efforts worldwide.
