The Superior Grown Mission

In Northeastern Minnesota and Northwestern Wisconsin, we are blessed with the bounty of having a rich agricultural heritage with many unique, small-scale, sustainable family farms. Superior Grown recognizes this bounty and is working to reconnect people with our dedicated farmers. By partnering regional consumers, businesses, and producers, Superior Grown promotes a regional production system that helps to nurture vibrant communities, providing quality, nutritious food to citizens and strengthening local economies. 

Our Mission Statement:

“To strengthen and promote regional food and products in Northeastern Minnesota and Northwestern Wisconsin through sustainable production, distribution, and consumption”. 

By using the Superior Grown trademark as a marketing and educational tool, we:

• Create a unique identity for our regional producers;
• Connect consumers with area farmers, restaurants, retail businesses, grocery stores and co-ops;
• Increase consumer and market awareness and demand for local products;
• Provide technical facilitation and education to farmers, businesses, and consumers;
• Become a venue for businesses to connect with regional producers;
• Provide quality, fresh food to our service area;
• Enable our producers to retain a greater percentage of the food dollar;
• Keep food dollars within the local community;
• Reconnect consumers to their farming neighbors;
• Recognize producer efforts to become more environmentally friendly;
• Promote choice;
• Preserve the Northland’s agricultural heritage; and
• Give the food supply control back to the people.

Our Region

Superior Grown has a unique 16 county geographic area, helped defined by various factors, including: proximity to Lake Superior and the Lake Superior Basin; distinct environmental and climatic conditions of Northeastern MN and Northwestern WI; participation from stakeholders at regional events and food markets; and natural county lines. 

Areas involved in Superior Grown activity include:

Minnesota counties of: 

• Cook
• Lake
• Carlton
• St. Louis
• Itasca
• Koochiching
• Pine
• and Aitkin.

Wisconsin counties of: 

Superior Grown and Sustainability

Superior Grown works to balance and meet three long-term objectives simultaneously:

• Sustainable environmental practices work to enhance finite soil, water, air, wildlife, and other natural resources on our farmlands in Northeastern MN and Northwestern WI;
• Sustainable economic practices work to build profitability for our farmers, paying them more of the food dollar, and for our businesses committed to working with regional products, keeping more of the food dollar within the local economy;
• Sustainable social practices work to enhance the quality of life for farmers, citizens of our service area, and our region as a whole, satisfying personal, family, and community needs for health, safety, food, and happiness.

For Superior Grown, the most sustainable choice occurs when the net effect of our work enhances and brings together all three goals. We recognize that sustainable farming and food practices will vary for every farm, business, and community within our region. Hence, Superior Grown works to preserve management options most appropriate for individual situations while focusing project goals in ways that assure progress towards sustainable development ideas of strengthening and promoting environmental, economic, and social capital.

Why Superior Grown Food?

Superior Grown food and local products are a ‘Superior’ choice because they strive to be:

• Fresh and taste better. Food grown in your own community is usually picked within a day or two of sales. The fresh food is crisp, sweet, and loaded with flavor. 
  
• Retains its quality. The average distance food travels from farm to plate is 1,500 miles. With a week or longer delay from harvest to the dinner table, sugars turn to starches, plant cells shrink, and produce loses its vitality.
  
• Better for you. Once picked, produce looses nutrients quickly. Therefore, the fresher the produce, the more nutrients it provides. In fact, food hat is frozen or canned soon after harvest is actually more nutritious than some “fresh” produce that has been on a distribution truck or supermarket shelf for a week.
  
• Preserves genetic diversity. In contrast to the modern industrial agricultural system where few hybrid varieties of little genetic diversity are used, local farms grow a large number of varieties of fruits and vegetables. The diversity of plants found on family farms provides for a long season of harvest, an array of eye-catching colors, and the best flavors of produce. Many varieties are heirlooms, passed down from generation to generation, containing genetic material from hundreds and even thousands of years of human selection.
  
• Free of GMO, sub-therapeutic antibiotic, and growth hormone use in livestock and crop production.  Due to the potential consumer and environmental health implications, Superior Grown prohibits the use of genetically modified organisms, sub-therapeutic antibiotics, and growth hormones in participating livestock and produce operations.
   
  • View the Code of Quality Statement for more information on Superior Grown product criteria.
  • To learn more about GMOs, sub-therapeutic antibiotics, and growth hormones, visit Resources.  
     
• Supports local farm families. With fewer than 1 million Americans now claiming farming as their primary occupation, farmers are a vanishing breed. With commodity prices at a historic low, often below the cost of production, farmers now get less than 10 cents of the retail food dollar. Local farmers who sell direct to consumers and businesses cut out the middleman and get full retail price for their food, meaning, farm families can afford to stay on the farm, doing what they love.
  
• Builds community. When you buy direct from the farmer, you are re-establishing a time-honored connection. Knowing the farmers gives you insight into the seasons, the weather, and the miracle of raising food. In many cases, it gives you access to a farm where your children and grandchildren can go to learn about nature and agriculture. Relationships built on understanding and trust can thrive.
  
• Preserves open spaces. As the value of direct-marketing increases, selling farmland for development becomes less likely. The agricultural landscape will survive only as long as farms are financially viable. When you buy locally grown food, you are proactively preserving the farming landscape. 
  
• Supports a clean environment and benefits wildlife. A well-managed farm is a place where the resources of fertile soil and clean water are valued. Additionally, the patchwork of fields, meadows, woods, ponds, and buildings provides habitat for many species of wildlife.
  
• About the future. By supporting local farmers today, you can help ensure that there will be farms in your community tomorrow, and that future generations will have access to nourishing, flavorful, and abundant food.

The Superior Grown Code of Quality 

Superior Grown values the quality of local food and products. The Superior Grown Code of Quality was developed as a way to ensure that local food and products marketed with the Superior Grown label are fresh, healthy, and quality items that participating stakeholders (producers and businesses) are proud to be associated with and consumers want to buy. 

The Superior Grown Code of Quality and Criteria:

1.  “It is only good enough for your family, if it is good enough for mine”.

1. All products must be produced in Northeastern MN and Northwestern WI which includes all of Cook, Lake, Carlton, St. Louis, Itaska, Koochiching, Pine, Aitkin, Douglas, Bayfield, Ashland, Iron, Price, Sawyer, Washburn, and Burnett counties.  Processing of products may take place outside of the region if local processing is not available.
    
2. Products must be of good quality and meet all applicable state and/or federal regulations.
    
3. Products must be produced by a Superior Grown partner to use the Superior Grown trademark and/or product sticker.  Purchasing product from outside the region to sell with the Superior Grown trademark logo and/or product sticker will not be permitted, with only the exception of non-mainstay ingredients and materials in processed food or products.
    
4. Products must be produced under sustainable farming practices that enhance finite soil, water, air, wildlife, and other natural resources on our farmlands in Northeastern MN and Northwestern WI.
   
   Examples of such practices include but are not limited to:  crop rotation, use of cover crops, turning under green manure to increase soil tilth, using compost and manure to increase soil fertility, maintaining permanent waterways to prevent erosion, protecting water resources from contamination by chemical or sediment run-off, reducing irrigation needs by maximizing moisture management, and/or reducing or eliminating the use of pesticides.
    
5. Use of genetically modified organisms is not permitted in livestock and crop production.
   
   Official GMO Statement:  Superior Grown prohibits the use of GMOs in particating operations.  The presence of a detectable residue of a GMO product alone does not necessarily constitute a violation to Superior Grown.  As long as the participating operation has not intentionally used GMOs and takes reasonable steps to avoid contact with the products of GMOs, the unintentional presence of GMO products would not affect the status of a Superior Grown operation.
    
6. Use of animal by-products in livestock feed is not permitted.
   
   Official Animal By-Product As Part Of Feed Statement:  A participating Superior Grown producer must not feed mammalian or poultry slaughter by-products to mammals or poultry.
    
7. Livestock may not be given sub-therapeutic antibiotics, growth hormones, and other synthetic medications.
   
   Official Antibiotic and Synthetics Statement:  When preventative practices and veterinary biologics are inadequate to prevent sickness, a producer may administer synthetic medications, provided that, such medications are allowed under state and federal law.  In addition, a Superior Grown producer will not:
   
    
   1. Administer any animal drug, other than vaccinations, in absence of illness;
       
   2. Administer hormones for growth promotion;  
       
   3. Administer synthetic parasiticides on a routine basis;
       
   4. Administer synthetic parasiticides on slaughter stock;
       
   5. Administer animal drugs in violation of state and federal law; and
       
   6. Withhold medical treatment from a sick animal in an effort to preserve its compliance with Superior Grown.  All appropriate medications must be used to restore an animal to health when methods acceptable to Superior Grown fail.  Livestock treated with a prohibited substance must be clearly identified.
       
8. Livestock must be raised in healthy and humane living conditions.