19 May 2022
Praktijkverhalen
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Local Learning and Eating producers of vegetables, fruit, dairy, grain, fish and meat work together with Rendiz and people with a distance to the labor market to make elementary school pupils happy with fresh and healthy food. A beautiful initiative that arose from passion and the conviction that things can be done differently. But how can you do it differently? Local dairy producer Zuivel van Nu and Lerend-Eten, the link between the two, can tell us all about it.
Passion-driven initiative
"The time is ripe for something new." With that sentence Marianne Geurts opens the conversation. Together with John van Helden she initiated Lerend-Eten. An initiative that, among other things, strives for fair prices for growers in agriculture. Marianne: "We want to create an open and transparent system, where local growers and people with a distance to the labor market can build on a more beautiful world." About two years ago, with a few growers from different settings, they started looking at how they could realize this together. With the 'healthy school of the future' in South Limburg, Learning to Eat came to life.
"We want to create an open and transparent system, where local growers and people with a distance to the labor market can build a more beautiful world."
Moving Together
"Step by step we are going to discover how to get more potential out of each other. It starts with children and healthy food. We are moving together with different parties, such as Kokkerelli. Our goal is to keep strengthening this movement. Together with local suppliers we want to help people, in this case children, with healthy food. And involve people with a distance to the labor market in this," says Marianne.
Drives
Motivations that come together in Learning to Eat are: how can the chain be more honest, more transparent and in a natural way? Marianne: "Above all don't do anything too complicated. Just the way we did it before, but then in this day and age. From connection and open." That's not at all easy in this strategic society. But at Lerend-Eten everything is transparent, including the earnings model. The local supplier sets the price. "We want to be able to look at ourselves in the mirror. That is a very important 'why' for us. That the chain becomes round again, with the consumer or child in the middle. We hope to inspire others to start doing this together. Then you get these kinds of beautiful connections," says Marianne.
"We can make people experience the whole story that Learning to Eat wants to convey."
Modern livestock farming today
Modern livestock farming today
Zuivel van Nu is a local dairy producer in Velden (Venlo). On the farm, owners Mark van Lipzig & Ineke Haast offer the opportunity to consume pure products and get to know dairy and the farmer behind it. Ineke: "We can let people experience the whole story that Lerend-Eten wants to propagate. That is also entirely in line with our passion: bringing people closer to the source, showing them where dairy products really come from. That is very nice."
Farm atmosphere
Zuivel van Nu supplies dairy products to supermarkets, retail, catering and hospitals. But ultimately people like to come to the farm and are also willing to pay a little more. Ineke: "The farm atmosphere brings a completely different experience than the shelf in the store. The goodness of the farm and the countryside with the roots of the past, the origin, that's a step back to the past. How it used to be, the short chain. It's important that the right information gets to the students. Education doesn't always connect with what's happening here by a long shot. We think it's crucial to show how dairy processing is really done. That's not just about health, but also about why a product is healthy and fair."
This article is the first part of the story of Learning to Eat & Dairy of Now. Part 2 and part 3 will follow soon.
