'Food hubs' spur local produce sales

By WEI YU
Capital News Service
LANSING – Detroit schoolchildren are eating more fresh Michigan-grown vegetables and fruit. Betti Wiggins, director of operations for food service at the Detroit Public Schools, said she started working with a local food hub about two years ago. Now the school system serves meals to about 45,000 students a day, and they include at least half a cup of fresh fruit and half a cup of vegetables, she said. “Because I have 130 schools, it’s about supply chain management, and that’s how I started to work with Detroit’s Eastern Market,” said Wiggins. “Our school and the Eastern Market have developed a crop plan – planned production by local farmers.