A recipe for food-industry growth?

FOOD FOR THOUGHT: Daniele Inc. co-owner Davide Dukcevich gives a tour of the facility to Providence-Warwick Convention & Visitors Bureau Vice President of Marketing and Communication Kristen Adamo, left, and President Martha Sheridan. The bureau is looking to find ways to partner around the idea of enhancing the state’s “foodie” reputation. / PBN PHOTO/RUPERT WHITELEY
FOOD FOR THOUGHT: Daniele Inc. co-owner Davide Dukcevich gives a tour of the facility to Providence-Warwick Convention & Visitors Bureau Vice President of Marketing and Communication Kristen Adamo, left, and President Martha Sheridan. The bureau is looking to find ways to partner around the idea of enhancing the state’s “foodie” reputation. / PBN PHOTO/RUPERT WHITELEY

A growing belief Rhode Island can become the “Silicon Valley of food” is fueling new collaborations and community discussions that have the potential to catalyze business growth, industry leaders say.
Known for its award-winning chefs, restaurants and ethnic cuisine, particularly in Providence, which was recently named by Movoto Real Estate as America’s most exciting midsized city, Rhode Island’s love affair with food crops up everywhere in an ecosystem that spans farming, fishing, education, business innovation and corporate growth – along with movements focused on buying local, food access and food security.
“What you’re really seeing is, our community is at a golden moment in terms of momentum, and an emerging understanding of the impact that food companies can make in the U.S.,” said Allan Tear, a Betaspring co-founder who two years ago gave the idea a boost when he launched RallyRI, a project funded by the Rhode Island Innovation Fellowship.
With food as one of four areas of focus, the momentum for RallyRI “really picked up” with Daniele Inc. co-owner Davide Dukcevich’s declaration of the idea of the state as a “culinary valley” early last year, Tear added.
“It’s the right time in the country,” Tear added. “It’s the right time in Rhode Island, and it plays to our strengths. It’s already more than an idea. While people are in the talking stage, people are also doing.”
Transforming Rhode Island into a “culinary valley” will be part of a May 28 Food Matters community conversation series hosted by the Rhode Island Food Policy Council entitled: “How to grow a local food system: Rhode Island-based food businesses share their stories.”
“Rhode Island has all these advantages of geography, entrepreneurs and great food,” said Food Matters co-host Melina Packer, chairwoman of the work group for a thriving food economy. The question to be asked is: “How can we foster this culinary valley in a way that both contributes to the state economy and proves equitably beneficial to all Rhode Islanders?” she said.
Upcoming events such as the April 24-27 Rhode Island Eat Drink RI Festival, following closely on the heels of the 2014 American Culinary Federation Northeast Regional Conference that was held April 11-14 in Warwick and Providence, reflect the vibrant scene here for consumers and chefs alike. Connecting the dots in the state’s culinary landscape even extends to the latest addition to Rhode Island’s corporate landscape, Greencore USA, an international food manufacturer, coming to North Kingstown with up to 400 jobs. And there’s the Food Innovation Nexus, an independent nonprofit funded by Johnson & Wales University that is poised to explore innovation at the intersection of food and medicine.
Tear said Dukcevich, the charcuterie owner in Burrillville, is helping sharpen focus on the strengths and food innovators in Rhode Island’s food ecosystem.
“We maybe went overboard with the video game investment [in 38 Studios],” Dukcevich explained.
“We are a culinary valley. The pieces are here. We have [Johnson & Wales University] feeding all these great restaurants and contributing to this vibrant culinary scene,” he said.
On Jan. 21 and again April 4, U.S. Sen. Jack Reed hosted a roundtable with restaurateurs and others in the food industry, discussing everything from economic development and health care to hunger and nutrition. One of the experts with the Rhode Island Democrat was Dr. Michael Fine, director of the R.I. Department of Health.
“We produce 1 percent of the food we consume,” said Fine on April 4. “If we produced 10 percent, we could add 4,000 to 5,000 jobs. I don’t think we spend anywhere near enough time thinking about the local economic development that comes from the food industry.”
Without any dedicated funding, branding or marketing as yet, Dukcevich and Tear said they are “building relationships” that will seek to expand Rhode Island’s identity as a center for the business of food.
Over the next 12 months, Tear said he would like to see a permanent, year-round market in Providence, an organized network for food producers and more food businesses and startups in the state. A Food Innovation Summit held last summer will be repeated this year, he said.
Tear’s vision could become reality in, if not the next year, the next three years, since David Dadekian, whose Eat Drink RI LLC and its website EatDrinkRI.com have become the hub for the festival of the same name, won a $300,000 innovation fellowship from the Rhode Island Foundation to build a “central market” in Rhode Island. Meantime, a mix of business owners and hospitality advocates are conjuring their own ideas and considering collaborating.
Robin Squibb, founder of the 5-year-old Granny Squibb’s Iced Tea, which currently transports its products to be bottled in New Jersey, is also part of the ongoing conversation. Squibb envisions shelf stickers in the supermarket aisles that would label about 150 products made locally with a Rhode Island label. Boosting the state’s food reputation has become a common goal, she said.
“There’s an awful lot of energy out there,” Squibb said. “There are enough of us excited about it – we just might be able to pull it off.”
While the Rhode Island Hospitality Association has been actively promoting “food tourism” here over the past several years, according to President and CEO Dale J. Venturini, new and longtime industry business owners and spokespeople alike say they’re ready for more – more promotion, more support, more incentives and more connections within and beyond state borders.
“It’s a fantastic time to position Rhode Island as the next food hub,” said Amanda C. Becker, director of marketing and communications for Hope & Main, the state’s first food-business incubator opening with as many as 30 startups this summer in a renovated school building in Warren.
Federico Manaigo, the Brooklyn, N.Y.-based developer of Rooms and Works, a $6.5 million culinary incubator with a residential component proposed for Providence’s West End, says the potential for universities to funnel chefs and trade startups to his project was one of the attractions to Providence.
Kristen Adamo, vice president of marketing and communications at the Providence-Warwick Convention & Visitors Bureau, said her organization is beginning to meet with companies like Daniele Inc. and find ways to partner around the idea of enhancing the state’s foodie reputation.
“Because we’ve been doing all this marketing on the leisure side of our efforts, we’re seeing meeting and conventions come to Providence that are food related,” she said.

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