During the pandemic we are starting to see some things that have been obvious to URFA and our supporters for some time now. For example, that a global food system is uncontrollable and many factors make it that way. It is unmanageable because it is a system built on national and even international lines of supply and transport, which under a catastrophe like COVID is totally vulnerable.

Despite Joe Buffone, director-general of Emergency Management Australia, saying that 'there was no food shortage, ... it's about staffing levels', supermarket shelves are empty in many products, including fresh produce and shoppers are turning to small, independent butchers and greengrocers for their fresh produce, who, while trying to source produce locally as much as possible, are increasingly turning to the centralised markets system to bridge the gap in supply. However, as Clive Erbacher of Erbacher's Fruit and Veg pointed out "Green cabbage I paid $3.50/kg yesterday and $5/kg today — beans I paid $4/kg on Tuesday, looking at $6–7 today. It just goes up and up all the time."

According to URFA, a regional food supply which is controlled by urban consumers, passionate about fresh, healthy, regional produce and supporting small businesses like Erbachers Fruit and Veg, experienced retailers like Mr Erbacher and his family, and regional farmers who are committed to cooperating to develop a regional food plan is what will make a regional food supply sustainable and manageable.

Sources and more info about the current situation: https://www.abc.net.au/news/rural/2022-01-08/buy-local-supermarket-fruit-vegetables-prices/100743822 and https://www.abc.net.au/news/2022-01-06/supermarket-shelves-bare-again-panic-buying-supply-chain/100739894 

URFA is an urban regional approach to a sustainable and manageable regional food system. Its focus allows control over a number of things: for example, the only controllable social and natural environment - our region. In the social environment it includes and empowers by building on primary relationships, creating more meaningful social business relationships through technology focussed on like-minded people in a region. In the natural environment, it allows for a more accurate understanding of supply and demand on the basis of what urban consumers, retailers and wholesalers and other food outlets actually want and posts the data to the regional food map. In this way, regional farmers can organise to supply not just staples but also develop new product lines.

The video below outlines the power of ESRI ArcGIS Mapping Tools and how we at URFA can see us and our teams using it to put Urban URFA supporters and Regional Farmers on the map. Using ArcGIS, URFA can provide not just a sustainable online market for Regional Farmers, Urban Consumers and Retailers and other Urban and Regional Foodies, we can use the data collected to create new product lines where farmers don't have to compete for the same market with same products, as well as creating a stable source of supply for staple product lines without the waste, and  get pre-paid a fair price for their products. 

Currently URFA is investigating a number of possibilities to move us further towards a real social/ business regional food system controlled by urban/ regional teams of four. One is the establishment of a Foundation Team of Four (made up of urban consumers and retailers and regional farmers). Another is to use GIS (Geographic Information Systems) such as ArcGIS and its mapping technology to provide a regional focus for information about regional farmers working with URFA, about urban supporters such as consumers, retailers, wholesalers and foodies in general, including a buying and selling system, and using the technology to communicate and organise so that the data captured is relevant and functional.