Adding Value to Plant Production: An Overview
“Value-added agriculture” is a broad term encompassing many practices that increase the value of farm products. Value-added agriculture has come to describe practices as varied as agritourism activities that provide consumers value from visiting a farm to large-scale processing endeavors that create mass-market retail food products from commodity crops.
Defining Value-added
According to the USDA definition, value-added agricultural products are characterized by one or more of the following criteria: a change in the physical state or form of the product; the production of a product in a manner that enhances its value, as demonstrated through a business plan; the physical segregation of a commodity or product in a manner that results in the enhancement of the value of that commodity.
Understanding the Value Chain
Another way of defining value-added crop production is to simply state that adding value is the “process of changing or transforming a product from its original state to a more valuable state.” The term used to describe the movement of crops or other products from an original to a more valuable state is “value chain.” A value chain is a way of thinking about how a crop begins a value transformation after it leaves its place of production. There are four major ways that value is added to crops along the value chain: product transformation, distribution, storage, and added service.
CCD Adding Value to Plant Production: An Overview
CCD Market Research for Value-added Products
CCD An Introduction to Policies & Regulations for Kentucky Producers
CCD Adding Value to Plant Production: A Summary of Kentucky Products
CCD Selected Resources for Developing Value-added Products in Kentucky