Project History
The Foodprints and Foodsheds Project began as part of a larger U.S. Department of Agriculture Cooperative State Research, Extension, and Education Service initiative, “Mapping Local Food Systems Potential in New York State.” At its inception, the “Mapping Local Food Systems Project” was created to investigate the capacity of New York State to use its agricultural land to meet the food needs of its population centers. Through partnership with Cornell University, University of California at Davis, Salisbury University, Tufts University and the W.K. Kellogg Foundation, the project has grown to encompass Michigan, Mississippi and New Mexico in addition to New York.
Through the project, a collection of research tools were created using spreadsheet-based approaches, geographic information systems and linear optimization to answer questions about the capacity of land to meet human nutritional needs. These modeling approaches have been applied to answer questions about the capacity of specific states to supply population food needs from local and regional sources.
What is an Internet Map Server?
The Foodprints and Foodsheds Project Local Foodshed Mapping Tool is an Internet Map Server (IMS). An IMS is a tool that enables a person to create maps of geographic data through a web browser using geographic information system software (GIS). To create a map using an IMS, the user is required to access and use web browsing software but does not need to have technical knowledge of GIS.
Institutional Partners:
