Welcome to Veggie Compass.  This ongoing effort involves the development of methods, data repositories, tools and training directed to diversified organic vegetable growers in order to help them improve their decision making, conduct whole farm planning and the maximize    profitability of their operations.  Accomplishments to date include the collection of farm yield and labor data and documentation of associated grower practices as well as development of a comprehensive spreadsheet entitled Veggie Compass 1.0 that guides growers through farm data analysis and decision making.  The effort has also resulted in the establishment of an outreach plan for the Midwest region through the development of ongoing, supportive communities of practice as well as grower workshops, presentations at organic farming conferences, and webinars.

Overall, this body of work has already provided economic and social benefit for participating organic farmers, assisting them in making effective business decisions that increase their efficiency and profitability as well as effectively managing their labor pools. Ongoing efforts intended to further advance the Veggie Compass mission include growth in volume of farm yield and labor data for use in baseline and comparative analysis as well as the design and development of Veggie Compass 2.0, which will improve the spreadsheet application with a formal database application whose use will be highly intuitive to organic vegetable farmers in the context of their daily operations and workflow.

For further information about the Veggie Compass initiative, contact Paul Mitchell at pdmitchell@wisc.edu.