Producers Trust: Supply Chain Connection

At its core, Producers Trust is about connecting people to their supply chain. We intend to leverage this heartfelt connection to inspire a global model that will empower farmers.
by on Monday, January 4, 2021

Uplifting Products with Data, Credibility, and Verification

Hands representing the supply chain connection
Connecting to the supply chain. Source: Producers Market’s producer Cairnspring Mills.

At its core, Producers Trust is about the connection to the supply chain. We intend to leverage this heartfelt bond to inspire a global model that will empower farmers with greater economic returns—and more awareness of their hard work. 

Our intention with Producers Trust is to bring to life our producers’ stories and their products’ journeys. Furthermore, we plan to validate these stories with immutable data and as much credibility and verification as we can muster, and then reach people everywhere through their smartphones. 

It’s an imperfect process to arrive at complete trust and validation. However, we believe that advances in digital technology around monitors, sensors, and data capture, combined with the wide-scale adoption of smartphones, will bring us closer to this goal. These technologies enable us to create scenarios in which frauding supply chain validations will be more expensive than just selling the outputs into conventional markets. 

The prevention of fraud in our system is as important as the stories that can shine in its absence. It is the root system of the proverbial supply chain tree. These roots sustain the strong trunk, the sheltering branches, and the beautiful leaves, flowers, and fruits. 

Digital tree of data capture
One of the Producers Trust‘s priorities is capturing data.

Producers Trust functions as the brain for a trusted central nervous system in which we organize and share the real-time bilateral movement of data and information across participating stakeholders. We hold the integrity of the system transparently and work to align our global community to shared values. 

Ultimately, we believe that if we want our food and agriculture systems to change, we as consumers must be willing to engage with products that align to our values. 

We eat, drink, wear, use, and move on, without a clue to the impact we have. Ignorance is an easy plea when we don’t understand complex supply chains. But what if we were no longer helpless? What if we could make informed decisions? What if we could actually get to know the people and communities we were impacting? 

When we bring trust and visibility to value chains—starting with uplifting stories and products with integrity—we begin to realize how powerful we really are. We understand that each product we consume, whether it’s food, clothing, accessories, or even energy, has a story. We wake up to the opportunity to do something meaningful for others, offered by each product we buy. This is a true supply chain connection.

Owning our responsibility as consumers, we can begin a new era of positive impacts on a long chain of stakeholders that includes ourselves, farmers, farm workers, and their environments and communities. 

Leaders from Cairnspring Mills actively participating in the supply chain
Transparency and verification are key to trust a product and organization. Source: Producers Market’s producer Cairnspring Mills.

To overcome our ignorance requires a certain level of understanding that we are indeed ignorant. Through our awakening, we can insist on turning the light on, begin the process of self-honesty, and observe the real consequences we are generating in this interconnected web of relations. 

Thank goodness our goal at Producers Trust is not to highlight what is wrong, but rather to celebrate what is right. We aim to inspire others to do what is right through positive incentivization, driven by people out there who care. 

Our mission is to bring as much trust and validated credibility to the information that will inspire these uplifting actions. 

What’s more, this cycle will bring premiums to those who take care of our resources properly, thus increasing the number of caretakers who transition into regenerative practices for their farming, fishing, forestry, and mining operations. This demand can support us to build a system in which those who are properly stewarding our natural resources are rewarded for having integrity in their management. Once they see the potential for economic reward, others will be motivated to do the same. 

The proof is in the pudding, as they say. If we eat the pudding that is proven to be uplifting, healthy, and ecologically aligned, then that pudding will begin to multiply and grow exponentially. 

This is the world we envision and are actively working to build. 

The main Sustainable Development Goals that Producers Trust aims to achieve.
The main Sustainable Development Goals that Producers Trust aims to achieve.

The caveat here is that this can and will only work sustainably if there is proper validation of information. More greenwashing from corporations, politicians, websites, and leaders will result in an even more aloof and careless society that simply doesn’t believe anything a brand shares about its good products and impact on farmers and value chains. 

Without faith in our information—or belief in the human spirit—we might as well give up.  

While we don’t have the perfect answer, yet, we believe that collaboration across the agricultural industry will achieve unprecedented results in our ability to validate claims, certifications, and other information on which we consumers rely. 

We are calling for major corporations, NGOs, governments, and farming groups to come together to build a decentralized system based upon immutable data capture. We are initiating a  process of truth, honesty, and transparency. Ultimately, we are working to build a trusted free market reward system in which great products get valued properly, and the people who demand great products pay the prices they are willing to pay. 

If we’d like to build a beautiful world to live in, let’s start by celebrating what’s right and sharing it with everyone we love. 


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