Open Food Network

Our aim is to revolutionise the viability and reach of direct farmer-eater food exchanges.

  A priority focus is the development of an online platform to scale-up direct local food sales. We have been inspired by platforms like “local dirt” and OpenFoodSource (developed from Oklahoma Food Coop software) in the USA, Sustaination and Stroudco in the UK and many others.

OFW PlatformWe are have been designing this system by working closely with many diverse local food enterprises, ranging in scale from Food Connect, the Food Garden and CERES Fair Food) to Melbourne’s extensive network of community collectives / coops, box schemes, farmers, farmer’s markets and community groups. We want solutions that make it easier for many diverse food enterprises to operate and connect.

Where’s it at . .

Our first focus has been building and trialling a platform that let’s us (Eaterprises) bring new options to farmers and eaters in Melbourne (currently being used with a network of food coops and others in Melbourne).

This has now been extended into a multi-user platform – the Open Food Network. Find out more here:

Our software is 100% free and open-source . . . and you can check it out (and help build it if you like!) here

But wait there’s more . .

Open Food Foundation . .

We’ve been designing carefully for maximum flexibility and user freedom – so that local communities and local businesses can come up with their own models for helping to connect farmers and eaters.

There’s a point where this gets much bigger than Eaterprises . . and that’s where the Open Food Foundation comes in. The OFF has been set-up as the licence holder of the open source software we’re working on. It will also become the driving force of making this available to anyone who wants to use it – and making sure it does what they need. For more regular updates on how this project is going go there!!