In Roanoke Valley, industries like food production and tree harvesting are old businesses with a new energy.

Any improvement to the handling of food or forestry products makes a big difference. And improvements are happening.

Farm To Table

The Farm to Table movement emphasizes growing and producing food locally and serving it locally. A great example is Happy Acres Farm, a 53-acre farm in Halifax County that sells a variety of fresh fruits and jams.

“One of my pet peeves is when you go to the store and all the fruit they have in there is old, shrunk or bad, not to mention overpriced,” says owner/operator James Matthews. “Our purpose is to set a high standard in this market for the quality of our fruits.”

Selling to local stores and consumers, “allows us to keep our costs down by not having to transport (the food). I believe Farm to Table reduces the possibility of spoilage, damage and increases freshness at the table, helping provide better nutrition. The cost is less to the consumer with a direct purchase from the grower,” he says.

Empire Foods

Empire Foods is on top of Farm to Table as well. Opening a 35,000-square-foot facility in the Halifax Corporate Park in early to mid-2012, Empire is a food processing company that uses cutting-edge technology to preserve fresh, local produce that not only makes the food shelf-stable for up to a year without refrigeration, but also retains 98% of its antioxidants and nutrients. Empire focuses on locally produced fare such as strawberries, apples, blueberries and tomatoes.

“The benefits to Halifax County are the opportunities for local and regional farmers to supply the products to Empire Foods,” says Cathy Scott, executive director of the Halifax County Economic Development Commission. 

The company buys all the farmers’ food to ensure that they will have no waste or spoilage. The technology was developed by top food industry researchers at North Carolina State University and licensed to Empire Foods.

Lumber Industry

North Carolina is Appalachian hardwood country, and such wood is ideal for construction of furniture, molding, flooring and cabinetry sold around the world. The process of preparing the material involves a lot more than just swinging an axe and yelling “timber!”

Coastal Lumber Company

Coastal Lumber Company was founded in 1937 and produces more than 90 million board feet of hardwood lumber each year from 11 different species.

As part of the company’s wood-preparation process, lumber is separated by species, precisely cut and examined by a National Hardwood Lumber Association-trained lumber grader. If needed, it can be dried on the air-dry yard or finished in a dry kiln that controls temperature and air flow to reduce moisture for proper manufacturing. The drying process can even be customized for a buyer’s needs.

Even the byproduct of the process is handled efficiently. Stripped bark is turned into landscaping mulch, sawdust is used as fuel for the kilns and the cut-off edges and ends of the lumber become chips for paper manufacturing.

Josey Lumber Company

Josey Lumber Company began in 1983 and employs 32 people today. The company manufactures rough, sawed and planed lumber, hardwood dimension and flooring mill. Owner Joey Josey says the process of harvesting lumber has come a long way in just the past 20 years. 

"It's changed quite a bit," Josey says. "Fifteen to 20 years ago there were 15 or 20 people out in the woods cutting lumber. Now it's about four people (because of advances in technology and machinery). It's also much safer now and people are much more aware. They go to training and seminars to learn how to be pro loggers,” he says.