Projects

The Massachusetts legislature is considering many bills in the 2021-22 session that relate to the Massachusetts Local Food Action Plan. This list includes bills that most closely align with goals and recommendations from the Local Food Action Plan.

The Collaborative is facilitating a campaign to ensure that every K-12 public school student in MA has access to high-quality food system education.

The Collaborative leads the Campaign for HIP Funding to ensure that the Healthy Incentives Program (HIP), which provides fresh, healthy, local foods for SNAP recipients, receives increased funding to meet demand, operates year-round, and adds new farmers to fill gaps in program coverage.

The Ag Equity Network is made up of and led by Massachusetts farmers who identify as BIPOC. The Network advocates for state public policy that supports equitable land access, jobs, education, and other resources that are vital for BIPOC farmers to be sustainable in their businesses, and for the food system in Massachusetts to be […]

Food policy councils operate in many cities, towns and regions throughout Massachusetts with the goal to improve the local food system. The Collaborative supports their work through the Food Policy Councils Network.

The Collaborative is working to reduce food waste in Massachusetts through research, advocacy and network building.

As part of the Collaborative’s mission to support a sustainable, equitable, and resilient food system, we have hosted dozens of advocacy trainings since the organization was founded. Training can go over the basics of how policy is made in Massachusetts, how to build relationships with decision makers, updates on food system bills, power-mapping, and more.  […]

Farming in Massachusetts faces many challenges from high land costs, to insufficient education and technical assistance resources, to incongruent regulations, to an inadequate labor supply. The Collaborative works to connect agricultural organizations with food system policy and advocacy efforts designed to create a more secure and sustainable local food system.

The Collaborative is working with Zoey Sloate from CISA and Ludia Modi from The Food Project to organize skill sharing among urban agriculture organizations.

Our food system, like our country, was constructed within a systemically racist framework. As healthy food relies on healthy soil, a healthy food system relies on practices based on an understanding of this framework and a commitment to dismantling it.