The legislature’s formal session for 2021-22 wrapped up on July 31, and while there still may be some movement on bills during the informal session things will be relatively quiet on Beacon Hill until the new legislature is seated in January, as attention turns to campaigns. The biggest news of the past few months was […]
read more…The second round of Food Security Infrastructure Grants were announced in April, distributing $22.5 million to 147 projects ranging from farms and fisheries, to food pantries and schools. In the two rounds of funding, the state has committed $62 million to essential food supply chain projects through this program, helping sustain farms and emergency food […]
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The Boston Public Market was founded in 2015 and has thirty vendors from across Massachusetts selling a variety of local products in a year-round, indoor space in downtown Boston. The pandemic closed the market to the public from March to September of 2020, a much longer closure than what they had originally anticipated. BPM also […]
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In 2020, Massachusetts invested $36 million in grants to local food system enterprises, launching the Food Security Infrastructure Grant (FSIG) program in response to the COVID-19 pandemic. In the face of breakdowns in the food supply chain that resulted in food shortages at grocery stores, increased demand on the emergency food system, and heightened interest […]
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Citizens for Citizens has been serving low income residents of southeastern Massachusetts since 1965. They run fuel assistance, SNAP application assistance, food pantry, and many other social service programs. Before COVID hit, they were serving 250-300 households per month at their food pantry, but during the spring of 2020 at the height of the pandemic […]
read more…Jen Barbeau has been farming on five acres in North Adams since 2015, raising chickens, ducks, goats for milk, fudge and soap, vegetables, and producing baked goods, pickles, jams, and more in an on-site kitchen. She has been a SNAP/HIP authorized farmer since 2017, and attends the North Adams farmers market. When the pandemic hit, […]
read more…The Boston Public Market was founded in 2015 and has thirty vendors from across Massachusetts selling a variety of local products in a year-round, indoor space in downtown Boston. The pandemic closed the market to the public from March to September of 2020, a much longer closure than what they had originally anticipated. BPM also […]
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The Hilltown CDC’s mobile market is in its third year, and purchases local produce from a number of small area farmers who would otherwise be traveling between up to 45 minutes to markets in Northampton or Pittsfield. There are few access points for local food in the Hilltowns, 22 towns between the Pioneer Valley and […]
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Brockton Public Schools has 16,000 students, 4,000 of them at the high school. As part of a local collaborative that included members of the community, the city’s farmers market manager, school teachers, and administrators, they applied for an FSIG grant to purchase a Freight Farm and were awarded $118,000 to do so. Freight Farms are […]
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Quincy Asian Resources Inc. (QARI) was formed in 2001 to fill a gap in culturally and linguistically relevant social services. At the height of the pandemic in the summer of 2020 they began thinking about ways to connect consumers with local farms. They came up with an idea for an online ordering platform where customers […]
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