A program is growing that will help low-income people across Michigan eat better and support local farmers at the same time. It's happening through a gift of $1.2 million from the Battle Creek-based
W.K. Kellogg Foundation.
The funds kick in when farm market shoppers purchase produce with their federal Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program (SNAP) card. For every $2 they spend in SNAP funds they receive $2 in tokens, up to $20 per visit, through the Double Up Food Bucks program. The tokens can in turn be used to buy more fresh grown foods at the market.
The
Double Up Food Bucks program, administered by the Fair Food Network, encourages shoppers to spend their
SNAP dollars at the local farm market where they can find fresh food
rather than at stores with few healthy choices.
In a pilot program at 15 participating farmers markets in Michigan and Ohio from August to October of 2010, shoppers spent $203,451 on produce -- $111,585 in SNAP benefits and a matching amount of $91,866 in Food Bucks tokens.
In Michigan, there are 1.75 million SNAP recipients -- that's 17.5 percent of the state's population. The national average is 12.9 percent.
President and CEO of the W.K. Kellogg Foundation Sterling K. Speirn says the foundation has been encouraged with early results from the program.
Double Up Food Bucks now serves residents in Battle Creek, Detroit, Ypsilanti and Ann Arbor. Plans are for it to expand to Flint, Grand Rapids, Kalamazoo, Lansing, Saginaw and Traverse City by May or June. Markets in another 36 cities will be added this year and be funded at least through 2013.
Fair Food Network currently is seeking funds from community foundations, corporate sponsors and others in the communities where the program will be offered for the first time this year. If threatened cuts in national food stamps funding come about the program could become even more critical in stretching the food dollars of low income people, says Rachel Chadderdon, of Fair Food Network.
Writer: Kathy Jennings
Source: Rachel Chadderdon, Fair Food Network
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