http://www.nwfecoleaders.org/profile/2345

Community

Increase access to nutritious and locally sourced food, reduce food waste at market, and educate market customers about food insecurity in our local community

Community Building, Education

The Share the Harvest program has surpassed all of our expectations! We began with a simple goal of reducing food waste at the Gillette Saturday Farmers Market by asking our vendors to donate excess food to our local food bank and soup kitchen located at the Council of Community Services (Council). To participate in Share the Harvest, all vendors have to do is simply bring their donations to the Farmers Market manager booth and market volunteers deliver it to the Council of Community Services. Three years later, we are still delivering produce and locally produced food items to the Council, but we have added an Annual Cookware Drive, Edible Garden Planting Day at Council, Cooking Demonstrations lead by Centsible Nutrition, and two Little Free Pantries (coming summer 2018).

Other

Monetary Value of Food Recovered - While the Farmers Market was remiss in collecting data, during the first two years of Share the Harvest, in 2017 thirteen vendors (75% participation among all food vendors at market) donated $1,182 of fresh produce and other food items to the Council of Community Services. During our summer season, which runs every Saturday mid-July through mid-October, we delivered recovered food to the Council every Saturday. The Farmers Market also collected over 12 totes of cookware during our first Annual Cookware Drive. Market and Centsible Nutrition hosted five budget-friendly cooking demos at market featuring fresh produce provided by our vendors that were attended by 8 to 15 market customers.

Share the Harvest launched during the 2015 market season and slapping an end date on it never occurred to us. Our market vendors are vested in Share the Harvest and I believe the program will continue for many years to come.

The main challenge facing Share the Harvest is funding. As we continue to build out the program and add more components, lack of funding could be prove to be an even bigger issue in the future. However, Share the Harvest has amazing community partners that help support and coordinate our work. The Centsible Nutrition program leads and funds the cooking demonstrations, farmers market volunteers collect and deliver all produce donated by vendors, and farmers market vendors donate starter plants for our Edible Garden Planting Day. For the Little Free Pantries, our local newspaper is donating old newsstands that volunteers will refurbish into pantries, and the Farmers Market will host a food drive to stock the two Little Free Pantries throughout the year.

The Gillette Saturday Farmers Market's Share the Harvest program would not be possible without support from our community partners including the Council of Community Services and Centsible Nutrition. We also rely on donations from our Farmers Market vendors, market volunteers, and market customers who have always been willing to answer our call for donations.

Share the Harvest is completely volunteer run and the projects we have taken on have not required monetary input to drive them towards success. We also have some amazing community partners that have been able to kick in extra support and funding when needed.

We use the Gillette Saturday Farmers Market Facebook page to advertise Share the Harvest, Annual Cookware Drive, Censtible Nutrition Cooking Demos, and Little Free Pantries (coming summer 2018). The Farmers Market also issues press releases to local media and attends a City Council work session at least once a year to provide updates.

Group reflection, Individual reflection, Other

Data collection without statistical analysis or review - for example, tracking monetary value of food donations, recording attendance, etc.

Communicated your project results through a blog or other media, Presented your project results at a conference or meeting, Added new team members with different expertise, Celebrated

I learned that in order to work in the area of food access you need to be able to listen to and learn from the community members your project is designed to support. Our Farmers Market is still struggling with making these connections, which is why we partnered with the Council of Community Services from the very beginning. This year we have plans to convene a focus group of community members that receive Council of Community Services benefits, qualify for Centsibe Nutrition cooking classes, and/or qualify for the SNAP program to determine how we can improve our cooking demos and create a more welcoming atmosphere at market. Our market volunteers realize that we have not solved (and we probably will never solve) hunger in our community, but we also understand that the small steps we are taking matter and help to elevate the issue of food insecurity in our of community.

Build community partnerships, know your limitations, and be creative! Our Farmers Market was able to overcome many of the challenges we faced by partnering with other community groups that had more resources or could access different resources than the Farmers Market. These partnerships also helped legitimize the Share the Harvest program in the eyes of the community. When we began Share the Harvest, we knew we were probably never going to be able to fund the program and that it would have to be volunteer run. We also knew that we didn't have strong connections to the individuals and families we were trying to reach (our market didn't accept SNAP until 2015). Acknowledging our limitations allowed us to keep our goals realistic and not stretch market resources to thin. What Share the Harvest lacked in funding, we made up for in creativity!

Share the Harvest has grown way beyond my original vision and as we add new volunteers with different backgrounds and interests, I think the possibilities for improving Share the Harvest are endless. Eventually, we would like to pay our producers for their donations to the Council at 50% of the retail cost of the food item. Not only will this help increase vendor participation in the program, which will hopefully lead to more food being delivered to the Council, but our vendors deserve to be reimbursed for the time and resources they expended growing or preparing the donated food item. Independent and family farmers in our area are struggling and Market wants to ensure our vendors are fairly compensated. We would also like to add three more Little Free Pantries to community parks over the next few years. Over the long-term our committee would also like to start a gleaning program to recover even more food and help reduce food waste on the farm. Funding will always be a challenge, but I believe Share the Harvest program will continue. Unfortunately, food insecurity is a systemic problem and our proposed solution no matter how small and imperfect is needed. Our Farmers Market Steering Committee is committed to continuing the program, as are our community partners so structures are in place to help recruit new volunteers.