"Garcia-Granados was shocked to see how many people in her Philadelphia Strawberry Mansion neighborhood had health-related diseases. After digging to the root of the problem — lack of access to nutritious food — Garcia-Granados and her husband founded The Common Market, a nonprofit that connects local farms to public schools, hospitals and workplaces. The NGO currently functions in the mid-Atlantic region, Southeast and Texas."
"As part of its mission, The Common Market offers community organizations, schools, and other qualifying nonprofits, like The Caring Center, with a fresh food incentive—a 25% Food Access Fund discount—expanding the value of their healthy food purchases as a means to foster food security in their communities."
"Results don't lie. If we stacked up initiatives like SFHC, The Common Market, Community Managed Natural Farming and others against industrial agriculture, there wouldn't be any contest. Clearly, doing the right thing as a food producer is a choice with huge positive impacts across a wide range of challenges—poverty, hunger, nutrition, health, climate, justice. If the world could compare, we'd never go back."
“Folks need to recognize that public money should serve the public good. [Good food purchasing] can create change in the economic structure of the food system.”
"Before the pandemic, the organization had created a food distribution network that included things like trucks and warehouses as well as strong relationships with food producers. So when the pandemic struck and the food chain was disrupted, the nonprofit was well-positioned to pivot toward meeting urgent hunger needs."
"But The Common Market’s approach is anything but typical, connecting urban communities with family farms and sourcing food from small and local producers. The Common Market (which co-author Haile Johnston co-founded) is democratizing food access and creating a thriving market for locally grown and produced foods, which too often are shut out of procurement processes."
"Core partners in this effort include the Camden City School District, Alliance for a Healthier Generation, The Common Market, Food Bank of South Jersey, FoodCorps, National Farm to School Network, Wellness in the Schools, Aramark and New Jersey American Water. These organizations, several of whom have been longstanding partners, will support nutrition education and training for students and staff, procurement of fresh, local foods and measurement for the program."
"Relying on local supply chains to support emergency feeding programs presents an opportunity to center quality, cultural relevance, and nutrition — facets not often associated with emergency feeding responses," said Haile Johnston, co-founder of The Common Market, a nonprofit regional food distributor responsible for delivering nearly 1 million local food boxes to communities across the Mid-Atlantic and Southeast regions in response to COVID-19 last year. "Offering fresh, nutrient-dense, and culturally appropriate foods is critical to an equitable emergency response effort, providing stability and dignity for recipients during a time of great uncertainty and loss."
"Sustainable Food Center is thrilled to announce that we have been awarded a Farm to School Grant from the U.S. Department of Agriculture (USDA). Together with our partners, the Texas Department of Agriculture’s Farm Fresh Initiative, The Common Market Texas, and the City of Austin’s Office of Sustainability, we will increase the amount of fresh, healthy, local food available in Central Texas schools."
"The group now wants to advocate for new policies to make the food in government programs more nutritious and higher quality. It sees policy as a powerful tool to boost the amount of local produce in school lunches and other government programs — and it’s optimistic about what’s ahead."
"Being able to incorporate seasonal, local, and sustainable products into the menu at a recovery center is challenging, but the impact it has on the nutritional value in the food and experience with our guests is astonishing."
— Chef Skyler Hanka, Prairie Recovery Center