"Meridian School’s Food Services Department has more than doubled local food purchases this year, thanks to a partnership through the Texas Dept. of Agriculture with the Sustainable Food Center and The Common Market. What is local? For Meridian, that means any Texas products."
Co-founder Haile Johnston told FarmWeek the Chicago area seemed a great fit as one of the country’s largest urban centers with leadership in food and food aggregation and a vibrant food scene. Yet, the area also struggles to support small- and medium-scale family farms and is home to food-insecure communities where families face significant economic challenges.
Johnston and Eliana Pinilla, director of partnerships for The Common Market Chicago Great Lakes, will share their vision March 23 during the Live Local: Food & Farmers Market Conference in East Peoria’s Embassy Suites.
"The program has helped 25 small, organic farmers preserve and cultivate 355 acres of farmland around Atlanta, launching new generations of growers and a healthy locally produced food scene. Could Philly be next?"
Small and urban farms are flourishing after helping Georgians weather the COVID storm.
“It does feel like this type of work has a mission, a community aspect and a human significance.”
"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."
"The best part about selling local foods to Texas schools is the partnerships and the community that it brings about, shared The Common Market Texas executive director Margaret Smith. "People light up when they receive a delivery of farm fresh local produce that is grown with integrity — the quality and flavor is bursting, and you can really tell that the family farmer worked hard to bring that food to your community."
"Being able to connect to a distributor and an organizer like The Common Market - that allows us to reach a local food producing community in a major way - is for us, a dream come true."
— Lucy Kerman, Ph.D., Vice Provost, University and Community Partnerships, Drexel University