Regional Food Systems
Our food systems reflect some of the 21st century’s most pressing challenges, but also offer significant opportunities to address them.
America’s industrialized and massive-scale agricultural system contributes to climate change, water scarcity and pollution, food-borne illness, antibiotic resistance, loss of wildlife and habitat, obesity and other disease and food insecurity.
Creating new, regional and sustainable food systems can help address many of these cross-cutting concerns while ensuring the most vulnerable among us – children, the poor and people in hospitals – are getting the healthy food they need to thrive. We’re supporting such a regional food system in New England by:
- Channeling demand from our region’s largest food purchasers such as schools, colleges and universities, and hospitals to increase the economic success of sustainable agriculture;
- Focusing on supply chains to expand and streamline the supply and demand of regionally and sustainably produced food; and
- Strengthening food production and distribution systems so they can meet the growing demand.
Grantee Profile
The Wellspring Collaborative
The John Merck Fund provided critical funding to the Wellspring Collaborative to develop a hydroponic greenhouse called Wellspring Harvest that will provide year round local produce to institutions and commercial venues in Western Massachusetts.
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Impact Investing
Ayers Brook Goat Dairy
In 2012, The John Merck Fund joined philanthropic partners, The Castanea Foundation and the High Meadows Fund, to form Evergreen Partners, L3C, committing $300,000 to the partnership to help finance Vermont Creamery’s ...
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Impact Investing
Fair Food Fund
In 2012, The John Merck Fund Board made a $425,000 investment in the Fair Food Network’s Fair Food Fund-Northeast. The Fund was established to help fill the financing gap that many smaller-scale sustainable farmers ...
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Recent Regional Food Systems Grant Awards
| Date | Description | Program Area | Focus | Amount |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 06/2017 |
Vermont Land TrustTo facilitate the continued growth and success of the Ayers Brook Goat Dairy by supporting the acquisition of high-quality nearby farmland at an affordable price, thereby enhancing its ability to build the state’s fledgling goat dairy industry. |
Regional Food Systems |
$150,000 | |
| 06/2017 |
Real Food ChallengeTo continue core campus organizing and launch a new initiative to directly address the anti-competitive practices that large food service management companies use to maintain market dominance. |
Regional Food Systems |
$100,000 | |
| 06/2017 |
Northeast Organic Farming Association of VermontTo increase the amount of local food purchased by Vermont institutions while supporting the economic viability of food producers. |
Regional Food Systems |
$50,000 | |
| 06/2017 |
New Hampshire Community Loan FundTo work toward economic viability for New England farmers and food producers by offering hands-on financial literacy training, expanding market channels, and connecting farms with agricultural investors. |
Regional Food Systems |
$40,000 | |
| 06/2017 |
Food ConnectsTo develop and share systems that integrate participants in a regional network of food hubs in order to increase source-identified local food sales to institutions in southeastern Vermont, southwestern New Hampshire, and northwestern Massachusetts. |
Regional Food Systems |
$50,000 | |
| 06/2017 |
Farm to Institution New EnglandTo create a regional network that engages participants in the food system, cultivates broad understanding of farm to institution’s role in strengthening New England’s food system, and advances stronger state and federal policies in support of farm to institution work. |
Regional Food Systems |
$225,000 | |
| 06/2017 |
Coastal Enterprises Inc.To accelerate local food systems development, enhance the viability of sustainable agricultural enterprises, and foster economic development in northern Maine. |
Regional Food Systems |
$150,000 | |
| 03/2017 |
National Sustainable Agriculture CoalitionTo educate and engage grassroots farm and food groups and practitioners about federal agriculture policy. |
Regional Food Systems |
$50,000 | |
| 03/2017 |
The Carrot ProjectTo develop a sustainable business assistance network across New England and New York State that promotes agriculture and local food systems and encourages food-related entrepreneurship. |
Regional Food Systems |
$20,000 | |
| 03/2017 |
Fair Food NetworkTo: (1) accelerate the growth of food system businesses in the Northeast by providing them with direct business assistance; (2) leverage $500,000 in funding from the USDA to support needed business assistance in the region; and (3) help increase coordination and collaboration among regional business assistance organizations. |
Regional Food Systems |
$50,000 |