The Florida Department of Agriculture and Consumer Services, Division of Food, Nutrition and Wellness (FDACS) is proposing to administer $21,674,292 through a non-competitive cooperative agreement from the United States Department of Agriculture (USDA) Agricultural Marketing Service’s (AMS) Local Food Purchase Assistance Cooperative Agreement Program Plus (LFPA Plus). These funds will be utilized to augment FDACS’s current LFPA project. 

The project purpose is to facilitate and increase direct-to-market sales of food products grown by Delaware farmers, to Delaware community members. The project will 1) establish a farmer cooperative focused on marketing, promotion, and to maximize capacity of small, disadvantaged farmers; 2) identify existing community outlets providing food access specifically to under-resourced populations with demonstrated food insecurities; and 3) develop a model enabling small farmers and community outlets (ultimately retailers and other market institutions) to establish procurement relationships.

The Connecticut Department of Agriculture (CT DoAg) will administer the LFPA Plus program funds through a continuation of (1) a partnership with the only statewide food bank, CT Foodshare (2) through awards made from a competitive grants process. Awardees are Brass City Harvest, City of Bridgeport, Click Inc., Partners for a Sustainable Healthy Community, New London Community Meal Center, Forge City Works, and Vertical Church. Both avenues allow for sub awards to local organizations to purchase and distribute Connecticut Grown farm products.

The Colorado Dept. of Human Services (CDHS) in collaboration with the Colorado Dept. of Agriculture (CDA), shall procure Colorado food products, focused on socially disadvantaged producers, packing, transportation and distribution to Coloradans in need of nutritional support due to financial hardship. A decentralized approach will be used, by administering the LFPA Plus program funds through multiple subawards. A new competitive Request for Proposals (RFP) process will be used to distribute additional LFPA Plus funding through April of 2025.

The goal of the Local Food Purchase Assistance (LFPA) program is to establish cooperative agreements with state governments and Tribal governments for the purpose of purchasing food, supporting local producers, and socially disadvantaged farmers. The California Department of Social Services (CDSS) will develop a partnership with multiple agencies to meet this goal. CDSS will be sub-awarding the funds to the California Department of Food and Agriculture (CDFA), California Association of Food Banks (CAFB), and California Food Banks.

Through the Local Food Purchase Agreement, the Arkansas Department of Human Service, Division of Child Care and Early Childcare Education Commodity Distribution Unit will partner with food banks, food pantries, soup kitchens, and other distributors within the local food distribution and network to order domestic food from local and regional producers. The partnership will target socially disadvantaged farmers/producers, with the intent to distribute to underserved communities in Arkansas.

The ‘’Purchase Local Arizona” LFPA/LFPA Plus program in Arizona is implemented by the Arizona Department of Economic Security (ADES), working in collaboration with the Arizona Food Bank Network (AzFBN) and Pinnacle Prevention.

The Alaska Local Food Purchase Program (ALFPP) will provide more grant funding for purchase of locally grown and produced foods from farmers in Alaska. With new funding from the Commodity Credit Corporation, this project will not only be extended for another full year from the original American Rescue Plan Act funds, but it will allow for the purchase of so much more food from locally sourced farmers to feed the underserved community members that truly need our help.

The purpose of our project is to create a successful collaboration of distinct but critical parts of the local food system to increase supply, distribution, and demand of specialty crops grown by socially disadvantaged farmers/producers within rural, remote, or underserved communities throughout Alabama.