Since the state’s fiscal year began in July, more than $5 million has been spent on fruits and vegetables thanks to HIP. Because of this continued growth in program use, HIP was suspended on February 24 and will not resume operations until May 15. Vendors and clients have been notified by DTA. We are extremely disappointed that only one months’ notice was given for the suspension, as this hurts farmers’ and customers’ ability to plan, and for winter farmers markets to build and maintain a consistent customer base.
The Department of Transitional Assistance has indicated that their plan is to operate HIP as a six-month, seasonal program moving forward, regardless of the outcome of our budget advocacy. The Department has indicated that this action is intended to make the program more consistent and sustainable. They have also indicated an interest in adding new farmer vendors in underserved areas, if funding allows, in an effort to increase access during the main growing season. The Collaborative is concerned about the impact this program change would have on the program’s mission, and we are particularly troubled by the fact that planning for such major programmatic changes seems to be happening without input from farmers or HIP users.
The Department has indicated that it will engage stakeholders in discussions around programmatic changes soon. If you would like to share your perspective on the seasonality change and the abrupt suspension, and how it will affect your farm/nonprofit/farmers market/community, please email
Becca Miller
.
Organizations and legislators have been speaking out about their concerns around the suspension, submitting op-eds, and speaking to reporters who are covering the program. We encourage individuals and organizations to continue to do so, and to follow our
Facebook page
and
Twitter feed
where we link to items as they are published.
HIP Lobby Day - March 19, 2020
HIP Lobby Day will be held on March 19, 2020! We will gather at the State House in Boston at 10:00 am to educate policymakers about the program’s success and importance, and to advocate for $10.5 million in the fiscal year 2021 budget. The day will begin with a briefing, followed by meetings with legislators and distributing information to all legislative offices. All are welcome - there is no prior advocacy experience required. Please RSVP
here
. Please email
Becca Miller
with any questions.
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Agriculture Updates
Bills Threaten Agricultural Composting
The Massachusetts legislature is considering bills that would subject farmers to local regulatory control of composting, potentially limiting their ability to maintain compost operations that help sustain farms, build healthy soils, and mitigate climate change.
An Act regarding agricultural composting programs (H840/S435) has passed out of the Joint Committee on Environment, Natural Resources, and Agriculture and has been sent to the Senate Rules committee for further consideration.
These bills, if passed, would be detrimental to achieving the state’s goals for farm sustainability and food waste reduction, as laid out in the MA Local Food Action Plan and could limit opportunities to divert food waste from landfills. The bills would place control of composting in the hands of often under-resourced, under-trained, and under-equipped local boards and agencies. Agricultural composting is a critical component of meeting the state’s climate change goals, because compost builds soil health, which plays a major role in helping mitigate the impacts of climate change and lowering greenhouse gas emissions. Allowing local control will create a patchwork of regulations that will make it harder to meet those climate change goals.
The Department of Agricultural Resources has been developing new agricultural composting regulations and will release them shortly. These regulations, developed through a public review process that considered concerns of farmers as well as other stakeholders, are intended to properly and effectively address safety and public health issues that have been raised at the local level. Because of the statewide importance of climate change, composting is most properly regulated by trained professionals at the state level, as is currently the case and as these regulations will support.
Please contact your legislators to let them know you are concerned about these bills. Ask them to bring your concerns to the Senate Rules committee and to House and Senate leadership. Request that no further legislative action be taken on this issue until the new MDAR regulations have been studied and assessed for effectiveness.
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Climate Change Legislation would Impact Agriculture, Without Adequate Input from Farmers
A number of climate change measures under consideration in the legislature could have significant impact on agriculture and other food businesses. Recently passed by the Senate, An Act Setting Next Generation Climate Policy (S.2477) is a very complex bill that deserves attention from food system stakeholders as it moves through the legislative process.
This bill would require lower greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions and set a statewide net-zero emissions limit by the year 2050. To do this it would set progressively lower GHG emission limits every 5 years beginning in 2025, require the Secretary of Energy and Environmental Affairs to set sub-limits for specific sectors including agriculture, and would specify a “Market-based compliance mechanism,” such as carbon taxes and perhaps carbon credits, and structural limits on emissions.
The bill would require support for low- and moderate-income communities disproportionately impacted by environmental issues, and protections for economic sectors and individual employers at risk of adverse impacts from compliance mechanisms.
The bill would require tracking emission reductions, including carbon sequestration from natural and working lands.
The Collaborative is pleased to see these actions, as they represent progress toward several recommendations in the Massachusetts Local Food Action Plan, including:
- Land 4.2.1: Add carbon sequestration by agriculture to the Massachusetts Annual and Three-Year Greenhouse Gas Emissions Inventories.
- Land 4.2.3: Research opportunities for Massachusetts farmers and farmland owners to access public and private carbon markets and establish a regional carbon market for farmers.
- Inputs 2.1.6: Continue to collect data on carbon levels in soil to identify areas that need interventions and to track progress.
Article continues:
click here
. Please contact
Jeff Cole
, Agricultural Network Coordinator, with questions.
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Collaborative and Partners set Legislative Priorities
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The Collaborative, in consultation with many food system stakeholder organizations, has set legislative priorities for 2020 and is currently circulating our annual legislative white paper for organizational sign-ons. This document guides our advocacy efforts for the year, and will be circulated to all legislators at the annual ‘Ag Day at the State House’ event on March 25.
The five priority bills remain unchanged from 2019, each of them having advanced through a first reading in the legislative session and now being considered by additional committees.
- An Act relative to an agricultural healthy incentives program, S2426, Senator Anne Gobi; H4232, Representative Paul Mark
- An Act relative to Agricultural Commission input on board of health regulations, S2446, Senator Adam Hinds; H4266, Representative Natalie Blais
- An Act encouraging the donation of food to persons in need, S869, Senator Jo Comerford; H1475, Representative Hannah Kane
- An Act regarding a farmland protection and viability action plan, S482, Senator Anne Gobi
- An Act to promote urban agriculture and horticulture, S1691, Senator Edward Kennedy; H2551, Representative Elizabeth Malia
Our budget priorities for FY2021 are also listed, including:
- Healthy Incentives Program: $10.5 million
- UMass Extension Soil and Plant Nutrient Laboratory: $166,000
- Farmland Action Plan: $200,000
Additional bills and budget items are also included. The full white paper can be
downloaded here
, and additional information and links to submitted testimony on many of the bills can be
found here
.
If your organization would like to sign on as a supporter of these priorities, please
use this form
. Please note that this is a call for organizational sign-ons, rather than individuals.
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Mobile Food Vendor Working Group Update
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The Mobile Food Vendor Working Group, which was created by The Massachusetts Food System Collaborative and the Massachusetts Association of Health Boards, began meeting in April 2019. The goal of the Working Group is to improve the system by which mobile food vendors apply for permits from the towns in which they operate, in order to reduce the administrative burden for Boards of Health and vendors while continuing to ensure food safety.
The Working Group has identified two regions that are interested in participating in a pilot program. In the first pilot, the Boards of Health or Health Departments from Peabody, Swampscott, Marblehead, Danvers, Salem, Nahant, and Lynn are working to create a common application for mobile food vendors. When the process is finalized, vendors will be able to complete one application and use it to operate in all of the towns.
The municipalities of Framingham, Natick, Sudbury, Wayland, Wellesley, and Weston are similarly working to create a standard application process and common annual and temporary applications. They also plan to design a database to enable towns to more easily share information and reduce the requests for documents from vendors.
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Food waste briefing at the Food System Caucus meeting
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On February 5, Winton Pitcoff and Brittany Peats presented the Collaborative's report “Reducing Food Waste in Massachusetts: Local Successes Informing Statewide Solutions” at the annual meeting of the Food System Caucus. Dozens of legislators and staffers learned about our research and discussed steps the legislature can take to comprehensively address food waste concerns. The meeting also covered the progress the Caucus has made in its first year in elevating food system issues in the legislature, and allowed lawmakers to discuss their upcoming budget priorities.
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Updates from around the MA Food System
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UMass Releases Census of Ag Analysis
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The UMass Center for Agriculture, Food, and the Environment has completed extensive analysis of the results of the 2017 Census of Agriculture for the state, examining data about farmland, economics, demographics, and other facets of the agricultural sector.
Of the 7,214 farms identified in the Commonwealth in 2017, the analysis reveals:
- 491,653 total acres in farms, a 6% decrease from five years earlier;
- Slightly more than ⅔ of all farmland is in farms of less than 50 acres;
- The number of large farms, with $500,000 or more in sales, increased by 8.2%;
- The market value of vegetables, melons, tree nuts and berries, dairy cattle and milk production, and animal aquaculture sold by Massachusetts farms was $277,691,000;
- The average age of the primary producer on Massachusetts farms was 59.7 years old; and
- The ratio of prices received for farm products to the prices paid for inputs needed to produce those products continued to decline.
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Good news for urban agriculture in the Commonwealth! The urban agriculture tax incentive bill (
H.2551
/
S.1691
) was reported favorably out of the Revenue Committee, a key step in the legislative process. Thanks to the wonderful farmers and advocates who helped to make it happen. Please contact
Sara Dewey
at the Conservation Law Foundation to receive future action alerts.
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Mobile Markets increase food access in Hampshire County
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Three mobile farmers markets in Hampshire County are increasing access to healthy food in a region where many people live far from grocery stores and public transportation is limited. The markets grew out of a recommendation in the Healthy Hampshire Food Access Assessment Report and are guided by coalitions that include people who will use the program. This engagement has helped “make a program that people want to participate in,” says Caitlin Marquis, Coordinator at Healthy Hampshire.
Healthy Hampshire
partnered with Grow Food Northampton to pilot a mobile market at two affordable housing complexes in Northampton in 2018. Participants could sign up for a HIP reimbursable CSA or purchase items individually using SNAP. The first year, 27 people signed up for the CSA and many more shopped regularly. Shoppers reported that they felt healthier and better able to meet their food needs. The mobile market expanded in 2019 to stop at three affordable housing complexes, three local schools, and a senior center, and 155 families enrolled in the CSA. Grow Food Northampton plans to continue to operate the market in 2020.
Hilltown CDC and Hilltown Community Health Center worked together to pilot a mobile market in 2019. The Health Center provided produce prescriptions for people to use at the mobile market and HIP was also accepted for CSA shares distributed at the market. The mobile market stopped at the senior center in Worthington and the town green in Huntington. 34 families enrolled in the CSA program, while about the same number of shoppers bought individual items each week. Shoppers reported that it was much easier to get fresh, healthy produce and that they were eating fruits and vegetables one additional day per week, on average. There are plans to expand this market to two additional sites in 2020.
Healthy Hampshire is looking to begin a mobile market in Amherst this year and is working with a coalition to design the program and identify an operator.
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Food System Changing Tool
:
Climate Adaptation Resource Database
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The University of Vermont has created a database to help farmers and agricultural service providers in New England better adapt to climate change. The
Climate Adaptation Resource Database
includes information curated towards farm type, adaptation practice, and type of information -- fact sheet, case study, tools, etc. Farmers can also find grant opportunities and ask questions.
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MA Food System News We're Reading
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- Taking away SNAP increases other costs: “One study that Dr. Berkowitz led found that receiving SNAP benefits was associated with a reduction in annual health care spending of about $1,400 per person among low-income adults.”
- The HIP suspension will negatively impact shoppers and farmers who were planning to sell their crops at winter markets.
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Upcoming Food System
Job Postings and
Events
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Job Posting Sites:
Job Listservs:
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Upcoming Food System Events:
Know of another great source of events or jobs?
Let us know
!
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Massachusetts Food System Collaborative |
www.mafoodsystem.org
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