USDA wants schools to buy goods from local producers for the school lunch program. Photo by md-duran unsplash
LOGAN – The U.S. Department of Agriculture’s (USDA) Agricultural Marketing Service (AMS) has signed a cooperative agreement with Utah for more than $1.9 million to increase their purchase of nutritious, local foods for school meal programs.
The Utah State Board of Education (USBE) will purchase and distribute local and regionally produced foods and beverages to serve children in the schools through the National School Lunch and School Breakfast Programs.
The goal of the program is to of improve child nutrition and build new relationships between schools and local farmers.
USDA Under Secretary for Marketing and Regulatory Programs Jenny Lester Moffitt said this cooperative agreement of supporting Utah schools is another example of how USDA is working to build a food system rooted in local and regional production.
“The Local Food for Schools Cooperative Agreement Program provides an opportunity for states to strengthen ties between local farmers, ranchers, food businesses and schools,” she said. “And it gives students access to nutritious foods unique to the area they live in, building stronger connections across local communities.”
Deputy Under Secretary for Food, Nutrition, and Consumer Services Stacy Dean said strengthening the relationships between local producers and schools is a long-term strategy.
“Through this program and many other efforts to support the school meal programs, USDA is committed to giving schools the tools they need to set children up to learn, grow, and thrive,” she said
The purpose of this initiative is to help support Utah’s small ranchers, local meat producers and processors by procuring competitive programs. This will allow Utah meat producers the opportunity to explore new market channels and build relationships with new buyers, while helping schools improve meal quality with healthy, locally-produced protein.
“The Utah State Board of Education is excited to expand markets for our state’s farmers and offer more nutritious, locally-produced foods to our students,” said State Superintendent of Public Instruction Sydnee Dickson. “Parents can rely on the National School Lunch Program to provide a healthy lunch for their students. Now they can also know that they are helping Utah’s farmers at the same time.”
This agreement will allow organizations the flexibility to design food purchasing programs that best suit their local needs, accommodate environmental and climate conditions, account for seasonal harvests, improve supply chain resiliency.
It will also meet the needs of schools within their service area. Additionally, the program will provide more opportunities for historically underserved producers and processors to sell their products.
Local Food for Schools Cooperative Agreement Program is authorized by the Commodity Credit Corporation Charter Act. AMS looks forward to continuing to sign agreements under this innovative program.
The Local Food for Schools cooperative agreement program is one of many ways USDA is supporting school meal programs this school year and transforming our food system in the long term.
- For more information on USDA’s work to support school meal programs, visit USDA Support for School Meals page.
- For more information on USDA’s efforts to transform our food system, visit Build Back Better page.
“Building on the momentum from September’s White House Conference on Hunger, Nutrition, and Health, we’re investing in innovative solutions and challenging industry to partner with us to ensure every student has access to healthy school meals,” said U.S. Agriculture Secretary Tom Vilsack. “For children to reach their full academic potential, they must build healthy eating habits, and USDA recognizes the importance of private sector partnership in making this happen.”
This marks the second phase of USDA’s $100 million initiative to improve the quality of school meals by strengthening access to nutritious food products.
USDA wants to touch the lives of all Americans in positive ways. The Biden- Administration, USDA is trying to transform the U.S.’s food system with a greater focus on more resilient local and regional food production, fairer markets for all producers.
The Biden administration wants to ensure everyone has access to safe, healthy and nutritious food in all communities, while building new markets and income for farmers and producers using climate-smart food and forestry practices.