Progress 07/01/23 to 06/30/24
Outputs
Target Audience:In this last reporting period, we sought to increase partipation in our monthly farmers market with Clinton Hill Community Action and the weekly market at Prince Street. We also developed a CSA box program to distribute to other residents, particularly those facing transportation barriers. The target audiences for each market are noted below: Clinton Hill Community Action Monthly Market: -residents of the Clinton Hill neighborhood of Newark, an area facing especially high food insecurity rates and a range of limitations, including transportation barriers and economic opportunity. A vast majority of Clinton Hill residents are minorities and live in an area classified as a food desert -residents of the South Ward, also experienceing high food insecurity rates -vendors based in the South ward, including farmers and growers The Clinton Hill monthly market, created in partnership with Clinton Hll Community Action, was meant to reach these target audiences by providing vending opportunitiesfor local businesses and creating access to affordable, fresh, in-season produce for residents of the Clinton Hill Neighborhood. Marketing efforts, led primarily by Clinton Hill Community Action, were robust and designed to reach residents of the Clinton HIll neighborhood directly. Prince Street Farmers Market (May-October 2023)/Makerhoods Market (June 2024-present) -residents of the Belmont/Springfield neighborhood, including those facing transportation barriers, those on food assistance programs and those facing challenges accessing fresh, local produce. The market was also a place where families could bring their kids, as there were activities for kids to participate in during market hours -Newark-based vendors, including food vendors, artisans, health professionals and organizations and community-based organizations The weekly farmers market in the Springfield/Belmont neighborhood was designed to provide regular access to fresh, local produce and other local goods in a centralized location in Newark. This market was meant to be a stimulating and fun environment where visitors could not just shop, but participate in programming like yoga or a healthy food demonstration. We wanted the marketto be a social place and fixture in the community. Mobile Farmstands: -residents of the local neighborhood, many of whom face barriers to accessing local, affordable produce These regular farmstands were placed in neighborhoods throughout the city where access to affordablelocal produce was especially limited. Changes/Problems:One primary challenge of the program is to ensure we develop a sustainable model for these markets and farmstands that will continue to have an impact on those facing food insecurity and/or access to affordable healthy food, especially as we enter Year 3 of this grant. We want to ensure we are developing markets that will be able to thrive long into the future and be a fixture in their local neighborhoods, a place where residents know they will be able to access delicious food and shop from local businesses. For our monthly and weekly markets, we continue to work on driving increased traffic and engagement so that we reach as many residents as possible who are facing food insecurity and/or challenges inaccessing fresh, local food. We also faced challenges collecting data in the 2023 market season. Many of the participants had been surveyed before so we are working with our evaluation partner to alter our approach to gain useful insights into making the marketsas impactful as possible. What opportunities for training and professional development has the project provided?The project has offered urban farmers opportunities to train in developing a community-supported agriculture program. The Farm Team at the Greater Newark Conservancy, running the largest urban farm in New Jersey, had the opportunity to better plan for and produce enough food for higher demand through the markets and farmstands. The team has been trained in safe produce-handling methods, and a variety of volunteers, student groups and interns got to learn associated skills with growing food, harvesting, washing and packing produce, and managing inventory. We were also able to build out a Food Initiatives team through this program, whose job is to manage the distribution of produce through markets and farmstands, learning useful retail, customer service, reporting and inventory management skills. How have the results been disseminated to communities of interest?Yes, we have held 3 community meetings with vendors, farmers and community members to gather feedback and develop stratagies for next market season. We also hold regular meetings with our partners (listed as sub-awardees) to share feedback, gain insights, and disseminate important information to other community members/organizations. What do you plan to do during the next reporting period to accomplish the goals?We will continue to host our monthly market in partnership with Clinton Hill Community Action and our weekly Springfield/Belmont market but we plan to increase traffic at both through continued marketing and community-engagement efforts, as well as through holding steering committee members. For the 2024 market season, we are partnering with a new organization called Newark Makerhoods, and will be moving the market from the Prince Street location to their venue just a few blocks away. The new space is behind a historic mansion and on a main thoroughfare, where we expect to see high traffic and engagement. Behind the mansion, the Makerhoods team built a new residential building and some of the units are classified as affordable houses. On the ground floor, are spaces for local Makers, who will be able to participate in the weekly market, increasing our vendor base. For our farmstands, we reassessed our current locations and made some changes for the 2024 season. We partneredwith local community gardens in neighborhoods facing higher rates of food insecurity and set up farmstand locations on a weekly or bi-weekly basis. The pay model for the farmstands is "pay-what-you-can", in hopes of more widely distributing local produce to residents who cannot easily afford it. This also helps to address transportation barriers to fresh food in these neighborhoods. Additionally, in order to better address transportation barriers, we are launching a Safe Route to Healthy Foods mobility marketing campaign to inform community members about the best no-car transportation access options for accessing the market and to encourage individuals and families to walk, bike and take transit to the farmers Markets.
Impacts
What was accomplished under these goals?
Objective 1a: a steering committee was organized for both the Clinton Hill monthly market and the weekly Belmont/springfield market. The steering committee offered insights into how markets could be most impactful and offer the most in terms of nutritional education and access to fresh, local produce, as well as offering economic opportunities to local vendors. Objective 1b. The monthly farmersmarkettook place in the Clinton Hill neighborhood of Newark from June-October in 2023, seeing over 350 visitors and consistently having over 20 vendors participate. Visitors were able to shop from a wide variety of local businesses, gain access to fresh, affordable produce and participate in various activities, including kids activities. Objective 1c. The weekly farmers market took place in the Springfield/Belmontneighborhood of Newark, seeing over 300 visitors during the season and over 10 vendor participants Objective 1d. Farmstand hours were twice a week for 2 hours, serving local residents, many of whom live in food deserts and are on food assistance programs Objective 2a. Over 20 vendors consistently participated in the monthly farmers markets, almost all from the Clinton Hill/South Ward of Newark, providing economic opportunities for local businesses. Objective 2b. the Newark Growers box was launched in early 2023, with 9 participating Newark growers, providing them access to additional markets for their goods, which included things like tea, honey and produce. We also provided products grown by 5 rural growers, including eggs and dairy products Objective 3a. neighborhood farmers markets saw an estimated 650+ customers throughout the market season. To attract customers, we used. variety of marketing methods, including flyers, email blasts, social media posts and mailers Objective 3b. An estimated 300 people were served at various farmstands that occurred on a weekly basis, including a senior housing facility, local hospital and areas around the city where residents face challenges to accessing fresh local produce Objectve 3c: Over 300 vouchers were distributed to local residents, especially at the monthly farmers market, where all participants were given $10 in vouchers that could be used for food. Other vouchers were mailed to local residents to use at our weekly farmers market Objective 3d. We partnered with several healthcare partners, incuding RWJBarnabus who offered mobile health screenings, to offer health services at monthly farmers market
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Progress 07/01/22 to 06/30/23
Outputs
Target Audience:43 Urban growersand rural farmers were contacted during farmers market vendor solicitation outreach efforts. 105 Residents and stakeholder were engaged n the Clinton Hill andSpringfield Belmont neighborhoods.through project outreach effort to form the farmers market steering committees. 140 Seniors living in the Springfield?Belmont and Newarks West Ward were provided nutritional education education. 60 Farmer standpatrons were provided healthy food prep demonstartions. Changes/Problems:The project has faced challanges in drawing residents to the Springfield/Belmont market. This is a new market and the project team and steering commitee are working diligently to outreach to the community to inform residents of the opportunity to access affordable healthy produce. Through these efforts opportuinites to utilize new distribution models have emerged. One opportunity is the new SNAP benefit feature that allows recipients to use their SNAP benefit to complete online purchases.To utilize online ordering, andproduce pick up and delivery, the project has develped a virtual farmers market. This market features all of the healthy food items available at the Springfield/Belmont Farmers market. Community members are able to access the market by scanning a QR code or entering the URL into their browser. The produce is then available for pick up or will be delivered to a pre-arranged pick up location in the target neighborhood. This approach reduces barriers to participation such as travel time, distance and transportation cost.Additionally by partnering with community organizations, churched and housing developments we are able to increase project exposure, intergate this service seamlessly into the community, modernize our approach and make healthy food accessconvient for community members. The projects evaluation consultant will develop a evaluation tool to be utilized in collecting participant data specific to this initiative. What opportunities for training and professional development has the project provided?
Nothing Reported
How have the results been disseminated to communities of interest?
Nothing Reported
What do you plan to do during the next reporting period to accomplish the goals?Between July 1st and November 30th we plan to provide asscess to affordable healthy produce for residents in In the Springfield/Belmont and Clinton Hill communities. We will contiue to host our scheduledweekly farmstands and farmers markets with a goal of serving 600 visitor over the market season. Additinally we wil provide a total of 500 farmers market vouchers to market participants over the market season. We will continue to promote and market the markets to our target populations through the development of a community outreach campaign aimed at increase community familarity with market opportunities and increase resident attendance at the markets. We will offer continued nutritional education and health meal preparation demonstrations at he farmers markets and farm stands. We will conduct anevaluation of the Clinton Hill Farmers Market and Springfield/Belmont farmers market in partnership with the evaluation consultant. Additionally we will share these findings with residents and stakeholders through scheduled community engagement events. We will provide food safety trainingto 30 local residents, local food entrepenurs and growers to increase knowledge of proper food safety procedures. Healthy meal prep workshops for youth and families that includes access to fresh healthy produce. Nutritional education for market attendees of the Springfield / Belmont and Clinton Hill markets.
Impacts
What was accomplished under these goals?
To improve food distribution infrastructure in food insecure communities in Newark, NJ we have constructed an on farm cold storage unit which will allow us to maintain the quality and nutritional value of vegetables that we produce for distributiontocommunity members. Additionally, the cold storage unit allows other local producers the ability to store their harvest and therefore be able to participate in markets and other opportunities available in the local food system. Market steering committees were established with representation from neighborhood residents, growers, vendors, healthcare partners, and other social service organizations. The Prince Street Steering Committee was comprised of 18 members. The Clinton Hill Farmers Market Steering Committee has 5. The market Steering committees meet monthly in April and bi-weekly in May. During these meetings, goals were set for community outreachto ensure we provided information about the markets to the target number of residents and stakeholders. Additionally, steering committee members developed strategies to increase resident participation and to developed themes and programming that would be informative, engaging andprovidea positive experience for community members. One per month Farmers Markets were developed and scheduled in the Clinton Hill district. This market provides quality, affordable healthy food options in an area that is food insecure. The farmers markets are scheduled one Saturday per month from June to November at the Hawthorne Avenue Farm, on Demerest Avenue between Nye and Hawthorne Ave. In addition to local vendors, RWJ Barnabas will also provide health education. At the Clinton hill Farmers Market cooking demonstrations and nutrition workshops and educational events have been scheduled throughout the market season. To increase resident participation Farmers markets and Farmstands promotional material were developed for the Clinton Hill Market, Springfield/Belmont farmstands and Farmers Market. These marketing materials include flyers, social media posts, posters and email blasts. Data collection and research was conducted to develop a list of urban, regional and small urban growers and farmers. Outreach was conducted through emails, social media in person visits and direct calling. These efforts resulted in 2 rural farmers, 3 newark urban growersand 22 local vendors registering to participate during the farmers market season. We partnered with local senior residences in our target communities to increase market opportunities to residents that lake the ability to regularly engage in local Farmers markets. Twice per month we provide 70 healthy produce bags to seniors in low-income food insecure communities. 700lbs of high-quality local produce was provided to these seniors during the month of June. During the reporting period we facilitated two local grower's meetings. The goal of these meetings was to hear from local growers and provide them with an opportunity to share their thoughts on how they can best be supported to increase their capacity to distribute in the local food system. 15 growers participated in the first meeting held in May and 25 growers participated in the meeting held in June. The outcome of these meetings has been identification of needs, training on production and season extension methods, development of direct-to-consumer online sales strategies and collective impact opportunities. Greater Newark Conservancy participated in community outreach events to connect neighborhood residents with local social and health service providers, educational opportunities, and community events to improve overall neighborhood health conditions. On Wednesday April 26th from 12:00pm - 3:00pm the GNC team participated in the NJPAC Wellness Fair: We provided produce and nutritional education. There were 250+ individuals in attendance. ?
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