In small communities like those in the Blackfeet Nation with few resources, help is vital to stretching food dollars where two of every three people are food insecure. The purpose of the project is to enhance the Blackfeet Tribes Food Distribution through the procurement and distribution of local, domestic food to underserved and food insecure Tribal members. The Tribe will seek out and engage local and regional socially disadvantaged farmers/producers who can provide foods for allocation to our community members.
Planned activities include sourcing local producers to increase and expand the procurement of healthy, culturally relevant foods for the Blackfeet Nation, including bison, wild game, beef, poultry, eggs, and produce developing policies for procuring food from an expanding network of local producers and increasing services and pursuing future potential funding opportunities for long term sustainability of food sovereignty.
The Blackfeet Tribe is requesting $680,000.00 for purchasing from local farmers/producers. The expected outcome of the project is Increased amounts of local indigenous foods in the food system for community members within the Blackfeet Nation. We estimate purchasing from 18 local producers, with over half of them being socially disadvantaged and distributions taking place at 12 locations, all of which will be in underserved communities. Intended beneficiaries of the project are food insecure members of the Blackfeet Nation, local producers, and a socially disadvantaged producers including, but not limited to, reservation bison ranchers, Hutterite Colony Producers, Montana Growers Cooperatives that are operating on or near Native American lands.