With funding from the Local Food Purchase Cooperative Agreement Program, The Tunica Biloxi Tribe of Louisiana will establish a program to empower our tribal community to determine how local food can be procured and distributed to underserved tribal citizens. The tribe will issue request for proposal from local farmers to begin purchasing food for tribal families in need. The Tribal Council will work with the tribe’s procurement office to expedite contracts with local suppliers. Local and tribal food procurement and distribution will be community driven with the tribal government getting buy-in from tribal government units such as Social Services Department, Education Department, Health Department, Housing Department, the Tribal Criminal Justice system, and collaboration with state and local agencies to identify disadvantaged farmers/food producers and tribal families facing food insecurity.
The Tribe will invest at least $250,000 thousand dollars of Local Food Purchase Agreement Program funding into food purchased from local farmers over the course of two years with a minimum of 51 percent of those dollars being spent on purchases from socially disadvantaged farmers. The Tribe also hopes to prioritize and streamline procurement of food that can be distributed within the community while providing tribal members the opportunity to determine pathways and parameters for procurement and distribution that can meet the unique needs of farmers and underserved members of the tribal community.