A new refrigerated van is about to mean more fresh produce reaching San Joaquin County families who live far from a grocery store.
Health Net and the Centene Foundation are giving Emergency Food Bank and Second Harvest of the Greater Valley more than $160,000 to expand access to nutrient-dense food across San Joaquin and Stanislaus counties. The gift is part of a $1.1 million investment through California Food Banks spread across 10 food banks in 12 California counties.
The money is going toward a new refrigerated Ford Transit 250 van, the centerpiece of Emergency Food Bank's Mobile Farmer's Market program. The program already reaches more than 45,000 San Joaquin County residents living in food deserts at 80 sites, bringing 20-pound bags of fresh produce along with a bilingual nutrition educator to each stop.
"Bringing 20 pound bags of fresh produce, a bilingual Nutrition Educator, and a driver to each site results in up to a 100 residents per site learning about each piece of produce in the bag, how to prepare it, what the nutritional value of it, and tasting a sample of the produce in a recipe cooked at the site," said Leonard O. Hansen, President and CEO of Emergency Food Bank. "It works to combat chronic diseases such as diabetes as well as providing fresh produce to residents who otherwise would not have access."
Beyond the new van, the broader investment funds expanded food distribution, emergency food response, and infrastructure such as refrigerated trucks and cold storage for food banks across the region. Health Net says the funding comes as food banks statewide are distributing record amounts of food, with roughly 1 in 5 Californians experiencing food insecurity.