By Pat Jones, Project Coordinator
The National Grocers Association Foundation Technical Assistance Center (NGAF TA Center) will be partnering with the Indigenous Food and Agriculture Initiative (IFAI) to offer a free webinar, “Help Promote Food Access in Indigenous Communities with GusNIP,” on May 16 at 4:30 p.m. EST.
The purpose of this webinar is to raise awareness within Indigenous communities of the existence of the Gus Schumacher Nutrition Incentive Program. Attendees will learn how the GusNIP program works, why non-profits or government agencies operating on/within Indigenous land may be interested in applying for and running a GusNIP program, and how it is currently being implemented by two separate non-profits working in native communities: Community Outreach and Patient Empowerment (COPE), which runs the Navajo Fruit and Vegetable Prescription Program (FVRx) and Yukon-Kuskokwim Health Corporation, which runs a produce prescription project on Tribal land in southwest Alaska. Representatives of these organizations will speak to their own experience running GusNIP projects and the benefits and challenges of operating a successful project.
Retailers are also essential partners in offering GusNIP nutrition incentive/produce prescription projects, and while they cannot apply for the funds themselves, they can identify potential non-profit or government agency partners to work with to get a program off the ground. If you operate a food retail store on Indigenous land, this webinar will help you gain valuable perspective on these projects and how you may be a part of the process, both in application and implementation.
Register here for the webinar on May 16 at 4:30 p.m. EST to hear more about how this program can be brought to your community to help provide healthier foods to people.
*The NGAF TA Center addresses the challenges grocers and supermarket operators face in establishing nutrition incentive programs and is a proud partner of the Nutrition Incentive Hub. The Nutrition Incentive Hub, funded through a cooperative agreement from the United States Department of Agriculture, National Institute of Food and Agriculture, is a new resource that provides training, technical assistance, reporting\ and evaluation for those working to launch or expand SNAP incentives or produce prescription programs. The Nutrition Incentive Hub is led by Gretchen Swanson Center for Nutrition in partnership with Fair Food Network along with a coalition of evaluators, researchers, practitioners, and grocery and farmers market experts from across the country dedicated to strengthening and uniting the best thinking in the field to increase access to affordable, healthy food to those who need it most.
