Collaboration and Service Improvement:

• Support strategic planning within the Upper Valley Hunger Council to identify opportunities to increase coordination of services and address gaps.

• Map food security assets to identify gaps and opportunities. 

• Increase use of Hunger Vital Signs as a screening tool to identify food insecurity in healthcare and social service settings, especially for children. 

• Expand access to meals for children at school and during summer breaks. 

• Increase the number of community gardens and gleaning providing fresh produce to people experiencing food insecurity. 

Education:

• Support strategic planning within the Upper Valley Hunger Council to identify opportunities to increase education about resources and healthy food options. 

Advocacy: 

• Host Bi-State Legislative Breakfast every two years to engage state policymakers in discussion of local health priorities. 

• Advocate for the expansion of low-barrier meal programs for children at school and during summer breaks. 

• Advocate for livable wages.

Equity:

• Increase capacity of grassroots and small organizations representing people with lived experience of health inequities to address the concerns of their communities independently through grantmaking and technical assistance. 

According to the United States Department of Agriculture (USDA), 33.8 million people lived in food-insecure households in 2021. Limited access to healthy, nutritious food can have health impacts such as depression, poor oral health, and trouble focusing. Inflation has caused food prices to rise an average of 11.4% in 2022, with staple foods like eggs rising in cost by as much as 39.8%. Practices to improve the food environment include lowering the cost of nutritious foods and increasing access to nutrition assistance programs like food stamps and food banks.

• Upper Valley Hunger Council (UVHC)
• Mt. Ascutney Hospital and Health Center (MAHHC) Food Security Workgroup
• Mt. Ascutney Regional Commission (MARC)
• Two Rivers Ottauquechee Regional Commission (TROPC)
• New Hampshire Hunger Solutions
• Hartford Community Coalition (HCC)
• Friends of Mascoma Foundation(FOMF)
• Vital Communities (VC)
• Willing Hands
• Public Health Council (PHC)
• Upper Valley Equity Anti-Racism (UVEAR) Leadership Team
• Upper Valley Community Health Equity Partnership (UVCHEP) Steering Committee

Data Overview: Feeding America's Map the Meal Gap program uses the USDA Food Security Survey to create a standardized measure of each county's food environment, called the Food Environment Index. This index is determined by the low-income population in a county that lives far away from grocery stores and the percentage of people who lack access to reliable food sources.

Limitations: Though this index can be useful to track an individual county's progress toward food security, this metric is not comparable across different counties due to differences in data collection and interpretation.