The Iowa Local Food Purchase Assistance Cooperative Agreement Program (ILFPA) was launched in September 2022 and achieved early, nationally recognized success in purchasing high-quality food from local farmers and producers at a fair price and distributing it to underserved communities throughout the state.
Funding for the Iowa LFPA is made possible by the U.S. Department of Agriculture, which was awarded to the Iowa Department of Agriculture and Land Stewardship (IDALS). The IDALS program is being managed in partnership with Iowa Valley Resource Conservation and Development.
Since the program’s start, the Iowa LFPA has purchased over two million dollars from local farmers and producers that has been distributed throughout the state through a network of food hubs, food banks, and the Meskwaki Nation. The program has strategically worked towards a positive impact for food access across Iowa. For every dollar spent through the Iowa LFPA the investment in local Iowa communities is almost double.
Since the start of the program in 2022, 234 beginning, established, and socially disadvantaged farmers and producers throughout the state have sold through the LFPA, getting food to the people who want it, without short changing the farmer.
However, the program isn’t evergreen. Non-profit organizations who work with the program, including Iowa Valley RC&D based in Amana, Iowa, are encouraging legislators to support the program in Des Moines Iowa at the Iowa Food and Farm Day on the Hill on Thursday, January 25th
Shad Swanson, from the non profit Life 5B in southwest Iowa, said the Iowa LFPA is making a large impact statewide, “from a producer standpoint, the LFPA gives a high market value. We signed up a half a dozen or more new producers this year in our area being able to use that as a selling point because they know where their food’s going and they’re getting paid [a fair price for it].”
To learn more about the program and how to support it, visit www.iowalfpa.org, https://iowaagriculture.gov/ILFPA, or contact Iowa Valley RC&D’s LFPA team at [email protected]. The Iowa LFPA program is building new partnerships and infrastructure across the state to continue serving communities with high-quality local food.