Awarded Grants

Teach Food is Sacred, Food is Medicine philosophy to the youth/community participants. Increase access to healthy, locally-produced foods. Create a network of local food producers that will be made available and utilized by community members. Create events and curriculum to make traditional food knowledge and practices more commonplace with Salish people. Increase overall health of project participants through food, exercise. and nutrition related information. Leverage resources from other local food sovereignty and youth projects. Create/leverage HJV activities for sustainability and replication in other reservation communities/schools. Create a network with similar FNDI grantees with HJV leadership team to share best practices.

The ultimate purpose of the Strengthening Menominee Health and Native Food System project is to utilize existing resources to maximize the community's availability, accessibility, and cultural understanding of local food. The College of Menominee Nation will 1) increase production of local food at the Collaborative Garden through volunteer engagement, 2) create financial incentives for low-income individuals to access food at the Kehtekaewak Farmers Market, 3) increase youth and Elders' cultural understanding and consumption of traditional squash, and 4) develop a 5-Year Agriculture Outreach Business Plan to place CMN's local food initiatives on a path towards self-sufficiency.

The ultimate purpose of our project is to 1) increase food security of the community, and to 2) develop a community system to provide access to fresh, healthy foods. This project will support the families, youth and elder gardening projects within the community by expanding on existing gardens, and creating new family gardens. As a follow-up, interested gardeners will receive encouragement and guidance to expand to market gardening, providing extra family income and filling a need for local produce.

The purpose of the CRITFC salmon marketing program is to create a resource for the tribes, tribal fishers and their families to utilize to help them control tribal natural resources. Fishers utilize food safety and quality handling techniques to help increase the quality and availability of products to tribal communities and also facilitate access to mainstream markets as consumers become more aware of the products being processed in conformance to applicable federal regulations. Education of new FSMA regulations can support strategies to promote a sustainable program that can be replicated overtime and passed on to future generations.

The ultimate purpose of this project is to create a community learning kitchen that will serve as a part of the local food system where the nutritious food grown in the adjacent 1 acre community garden can be cleaned, packaged, and prepared for delivery to those who need it most. This renovation and remodel will extend the useful life and better use this building to its full capacity. This Commercial grade community kitchen will allow the tribe to have more control of the local food system, increase productivity and leverage other assets in the process.

The ultimate purpose of this project is to increase economic opportunity on the Pine Ridge Reservation through ag economy, and continue to create a food system on the Pine Ridge Reservation. We will do this by leveraging our small demonstration farm by implementing a farmers market and begin to create value added products.

The purpose of this grant is to create an alternative way to ensure healthy and fresh produce for the residents of Fort Belknap. A community garden has already been established, however this can only be accessed for a short growing season. A greenhouse will ensure fresh produce would be available longer. Having fresh produce year around is a needed resource that has been non-existent before. Fort Belknap is experiencing a high rate of obesity, diabetes and heart disease. Fresh organic produce will ensure healthy eating habits and lifestyles prolonging lives and a better way of life on Fort Belknap.

The ultimate purpose of the CNFR is to :1) create a sustainable youth farm and ranch program on the Crow reservation by providing opportunities for youth to learn from Crow ag experts, ranchers, and farmers using traditional and cultural methods, 2) increase awareness and knowledge of local food systems using traditional/tribal resources and course work, 3) leverage funds from junior agriculture loan program to improve youth access/opportunities to farm and ranching, and 4)utilize the Crow Youth Ranch and existing program resources to support local sustainable healthy foods / economies.

The ultimate purpose is to (1) create a new and affordable food product from a spiritually, traditionally and nutritionally important resource that can support California Indian people and others in addressing Type II diabetes; (2) retain knowledge about the importance of acorns in California Indian diets and acorn gathering and processing skills in the community by creating demand for and instilling knowledge in Native youth; and (3) leverage the project results to advance the youths' work to develop a mission-driven, micro-enterprise that serves the health and nutritional needs of California Indians and educates others about California Indians.

As people rely more heavily on store-bought processed foods and traditionally-harvested natural foods become a smaller part of Tribal Members' daily diets, nutrition-related illnesses increase and cultural traditions are in danger of being lost. The ultimate purpose of the Wiyot Tribe Healthy and Traditional Food Systems Initiative is to create greater control over nutrition and food security for the Table Bluff Community by leveraging the abundant natural resources on land and water and utilizing traditional and modern harvest techniques to retain stronger cultural ties between the people and their natural environme