By Susan DeBlieck, Christine Hradek
Iowa Master Gardeners will receive support to fight against hunger, poor nutrition
Master Gardeners will sow the seeds necessary to combat hunger and provide healthy food for struggling Iowans through a new program set to begin this winter. The gardening volunteers, certified through Iowa State University Extension and Outreach, will increase the amount of produce they donate to food banks.
The program is a collaborative effort involving the ISU Extension and Outreach Master Gardener Program, ISU Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Education (SNAP-Ed) Program and the ISU Research and Demonstration Farms. It will ensure that produce needed by food banks is grown at the seven Master Gardener demonstration gardens on the research farms in the 2016 season.
Iowa Master Gardeners will have the opportunity to learn how to work more closely with Iowa’s eight food banks during a three-part webinar series offered for MG required continuing education credits.
“The beneficiaries will be the Iowans who will receive much needed fresh food,” said Susan DeBlieck, program assistant for the ISU Extension and Outreach Master Gardener Program, who provides educational opportunities for the volunteers.
DeBlieck said the food banks are seeking produce that stores well, doesn’t necessarily have to be refrigerated and needs little preparation, such as sweet potatoes, onions, potatoes and cherry tomatoes. “All these crops are grown easily in Iowa,” she said.
“Families experiencing poverty are at greater risk for diet-related chronic disease and often have limited access to healthy foods they can afford,” said Christine Hradek, who coordinates SNAP-Education for ISU Extension and Outreach and was closely involved in implementing the new initiative. “It takes a lot of partners working together to provide adequate fresh produce for food banks. We are excited to have Master Gardeners expand their role in this work.”
Many Master Gardeners already are on the front lines in responding to needs in their communities with donations from gardens to food banks. Located in 90 Iowa counties, they are known for their service-oriented spirit; each person commits to 20 hours of volunteer labor each year. About 2,400 Iowa Master Gardeners donate about 100,000 hours to their communities on an annual basis.
For example, Mills County Master Gardeners donated more than 7,700 pounds of produce from their Glenwood Giving Garden to local food banks in 2014. In western Iowa, the Woodbury County Master Gardeners connected gardeners with food banks and the Salvation Army, collecting and distributing another 7,000 pounds of food that year.
The potential is great for Iowa Master Gardeners to make a difference in improving nutrition in a demographic that finds it difficult to purchase fresh produce. About 12.7 percent of Iowans — 389,250 people, including 139,850 children — are food insecure, meaning they have inadequate access to healthy foods.
“The model donation gardens planted on the research farms could yield more than one ton of food, depending on how the growing season goes,” Hradek said.
Special winter training for Master Gardeners
Master Gardeners must receive 10 hours of continuing education each year. The new initiative will give them the chance to receive six hours of training in food access issues for low-income Iowans, ideas on how they can work with food banks and proper food handling practices.
The new training will consist of three, two-hour webinars offered from January to March 2016 at county extension offices. The live, online educational presentations will feature Iowa State food and nutrition experts. They will be free of charge.
The volunteers who complete the training can apply for grants up to $500 to fund local projects. The grants are geared to Master Gardeners who seek to establish community coalitions for food bank donations, to connect growers with food banks in their towns or to teach people in poverty to grow their own food. Funding will be provided by the U.S. Department of Agriculture, which administers the national Snap-Ed Program.
Source: iastate.edu