Local Food Purchase Assistance Program (LFPA)

The USDA Agricultural Marketing Service established the Local Food Purchase Assistance Cooperative Agreement Program (LFPA) in early 2022. Cooperative agreements will allow for state and tribal governments to procure and distribute local and regional foods and beverages that are healthy, nutritious and unique to their geographic area.  The food will meet the needs of the population, and serve feeding programs, including food banks, schools and organizations that reach underserved communities. In addition to increasing local food consumption, funds will help build and expand economic opportunity for local and socially disadvantaged producers.

While Montana is a large producer of commodity crops, the availability of locally grown food products is limited in supply. Because the state is predominantly underserved due to its rural character, LFPA creates a unique opportunity to address these issues. LFPA can be used not only as a tool to ensure that more Montana food is ending up on the plates of Montanans, but also to initiate long term buyer-seller relationships that will grow our local food economy.

The Montana Department of Agriculture will subaward funds to organizations statewide to increase the distribution of local food from and to underserved constituencies, and to facilitate the establishment of business relationships between underserved farmers and food purchasers in underserved communities. The primary objective of sub awardees will be to identify or organize producers or groups of producers in sizes to provide sufficient volume and capacity to serve underserved areas. Once producer groups are identified, funding will be used to supplement the cost of procuring and distributing food into underserved communities. The objective in supplementing food purchases is to connect underserved producers with underserved communities, while also working to establish business relationships that will carry on into the future. Grants will be awarded from $50,000 to $200,000 over a two-year period for this effort.

Outcomes of this project will be the distribution of local food from and to underserved constituencies, the organization of producer groups, establishment of business relationships with underserved communities, and identification of best business practices.