Food SPICE
Food SPICE (Food Systems Partners Investing in Communities and Entrepreneurs) connects food businesses and other food systems partners to work together to grow equitable local economies across Michigan, with a special focus in Southwest Michigan and the Upper Peninsula.
Project Plan
In 2020, 22 partners from across Michigan agreed to partner to create a stronger Michigan food system, with a particular focus in Southwest Michigan and the Upper Peninsula.
Starting with one-on-one business support of new incubator kitchens, we seek to redesign the food system and food business collaboration infrastructure so that lower-resourced communities can use food as an equitable economic engine.
Food SPICE is coordinated by MSU Center for Regional Food Systems.
To learn more about our partners, check out our people page!
Project Objectives
To strengthen public and private partnerships for more resilient and just food systems in rural and urban communities across Michigan, we set the following objectives.
Objectives
- Provide technical assistance to at least 120 food and farm businesses in economically disadvantaged, rural and urban communities in Michigan.
- At least 90 food and farm businesses will have better access to financial support for their business.
- At least 60 food and farm businesses will have increased sales and more customers.
- Expand the Michigan Incubator Kitchen Network so that 40 new Black and Indigenous entrepreneurs can start small processing businesses and build their network of sales channels.
- Food SPICE partners will have more capacity to assist to food and farm business owners.
- By August 2023, most Food SPICE partners will be collaborating more than they were before the project.
- By August 2023, food retailers, institutions, and distributors in the Upper Peninsula and Southwest Michigan will purchase 20% more locally-produced products than they did in 2020.
About the Partnership
Our Food SPICE partners include:
- local food policy councils,
- Tribal communities,
- economic development organizations,
- higher education institutions,
- financial institutions,
- food hubs,
- a food distributor and cooperative, and
- private funders.
Our Food SPICE partners are committed to addressing:
- issues that growing good food and farm businesses face,
- barriers to getting financing or kitchen space for production,
- increasing sales of locally produced foods, and
- prioritizing racial equity in building food systems that are more just.
Where We Work
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