Partnership for a Healthier America pilot program focuses on food security
Partnership for a Healthier America pilot program focuses on food security
Partnership for a Healthier America, the American Frozen Food Institute and Instacart released the findings of an innovative pilot program that successfully expanded access to fruits and vegetables for families with lower incomes by including frozen produce as an option. Conducted as an extension of PHA’s flagship Good Food at Home program, the pilot was supported by AFFI and delivered via Instacart in Chicago, Philadelphia and Baltimore.
The Good Food at Home Fall/Winter 2024 pilot provided participating families with $80 per month for three months in Instacart Health Fresh Funds grocery vouchers, to purchase fresh and frozen fruits and vegetables for delivery. The results confirm that including frozen produce is a practical and highly effective strategy for increasing both produce access and consumption, establishing a powerful new model for food security initiatives nationwide.
“Thanks to our partnership with AFFI, the addition of frozen fruits and vegetables marks a breakthrough in nutritious food access,” said Noreen Springstead, president and CEO of Partnership for a Healthier America. “Our traditional approach of providing produce boxes or credits for fresh items, while effective, often overlooked the issue of perishability for families with limited time, money and transportation. The positive response to frozen produce — from preventing waste to diversifying diets — proves that it is a critical, modern and practical solution for driving food equity. By expanding the eligibility to include frozen, we are taking a major step forward in ensuring that every family, in every zip code, has dignified access to good food."
The evaluation demonstrated that frozen fruits and vegetables support nutrition access and healthy eating for households, especially those facing nutrition insecurity.
Across the three cities in the pilot, participants showed high engagement and reported positive outcomes. More than 75 percent of program participants in Philadelphia, Baltimore and Chicago made at least one purchase with their Fresh Funds and also indicated that the access to produce helped their families build a habit of eating more fruits and vegetables. More than 200,000 total additional servings of fruits and vegetables were made possible through the program.
Overall, 93 percent of Philadelphia and Chicago respondents said that Fresh Funds allowed them to buy more fruits and vegetables than they could usually afford, and 85 percent of Baltimore respondents reported the same.
