We’re excited to finally announce that we were one of the 93 recipients of the Community Food Relief Fund grants from the Victorian Government!

The $5 million grants aim to strengthen food relief services across the state to ensure healthy food reaches Victorians in need. We will use the funds to develop an innovative new voucher program, the Grocer Gift Program, for people on low or no incomes. This builds on our hardcopy voucher scheme that has been in place for a number of years now. Key to our mission is dignity, choice and nutrition. Our innovative voucher program will allow recipients to access food relief in a more discrete and accessible way. In addition, our markets provide a setting that enables choice - with a wide variety of high quality, fresh produce available - and a stepping stone away from food relief to food security, with our low priced and high quality produce available to everyone.

We’ll begin piloting the project in February and March with our current partner, Cohealth, at our Fitzroy and Carlton markets, before expanding to more markets with more partners later in the year.

Some of the funds will also contribute to allowing us to continue to deliver food relief boxes to partnering agencies, ensuring more people get more fresh produce on their tables.

It’s been incredible to see our organisation featured in the announcement of the grants, both in the press release and news.

We love that our work can be recognised in this way and we can’t wait to continue to share new developments with you.

Stay tuned for more details!