State of the Plate
Assessing the Charlotte-Mecklenburg Food System
In the past, we have used our State of the Plate assessments to advocate for mobile market funding and policies that support them, to bring FoodCorps to Charlotte to help schools educate children around healthy food, to ask for SNAP Double Bucks (which we’re now implementing with BCBSNC), and a variety of other policy and project priorities.
Below is information on our recent efforts, as well as the 2015 State of the Plate Assessment (SOTP)
Below is information on our recent efforts, as well as the 2015 State of the Plate Assessment (SOTP)
SOTP 2020
We are in the process of planning for the 2020 State of the Plate. Please contact npeterson@uncc.edu if you would like to join the planning and research team.
Current questions for 2020 SOTP assessment:
Project Summary
Food system resilience is critical for food access, food justice, and a healthy food system. In bringing together over 80 organizations and individuals working towards this in Mecklenburg County, this project will assess how COVID-19 and other events have changed our food system, and how they might shape it in the future towards equity and sustainability. There is a demonstrated need to understand more about the local organizational challenges to addressing food system issues, and this has arisen as a priority research need from the recent discussions around the 2020 State of the Plate planning undertaken in 2019 by this research team. The funding will allow us to discuss organizational needs, as well as ideas around resilience, adaptation, and sustainability that are both meaningful to these organizations and valuable for theorizing how our world is shifting under COVID-19 and other drivers. We have continually worked with our partners to develop the research questions, and need to continue to collaborate to develop these more fully as well as the specific survey and interview questions, and other instruments.
The impact of this process will be that we will identify what we need to change and how we can implement these changes, as well as how resilience and adaptation can create the conditions for justice and sustainability in our local food system. What we find will be used in applications for collaborative organizational support grants and assessment processes for multiple organizations and agencies.
Current funding is through UNC Charlotte.
Current questions for 2020 SOTP assessment:
- What assets and gaps are there in our local food system, what are the barriers to success and the possible solutions? How has this shifted in light of COVID-19? What kinds of strategies and tools, like the Rivendell’s Map, have emerged to address COVID-19 and could these be valuable in the future? In addition, What is the value of our food system for the local economy? What are the experiences, interconnections, and barriers to success? How has this shifted in light of COVID-19? What kinds of strategies have emerged to address COVID-19 and could these be valuable in the future?
- How has household food security in Mecklenburg County been affected by COVID-19? How is this related to housing, healthcare and health, transportation, or other systems also potentially affected by COVID-19?
- What do Mecklenburg County residents want or need from the food system? How has this shifted in light of COVID-19?
- What is our collective vision for the food system? How does this tie to ideas about justice, equity, resilience, adaptation, and sustainability?
Project Summary
Food system resilience is critical for food access, food justice, and a healthy food system. In bringing together over 80 organizations and individuals working towards this in Mecklenburg County, this project will assess how COVID-19 and other events have changed our food system, and how they might shape it in the future towards equity and sustainability. There is a demonstrated need to understand more about the local organizational challenges to addressing food system issues, and this has arisen as a priority research need from the recent discussions around the 2020 State of the Plate planning undertaken in 2019 by this research team. The funding will allow us to discuss organizational needs, as well as ideas around resilience, adaptation, and sustainability that are both meaningful to these organizations and valuable for theorizing how our world is shifting under COVID-19 and other drivers. We have continually worked with our partners to develop the research questions, and need to continue to collaborate to develop these more fully as well as the specific survey and interview questions, and other instruments.
The impact of this process will be that we will identify what we need to change and how we can implement these changes, as well as how resilience and adaptation can create the conditions for justice and sustainability in our local food system. What we find will be used in applications for collaborative organizational support grants and assessment processes for multiple organizations and agencies.
Current funding is through UNC Charlotte.
SOTP 2015
Letter from the Charlotte-Mecklenburg Food Policy Council
Since our founding in 2010, when the first Charlotte-Mecklenburg community food assessment was completed, the Charlotte-Mecklenburg Food Policy Council has advocated for policies that build a sustainable, equitable, and healthy food system. The original community food assessment, often referred to as the “Food Desert Study,” provided stark statistics about the state of healthy food access in our county.
While the statistics aren’t always pleasant, they do have the impact of mobilizing a community to make important changes. No one wants to hear that 35% of Mecklenburg County households with kids faced food insecurity in the past year or that some parents have to make the difficult choice between food for their families or medicine for themselves. Numbers like these can be hard to hear but they can also galvanize people to take action and work together to improve our food system.
Since that first food study in 2010, Charlotte and Mecklenburg County has seen mobile farmers market legislation passed, food pantries on college campuses opened, FoodCorps service members serving in high-poverty Charlotte- Mecklenburg Schools, the formation of the Fresh Look at School Food coalition to improve access to healthy food at school, the creation of the Piedmont Culinary Guild bringing together local chefs and farmers, and an overall increased awareness of the issues surrounding equitable food access.
With the release of the 2015 State of the Plate Community Food Assessment, we are so proud that not only do we have the facts and figures to further the work of our organization and countless others in Charlotte, but that this report also has an even more important component – the voice of the community.
As Mark Winne, community food systems advocate, said, “When it comes to how we assess a community’s food system, listening is the most important tool we have.”
The 2015 State of the Plate would not have been possible without the support of two very important sponsors: Wells Fargo, and Blue Cross and Blue Shield of North Carolina. The breadth and depth of the work accomplished in 2015 happened because of the collaboration of many partners here in Charlotte and due to the tireless work of our two primary researchers, Victor Romano, EdD and Katherine Metzo, PhD. We are fortunate to have a very dedicated Board of Directors and Experts’ Panel who helped in so many ways to see this enormous undertaking to completion. We want to thank Johnson C. Smith University for their leadership, and our colleagues from Queens University, Winthrop University, and UNC Charlotte, as well as the dynamic team at the Mecklenburg County Health Department for their contributions to this project and their continued support going forward as we make even more improvements to increase healthy food access in our community.
The release of the 2015 State of the Plate report is truly just the beginning. We don’t have all the answers but we are excited to be leading the discussion and helping the community take action to build a more just food system in Charlotte and Mecklenburg County.
Erin Brighton, MPH, M.Ed.
Executive Director
Charlotte-Mecklenburg Food Policy Council
Since our founding in 2010, when the first Charlotte-Mecklenburg community food assessment was completed, the Charlotte-Mecklenburg Food Policy Council has advocated for policies that build a sustainable, equitable, and healthy food system. The original community food assessment, often referred to as the “Food Desert Study,” provided stark statistics about the state of healthy food access in our county.
While the statistics aren’t always pleasant, they do have the impact of mobilizing a community to make important changes. No one wants to hear that 35% of Mecklenburg County households with kids faced food insecurity in the past year or that some parents have to make the difficult choice between food for their families or medicine for themselves. Numbers like these can be hard to hear but they can also galvanize people to take action and work together to improve our food system.
Since that first food study in 2010, Charlotte and Mecklenburg County has seen mobile farmers market legislation passed, food pantries on college campuses opened, FoodCorps service members serving in high-poverty Charlotte- Mecklenburg Schools, the formation of the Fresh Look at School Food coalition to improve access to healthy food at school, the creation of the Piedmont Culinary Guild bringing together local chefs and farmers, and an overall increased awareness of the issues surrounding equitable food access.
With the release of the 2015 State of the Plate Community Food Assessment, we are so proud that not only do we have the facts and figures to further the work of our organization and countless others in Charlotte, but that this report also has an even more important component – the voice of the community.
As Mark Winne, community food systems advocate, said, “When it comes to how we assess a community’s food system, listening is the most important tool we have.”
The 2015 State of the Plate would not have been possible without the support of two very important sponsors: Wells Fargo, and Blue Cross and Blue Shield of North Carolina. The breadth and depth of the work accomplished in 2015 happened because of the collaboration of many partners here in Charlotte and due to the tireless work of our two primary researchers, Victor Romano, EdD and Katherine Metzo, PhD. We are fortunate to have a very dedicated Board of Directors and Experts’ Panel who helped in so many ways to see this enormous undertaking to completion. We want to thank Johnson C. Smith University for their leadership, and our colleagues from Queens University, Winthrop University, and UNC Charlotte, as well as the dynamic team at the Mecklenburg County Health Department for their contributions to this project and their continued support going forward as we make even more improvements to increase healthy food access in our community.
The release of the 2015 State of the Plate report is truly just the beginning. We don’t have all the answers but we are excited to be leading the discussion and helping the community take action to build a more just food system in Charlotte and Mecklenburg County.
Erin Brighton, MPH, M.Ed.
Executive Director
Charlotte-Mecklenburg Food Policy Council
