The Michigan Department of Agriculture and Rural Development (MDARD) recently announced recipients of the 2023-20244 Food Safety Education Fund grants for food safety training for the food industry and education and outreach for consumers. MIFMA has been awarded $96,075 total for two projects.
MIFMA has been awarded $63,479 for a twelve-month statewide consumer food safety education outreach project. This project will allow MIFMA to connect with markets to implement food safety programming in a way that fits the needs of their community. Potential resource topics include safe food sampling, cooking demonstrations, cooking at home with fresh farmers market products, and other relevant matters as requested by farmers market managers.
This outreach program was originally developed and executed for the 2022 market season and was continued in 2023. During this time, it was clear that there was a greater need for food safety education in farmers market settings. This consumer-facing project will expand upon last year’s efforts and will help connect more markets with food safety programming and materials based on their community’s needs during the 2024 farmers market season.
MIFMA has also been awarded $32,596 to execute comprehensive, accessible licensing and food safety education to Michigan farmers market managers.
This project aims to provide in-depth licensing and food safety education to farmers market managers, to strengthen communication and collaboration between MDARD food inspectors and the managers of the farmers markets in their areas, and to increase the accessibility and ease of use of licensing and food safety information available to farmers market managers. MIFMA will leverage our position as a well-established centralized resource for Michigan farmers markets, as well as our relationship with MDARD, to provide materials and educational resources to farmers markets as requested by market managers in order to ensure high-quality licensing and food safety education that is accurate and relevant to Michigan farmers markets.
To read the entire press release, click here.