HOULTON, Maine — Helping those less fortunate to a supply of fresh fruits and vegetables has gotten a little bit easier for folks in the greater Houlton area.
Thanks to a federal grant, big changes have come to Houlton’s Community Market, as the farmer’s fair is now accepting EBT cards, as well as credit and debit cards for purchases from all vendors participating at the market.
In addition, the Houlton Community Market is one of 35 farmers’ markets statewide, and the first in Aroostook County, to offer “Maine Harvest Bucks” this season. With the Maine Harvest Bucks program, shoppers using federal Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program (SNAP) benefits will receive a fruit and vegetable bonus voucher for every SNAP dollar spent at market.
Marie Taft, SNAP coordinator for Houlton, explained the reason for the new addition was to help families in need get more bang for their SNAP bucks.
“We are trying to make available, money through grants, to help people stretch their SNAP dollars,” Taft explained. “At the market, if they use their EBT card on an eligible product, they will get an equal amount of Harvest Bucks, which are vouchers for fresh fruits and vegetables.”
SNAP-eligible foods include baked goods, breads and cereals, jams, jellies, pickles, honey, maple syrup, fruits and vegetables, meats, fish and poultry, cheese, eggs and dairy products as well as seeds and vegetable plants that will produce food.
The Houlton Community Market, founded in 2009 and now featuring up to 24 vendors, signed up for the Maine Harvest Bucks program as part of an effort to combat the fact that Maine ranks first in New England for food insecurity.
According to Emilie Knight, SNAP Program coordinator for the Maine Federation of Farmers’ Markets, the federally funded and state-administered SNAP program provides a national average of $28 per week to eligible individuals. These benefits are designed to help relieve food insecurity. Research demonstrates that using SNAP dollars has a positive correlation with childhood development and long-term health as well as the stabilization of local economies.
The Maine Harvest Bucks program is also federally funded under the USDA’s Food Insecurity Nutrition Incentive Grant. The Maine Local Foods Access Network received this grant via Wholesome Wave, a national leader in nutrition incentive work. Harvest Bucks will help extend limited SNAP dollars, bringing fresh fruits and vegetables within reach and furthering the positive impact of SNAP.
“Maine Harvest Bucks is a nutrition incentive program,” Knight said. “The obvious goal is to get more local nourishing food, in particular fruits and vegetables, to folks who need it by incentivizing more healthful purchases, as opposed to trying to limit less nutritious foods. It is very important to us that this program operates smoothly for farmers and their markets. We are endlessly grateful to the dozens of market and community members who offer their time to make this service available at markets statewide.”
At the Houlton Community Market, a “Market Information Booth” will be set up to further explain the details of the program. The addition of debit and credit cards should also be a benefit for both shoppers and vendors alike.
“We had a machine that could swipe credit/debit cards, so we have made that available to customers,” Taft said. “Any vendor can now sell an item with credit or debit cards.”
Consumers can use credit or debit cards at the information booth to make one purchase from several different vendors. The vendor will be reimbursed through the Greater Houlton Chamber of Commerce, the organization in charge of processing the credit/debit card purchases.
The Market takes place every Saturday, 9 a.m.-1 p.m., May through October in Market Square. For more information, visit maineharvestbucks.org.
