Tribal Elder Food Box Program

On August 13, 2021, partners came together to celebrate and discuss the importance of several recent efforts to improve nutrition security of Tribal members and support Tribal agriculture and economic development. Partners discussed the creation of the Tribal Elder Food Box Program, Oneida Nation and Menominee Indian Tribe of Wisconsin’s USDA Food Distribution Program on Indian Reservations 638 Self-Determination Demonstration Joint Project, and Oneida’s Food Distribution Center renovations.

The Tribal Elder Food Box Program was inspired and implemented through a partnership between Bad River Band of Lake Superior Chippewa, Forest County Potawatomi, Ho-Chunk Nation, Lac Courte Oreilles Band of Lake Superior Chippewa, Lac du Flambeau Band of Lake Superior Chippewa, Red Cliff Band of Lake Superior Chippewa, Oneida Nation, Menominee Indian Tribe of Wisconsin, Sokaogon Chippewa Community (Mole Lake Band of Lake Superior Chippewa), St. Croix Chippewa Indians of Wisconsin, and Stockbridge-Munsee Community Band of Mohican Indians, Feeding Wisconsin, Feeding America Eastern Wisconsin, Department of Agriculture, Trade and Consumer Protection, healthTIDE, UW-Madison, Wisconsin Tribal Conservation Advisory Council, and the Wisconsin Food Hub Cooperative. This group of partners has formally established the Great Lakes Intertribal Food Coalition (GLIFC) to continue expanding and enacting the vision of a connected, intertribal food system.

As this program was in pilot stages in 2021, many elders from the partnering indigenous communities shared that common traditional emergency food box items such as milk and cheese would exacerbate existing chronic illness and did not reflect traditional indigenous health-promoting foods. Thus, the Tribal Elder Food Box Program (TEFBP) was piloted as a means to restore Indigenous food-ways and access to traditional foods. These efforts included the purchasing of culturally appropriate, local and traditional products grown by Indigenous producers. Boxes contain a combination of protein (beef, bison, fish, chicken, and pork) and seasonal produce (greens, apples, berries, corn, beans, squash, potatoes, tomatoes, etc.) representative of traditional, Indigenous foods as desired by Tribal Elders. The TEFBP has experienced tremendous growth and use over the last three years.

The 2023 box distribution season ran through December 2023 and distributed 31,800 total boxes to tribal Elders in the state of Wisconsin. In the 2023 distribution season, we partnered with over 23 Indigenous producer groups and several other producer groups who identify as BIPOC, non-native, and historically underserved. The 2023 season was supported by $933,000 through the Feeding America National Regional Agri Food Distribution Program, $451,000 of Feeding America Eastern Wisconsin ARPA funding, $258,000 of Wisconsin LFPA Direct to Farmer Grants, and close to $300,000 in Intertribal LFPA grant funding.

After three successful years of running the TEFBP, Feeding America Eastern Wisconsin in partnership with the Great Lakes Intertribal Food Coalition will have provided over 2,300 Tribal homes with approximately 63,250 culturally specific and nutritious food boxes. Since 2021, it has demonstrated an increased access to healthy and culturally relevant food including, but not limited to Great Lakes wild-caught fish, bison, beef, chicken, pork, dried beans, dried hominy, maple syrup, hand harvested and dried teas, corn mush flour, wild rice, apples, and produce for Tribal elders purchased by Tribal producers. It has increased opportunities for Indigenous producers as vendors and solidified long-term partnerships. We intend to continue building on this work towards a vision of an Intertribal Food Hub.