We Funded Farm to Early Care and Education in Five States. The Impacts Were Profound

It’s hard to look at anything related to education right now and not immediately think of the great upending caused by the pandemic. But outside the upheaval that we’ve rightly been focused on, many programs are quietly flourishing and setting the stage for even greater impact after the pandemic subsides.

One such success story is the farm-to-school movement, which has since expanded to become farm to early care and education, connecting young children with local food production and healthy eating. As we celebrate Farm to School Month in October, it’s a good time to look at how farm to early care and education is changing the equation for children and local food producers around the country.

Data show these initiatives are a wise investment for both private and public dollars targeted at education and local economies. After completing a five-year, five-state farm to early care and education pilot program, we at the W.K. Kellogg Foundation can attest to the many interconnected benefits such programs can offer.

Right now, one in three families with children is experiencing food insecurity, and even as care arrangements have shifted over the past two years, millions are in childcare settings for hours each day. As the pandemic made abundantly clear, there are health, racial and access inequities in both our education and food systems. And yet in 46 states, more than a quarter-million attend programs that have a farm to early care and education element.

Farm to early care and education is a win for young learners, for providers and for local food systems. With food planters in classrooms and gardens outside, curious children put their hands in the soil where their snacks are grown—an exciting, kinetic way to teach both science and healthy eating to wide-eyed learners. Meanwhile, education and early care providers build on these lessons by procuring food from small and midsize area growers, bolstering the local economy.

In 1930, when W.K. Kellogg established our foundation to promote the health, happiness and well-being of children, he did so mindful of the interconnections between children, families and their communities. To change children’s lives for the better, community members had to come together, recognize their power to lead and affirm the value of each person’s contribution in shaping society. Our farm to early care and education program did just that.

Statewide coalitions in Iowa, Georgia, North Carolina, Pennsylvania and Wisconsin brought together a diverse group of partners in agriculture, health and education. Here’s what we funded and what we learned:

Farm to early care and education makes an upstream impact. These initiatives reach children at a critical age when their tastes are forming. Kids who eat fresh fruits and vegetables are 2.3 times more likely to eat the recommended five servings daily. Farm to early care and education gets kids outside for exercise in the gardens—and provides healthy nutrition for thinking and growing when they’re at their desks. Early good nutrition is linked with healthy development, as well as educational success and opportunities later in life.

Farm to early care and education can provide a strategic framework for racial equity. Statewide coalitions link food, farming, early care and education, and health to intentionally focus on the needs of those most adversely impacted by racist policies. In Pennsylvania, the Ready Set Grow task force has formed Regional Learning Collaboratives that are centered on grassroots leaders and networking local farmers, providers and families who normally wouldn’t be in the same room together. Through a West Philadelphia collaborative, for example, an urban farm and early care and education provider were connected, and now the parents of children at the center are picking up lettuce from the nearby farm weekly.

Farm to early care and education creates new market opportunities for small and midsized farmers. Because early care and education providers purchase fruits and vegetables year-round, they become a dependable source of income for local farmers and food hubs. This is particularly valuable for new entrepreneurs, especially farmers of color and women farmers. In North Carolina, the Center for Environmental Farming Systems is connecting area farmers with providers and exploring ways to aggregate demand. This includes forming cooperatives among care and education providers, linking purchasing between care providers and K-12 school systems, and adding community-supported agriculture boxes to providers’ purchasing so families can get nourishing foods, too.

Both the data and the stories from this pilot tell us that states should be pushing for more farm-to-early-care-and-education programs throughout the United States. For example, if Iowa farmers met just half of the demand for locally grown food, it would generate $1.67 billion in annual sales and support 12,000 jobs. Iowa’s Local Food, Healthy Kids initiative has been successful in securing incentives and other funding because it balances benefits for the state’s No. 1 industry, agriculture, and the state’s No. 1 future asset, children.

Today, billions of federal dollars are available to support farm to early care and education. Meanwhile, philanthropy’s role is clear. We must continue to lift up the many farm-to-early-care-and-education wins, seed innovative programs, support coalition building and advocate for stronger, equitable policies that give federal and state governments across the country the pathway to expand access. To support this work, there are many tools and resources for funders, with specifics on advancing promising procurement strategies, leveraging federal and state funding streams and supporting state coalitions.

The idea of farm to school, in all its forms, has flourished in part because it addresses current needs while paving the way for lifelong healthy habits. The pandemic has shown that our immediate needs can shift quickly. Farm to early care and education has proven itself not just for the moment we’re in, but for decades to come.

Carla Thompson Payton is vice president for program strategy for the W.K. Kellogg Foundation.

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