Mission: To cultivate social and economic equality in the local food system through dynamic, inclusive and creative collaborations across our diverse rural community. LONG TABLE HARVEST

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Goals

We aim to promote systemic change in the development of a resilient local food system by prioritizing collaborations and partnerships around:
Consistently connecting farm surpluses to emergency food sites and community based organizations while closing the food loop through sustainable surplus redistribution.
Increasing regional capacity to improve accessibility and cultural appropriateness in the local food system.
Creating greater exposure to the valuable work of our local farmers.
Cultivating awareness of and capacity to change inequalities in the food system by directly engaging community members through opportunities for hands-on reciprocity and creating a county-wide network for resource, knowledge and wealth-sharing.

Our Gleaning Program is based on strong partnerships with area farms in order to sustain reliable weekly distributions of fresh fruits and vegetables to food pantries and afterschool programs in Columbia and Dutchess Counties. We pick-up already harvested produce from our partner farms every Monday and Tuesday, distributing to recipient sites on the same day to maintain peak freshness. The winter months have us gleaning more sporadically, with the occasional distribution of seconds storage vegetables.

This program began in the late spring of 2016 and ran continuously through November, culminating in the redistribution of over 31,000 pounds of sustainably grown food from over 25 farms to 15 sites on a weekly basis. In 2017, we have grown our program to work with 15 new farms and 16 new food pantries and afterschool programs.