FARMINGTON — The University of Maine Farmington, the University of Maine Presque Isle and food services provider Sodexo was one of only six teams to win the 2019 New England Food Vision Prize Award. The $250,000 award will go toward increasing the amount of locally sourced food on campus menus.

The awards are given by the Henry P. Kendall Foundation.

The Maine University Team, led by Sodexo and in partnership with the Good Shepherd Food Bank and Maine-based food producer Jasper Wyman & Son, will endeavor to develop a vegetable freezing facility in Maine. It represents a first-in-the-area opportunity to meet the demand for locally processed product at a price the local market can afford.

The facility will sell products into the institutional market and provide product through hunger relief channels, capitalizing on the Food Bank’s network as well as distribution routes to the K-12 market.

Ideas for the prize were required to be collaborative, meaning winning ideas had to represent two or more campuses working together. Ideas also had to be replicable and sustainable, applicable outside of the specific contextual factors of one campus or one period of time. Applicants also had to demonstrate how they would measure impact and include elements of movement-building, such as growing demand or knowledge around regionally-produced food.

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