Document Type
Conference Proceeding
Files
Download Full Text (296 KB)
Publication Date
Fall 9-17-2024
Description
Food systems must navigate uncertainty as they experience and respond to crisis. The COVID-19 pandemic amplified or magnified several interconnected slow-crises, including hunger, housing, food supply chain vulnerability, and job insecurity. Launched in August 2020, the Vermont Everyone Eats (VEE) was a FEMA-funded, state-wide COVID-19 response program geared at reducing food insecurity to support community resilience. The program provided prepared meals to Vermonters while boosting the local economy by keeping local restaurants and farmers in business at a time of general economic crises associated with the pandemic. While the emergency response financial support FEMA provided was valuable to response and recovery efforts, its funding structure simultaneously created uncertainty for VEE organizers. More research is needed to understand how communities are impacted and respond to these funding uncertainties during times of crisis. This poster examines how VEE leaders anticipated and responded to varying degrees of certainty associated with the pandemic and FEMA funding. It also explores how certainty and uncertainty due to FEMA funding, whether positive or negative, extended far beyond just the financial assistance itself to food system, labor, and social sustainability. This research is valuable to policy makers and administrators of food assistance programs to better understand how they can navigate between the certainty and uncertainty associated with their source of funding.
City
Burlington, Vermont
Keywords
Vermont Everyone Eats (VEE), FEMA funding, pandemic response, food security, community resiliency, food assistance programs
Disciplines
Agricultural Economics | Agricultural Education | Agricultural Science | Agronomy and Crop Sciences | Community-Based Research | Environmental Policy | Environmental Studies | Food Chemistry | Food Processing | Food Security | Food Studies | Forest Management | Human and Clinical Nutrition | International and Community Nutrition | Models and Methods | Plant Biology | Race and Ethnicity | Regional Economics | Social Justice
Recommended Citation
Abijah, Priscilla Panyin, "POSTER PRESENTATION: Vermont Everybody Eats FEMA Response to Covid-19" (2024). Food Systems Summit 2024. 24.
https://scholarworks.uvm.edu/fss2024/24
Included in
Agricultural Economics Commons, Agricultural Education Commons, Agricultural Science Commons, Agronomy and Crop Sciences Commons, Community-Based Research Commons, Environmental Policy Commons, Environmental Studies Commons, Food Chemistry Commons, Food Processing Commons, Food Security Commons, Food Studies Commons, Forest Management Commons, Human and Clinical Nutrition Commons, International and Community Nutrition Commons, Models and Methods Commons, Plant Biology Commons, Race and Ethnicity Commons, Regional Economics Commons, Social Justice Commons