Friends of the Farm

Friends of the Farm (FoF) is a farm-to-food bank program that helps Arizona’s small growers and BIPOC farmers while also helping Arizona’s food-insecure families.  

Thanks to seed money from the office of then Governor Ducey, AzFBN’s Friends of the Farm program was established in early 2020. Staff made connections with farmers to start purchasing Arizona-grown fruits, vegetables, dairy, eggs, and meat for distribution throughout our network of food banks and pantries. 

Our FoF team works hard every day to plan contracts and purchase surplus from small-scale producers.  We want to provide a reliable market that pays a living wage, offers unique variety to food bank clients, and invests in a strong local food system. 

Thanks to the American Rescue Plan, FoF got a big raise in May 2023. Administered by the USDA, the new Local Food Purchasing Assistance (LFPA) provides millions of dollars from now until 2026 to fund even more purchases. We’re excited that we still have support from the state as well to keep making agreements and buy locally-produced food. 

 We’ve already worked with dozens of farms in all 15 counties to purchase and distribute food. We’re adding to the list of farm partners every day.