In 2017 the Cumberland County Extension service hosted a series on Cooking with the Farmers Market at the extension office where we had people sign up and learn about cooking with locally grown produce, we surveyed the participants and discovered there was a real problem with people in our community not eating enough fruit and vegetables in their diet. According to the Government Health Survey, Cumberland County has a high number of residents with Diabetes ,there is also a high rate of obesity.

So this year the extension service decided to have different programs run at the farmers market over the entire season to try and increase the consumption of freah fruit and vegetables. The youth program was called the POP(Power of Produce ) Club once a month the Parents brought children for activities and taste tests on the fruit or vegetable of the month and in doing this received vouchers to spend at the market this was sponsored by the local health coalition. I ran a Nutrition education program along with activities every week with the adults, like list all the fruit and vegetables at the market that week, and find the missing ingredient in a recipe, families sampled recipes to see if they liked it then they shopped for ingredients at the market afterwards.

The impact from the programs has been wide reaching and powerful with families including children, parents, aunts ,uncles and grandparents visiting the market to learn more about the fresh products, some learnt what the produce was and how they were grown, how to cook with them or how to incorporate them into their meals and live healthy. The numbers of senior farmers market voucher Packages for the county increased from 95 packages to 110 packages, in August Cumberland county had the highest redemption rate in the State. WIC vouchers were being redeemed more this year with younger families now frequenting the market to purchase food increasing 100%.