People eating food in a community garden

Food and Agriculture

Our goal: Create healthy, just and sustainable food systems, and put an end to food insecurity.

SPUR’s Five-Year Priorities:

• Make healthy food easier to find, afford and choose.

• Preserve agricultural land and reduce the food systems’ environmental impact.

• Support Good Food Purchasing practices, access to farmland and industrial land for farmers and producers, and quality jobs in the food industry.

 

​ Read our policy agenda

 

Double Up Food Bucks California

Piloting a scalable model for making healthy food more affordable

One of the biggest obstacles to healthy eating is the affordability of healthy food. Our Double Up Food Bucks California project helps families overcome that barrier. The project provides matching funds so that families and individuals participating in the CalFresh program can buy even more fresh fruits and vegetables at the grocery store.

Healthy Food Project

Read more about the project

 

 

 

 

 

Medically-Supportive Food and Nutrition

Expanding health care coverage to use food as medicine

The need for these food-based interventions in Medicaid has been exacerbated by the COVID-19 pandemic which highlighted many health and social inequities, especially for Black and Brown communities. This pandemic emphasizes the need to use food to treat and prevent chronic disease and to decrease the effects of health disparities and food insecurity on chronic disease.

Medically-Supportive Food and Nutrition

Read more about the project

Close-up of apples

SPUR Report

Healthy Food Within Reach

One in 10 adults in the Bay Area struggle to find three meals a day, while more than half of adults are overweight or obese. To meet our basic needs, improve public health and enhance our quality of life, Bay Area residents must have access to healthy food. SPUR recommends 12 actions that local governments can take to improve food access in Bay Area communities.
Read More
Fruit haning from a tree

SPUR Report

Locally Nourished

The Bay Area’s food system supports our greenbelt, employs hundreds of thousands of people, and helps reduce our greenhouse gas emissions. SPUR's recommends a series of policies to help us more effectively capture the benefits of our regional food system.
Read More

SPUR Report

Public Harvest

Urban agriculture has captured the imagination of San Franciscans in recent years. But the city won't realize all the benefits of this growing interest unless it provides more land, more resources and better institutional support.

Read More

Ongoing Initiative

Double Up Food Bucks California

Double Up Food Bucks California provides matching funds so that families and individuals participating in the CalFresh program can buy even more fresh fruits and vegetables at the grocery store. For example, a shopper who spends $10 of CalFresh benefits on California-grown fruits and vegetables at participating stores will get an extra $10 to spend on any fresh produce in the store.

Read More

Updates and Events

SPUR Comments on Oakland's Draft Environmental Justice Element

Advocacy Letter
SPUR recently submitted comments on the Draft Environmental Justice Element of the City of Oakland 2045 General Plan Update. Overall, SPUR feels that the EJ Element Draft is a thoughtful document that effectively uses data and demonstrates a clear commitment to evidence-based, inclusionary policy. The EJ Element is an important step toward addressing Oakland's past of inequitable city planning and ensuring that all Oaklanders have access to pollution-free air, clean water, a safe home, and other positive environmental factors. In our comments, SPUR offers recommendations on how the EJ Element can be improved to meet these goals.

SPUR Supports SB 600, a Bill to Boost CalFresh Benefits

Advocacy Letter
SPUR supports SB 600 (Menjicar)– CalFresh Minimum Benefit Adequacy Act of 2023. The bill would boost CalFresh benefits, particularly for those who receive meager and inadequate allotments below $50 per month.
farmer's market

Two State Bills Aim to Shore Up the Food Safety Net

News /
The convergence of high food prices and the end of CalFresh emergency allotments is hitting low-income Californians hard. SPUR is co-sponsoring two bills to keep struggling households from slipping through the food safety net. Both would make proven pilots into permanent benefits that reduce hunger and improve public health.
Grocery store stand with fruits and vegetables. Sign on the left side describing the benefits of the EBT pilot program

A Technological Leap Makes Expanding Healthy Food Incentive Programs Easier

News /
California has taken a big step forward in scaling up healthy food incentive programs: CalFresh participants can now get bonus dollars from their healthy food purchases electronically credited to their benefits card. That technological leap happened because of legislation SPUR co-sponsored. Now SPUR is working to overcome the remaining challenge to enlarging healthy food incentive programs: insufficient funding.

SPUR and the Food as Medicine Collaborative Support AB 1644, a Bill to Cover Food and Nutrition Interventions with Medi-Cal Benefits

Advocacy Letter
SPUR and the Food as Medicine Collaborative, as co-sponsors of the legislation, support of AB 1644 (Bonta), which would transition medically supportive food and nutrition interventions from optional services in healthcare to covered Medi-Cal benefits. By fully embracing food and nutrition support as a critical and strategic investment in health outcomes and health equity, California can lead the nation in tackling root causes of health disparities.
Get Our Newsletters