Food Research & Action Center/Maryland Hunger Solutions

Pilot Installation of Electronic Benefit Transfer (EBT) Machines at Baltimore Farmer's Markets

Maryland Hunger Solutions designed a year-long pilot project to install Electronic Benefit Transfer (EBT) machines at two Baltimore City farmers’ markets that enable farmers to accept federal food benefit payments. Funded jointly by the Harry & Jeanette Weinberg Foundation and The Abell Foundation, the goal of the $40,000 project is to provide outreach to recipients of the federal nutrition benefits program, so as to encourage purchase of fresh fruits and vegetables at farmers’ market locations in Baltimore City.

In Baltimore City, more than 150,000 households lack resources to buy sufficient food, and are dependent upon federal nutrition programs to meet family needs. At the same time, many neighborhoods in Baltimore City lack full-service grocery stores. Convenience and corner stores stock, for the most part, packaged goods and processed foods, and do not often offer fresh fruits and vegetables. This lack of access to healthy foods in neighborhoods contributes to disproportionately higher rates of obesity, diabetes, and hypertension – any one or all of which lead to expensive interventions and health treatments.

Concern about resident nutrition and the geographic disparities in accessing nutritional food led to the creation of the Baltimore Food Policy Task Force, convened by the Baltimore City Health and Planning Departments. The Task Force final report lists promotion and expansion of farmers’ markets as the number one goal, with acceptance of EBT benefits as a primary method to achieve this.

Federal nutrition program benefits, recently named the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program (SNAP), are now provided to recipients entirely through EBT cards, similar to debit cards. Because farmers’ markets do not generally have available electricity and phone lines, the elimination of paper benefits has had the unintended consequence of limiting federal food benefit recipients from accessing farmers’ market vendors.

In the past several years, a number of pilot projects have been started at farmers’ markets around the country to enable beneficiaries to convert their SNAP debit funding into tokens, which can then be used at individual farmer and vendor stands. According to the U.S. Department of Agriculture, at the end of FY 2008, 735 farmers’ markets in 24 states were authorized to accept SNAP, an increase of 34 percent from the previous year. The level of sales after acceptance of electronic benefits charges by the farmers’ markets varies by size, location, and the extent of outreach conducted. Some of the most promising fresh food repeat purchases at farmers’ markets come from programs that initially combine monetary incentives with EBT access and outreach.

The Baltimore project is modeled on a pilot initiated by parent organization Food Resource & Action Center at four farmers’ markets in Washington, DC, which have resulted in fresh produce purchases at farmers’ markets by SNAP recipients. Following the examples of programs throughout the country, Maryland Hunger Solutions’ Baltimore pilot will maintain a significant outreach component, incentive vouchers to maximize household beneficiary participation and purchases, and a quantitative and qualitative evaluation to measure the results.

Two pilot markets will be selected in Baltimore City based on neighborhood accessibility and farmers’ market management interest, and each market will be provided with a wireless EBT machine, operational costs for one year, and monetary incentives for SNAP recipients. To increase the sustainability of the project, the EBT machine will accept debit cards and charge a minimal convenience fee on debit transactions that will be used to cover the monthly wireless service charge. Each market will be offered training and technical assistance on EBT project implementation, utilizing a national trainer who has been involved in implementation efforts in numerous states. Maryland Hunger Solutions will launch an extensive outreach and promotional effort to attract SNAP beneficiaries to farmers’ markets through service and benefits providers and community organizations.

During the year, the organization will periodically survey and interview farmers’ market customers on awareness of the EBT projects, attitudes about using EBT cards at the markets, effectiveness of outreach efforts, and challenges or barriers to implementation. At the conclusion of the pilot, the organization will measure the number of transactions and the volume of sales, and evaluate the markets' EBT revenues to assess future financial sustainability of the EBT projects.