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The Local Food Report
As we re-imagine our relationships to what we eat, Local Food Report creator Elspeth Hay takes us to the heart of the local food movement to talk with growers, harvesters, processors, cooks, policy makers and visionaries

Farmers' Markets Accept Electronic Replacement to Food Stamps

Elspeth Hay

  Every year low-income Massachusetts residents receive $1.2 billion to help buy food. On the Local Food Report, Elspeth Hay examines the program called SNAP, or the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program. Until recently, the money was given out as food stamps—physical, tangible pieces of paper. But in the late 90s, SNAP went electronic.

Residents who get food assistance now get it in the form of an EBT card—essentially a debit card—that is recharged by the state. You can use it pretty much anywhere you could use a credit card. Unfortunately, this does not include most farmers' markets. But the number of farmers markets who accept SNAP is growing. 

Find out more on Elspeth's blog, Diary of a Locavore.

This episode is a rebroadcast of one that originally aired in May, 2012.

An avid locavore, Elspeth lives in Wellfleet and writes a blog about food. Elspeth is constantly exploring the Cape, Islands, and South Coast and all our farmer's markets to find out what's good, what's growing and what to do with it. Her Local Food Report airs Thursdays at 8:30 on Morning Edition and 5:45pm on All Things Considered, as well as Saturday mornings at 9:30.