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Denver rainbow (Al Case/Flickr)
Do you work for a hospital in the city and county of Denver? Are you interested in purchasing, growing, or developing opportunities to purchase more local food for your hospital? Then an important new research group wants to hear from you.
As part of the Denver Food Vision, the Denver Department of Public Health and Environment, Colorado State University Food Systems Initiative, and other partners are working on a project to show the impact that large scale food policy changes could have on agriculture and institutional food purchasing, and they are looking for hospitals to participate.
Specifically, they are interested in seeing how small shifts in your local food work can make big impacts in the food system. For example, if your hospital is working to purchase more local beef then they would quantify the impact of those purchases on greenhouse gas emissions, your bottom line, and Colorado farmers.
The project has several big goals. First, to look at the potential opportunities for local food production and local purchasing in the Denver metro area. Second, to coordinate data sharing to avoid duplicating efforts. Then finally to align all of the information gathered from individuals, government, research, institutions, and organizations about the work that is happening throughout the regional food system. To do this they need input from all of these entities that interact with the food system...including hospitals.
So participation not only contributes to growing this body of knowledge about the Denver food system but it would also give your institution important feedback on how your purchases are making an impact. If you are interested in participating in this project, please contact Marion Kalb for details.