Go for Gold Food Grants

We are pleased to launch this year’s Neil Smith Gold Food Grants, where community food projects can apply for up to £850 to undertake work with children, families and young people in Brighton & Hove.

PLEASE NOTE THAT NEIL SMITH GOLD FOOD GRANTS IS BEING POSTPONED DUE TO THE CURRENT COVID-19 CRISIS.

Neil Smith ‘Gold’ Food Grants is a new name for an annual funding stream that has funded lots of exciting work in Brighton & Hove over the last 9 years.  We are ‘Going for Gold’ this year to link in with our campaign to make Brighton & Hove a Gold Sustainable Food City. Every action counts towards our #goldfoodcitybid.

This year we will fund:

Community food projects (e.g. cooking, growing and healthy eating activities) for children, families or young people (up to age 25)

  • experiencing poverty
  • tackling climate change
  • tackling current COVID-19 implications

The kind of project we would fund:

  • Edible hedgerow and tree-planting at a school
  • Installing a community fridge in a children’s centre
  • Intergenerational nature connection activities with outdoor cookery
  • Healthy-eating cookery project for young care leavers
  • A food bank increasing the use of Healthy Start vouchers

This fund is only possible because of a legacy by Neil Smith a much loved volunteer who worked with the Food Partnership on many different things including Racehill Community Orchard.

If you wish to apply for this funding, please read our NSGFGguidancenotes20-21 before using the NSGFGapplicationform 2020-21 to apply.

The deadline is POSTPONED UNTIL FURTHER NOTICE

Please send your applications to [email protected].

Last year we funded 18 different projects including:

Nurture through Nature

Thanks to funding from the Neil Smith Good Food Grant and other funders, Nurture through Nature had another successful year. Core funds meant that they have been able to run two volunteer sessions a week attracting more volunteers, including students from Brighton and Sussex Universities and a number of individuals living in the local community.  A second allotment enabled them to grow and donate more food this year (including beautiful and giant carrots!) to the Brighton Unemployed Centre Families Project and City Mission Foodbank. They have also acquired a third allotment plot and have been working hard to prepare it for growing in the upcoming season. The funds have also helped to buy green manure to get some well-needed nutrition into the soil for those lovely veggies!

Quote from Nick Blewitt, Head Gardener on the project:

The grant from the Brighton & Hove Food Partnership has been very valuable because it helped us get established on a new third allotment which will enable us to grow even more food this coming year to donate to the food banks.

Quote from an individual who benefited from food donations at the Brighton Unemployed Centre Families Project:

“Receiving fresh vegetables has been a real boost to our family, as a single mother of three I try really hard to provide healthy food for my children, but find it so expensive. The vegetables I have received have been of such high quality, and made such a positive difference to our meal times.”

Plot 22

The Good Food Grant paid for Plot 22 to do Taster Sessions – a Harvest Lunch special. They promoted it with the Hangleton & Knoll Food Bank, GP surgeries and at the Hangleton & Knoll community hub meetings. One participant came for the first time with his YMCA support worker. Katie (in photos) and J (YMCA) have since booked onto other sessions at PLOT 22. During the session they explored the site and learned the different ways to get involved. Participants took home produce from the garden and fresh cut dahlias.

“I put myself in a situation where I knew no one and didn’t have a clue what I was expecting but I loved PLOT 22 – gardening, picking veg for the winter stew we cooked outside and ate together; honestly not one bit of anxiety came over me. It’s so quiet and peaceful, exactly what I needed.” Katie, volunteer

If you have any questions about the Neil Smith Gold Food Grants and whether you might be eligible, please contact Helen Starr-Keddle on 07850 002596 / 01273 234810 or email [email protected].

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