Making Change and Building Community
MAP Youth at the 2017 People's Climate March in Washington D.C.
We believe everyone has a right to nutritious, affordable, accessible and culturally relevant food. We believe people and communities should have access to power, land and resources to to define their own food and agricultural systems in harmony with natural systems. We believe growers, local markets and eaters should drive local food systems and not corporations and policies that favor destructive and extractive practices.
MAP’s Food Justice and Climate Justice work is based on these beliefs. We work to educate, engage and build youth leaders, provide greater access to nutritious food, provide opportunities to advocate for change towards a just economy and engage in meaningful work in service to our community and the earth.
2025 Advocacy
Supporting the Good Food Buffalo Coalition
MAP is a proud member and partner of the Good Food Buffalo Coalition (GFBC), a coalition of over 30 member organizations working collaboratively to center racial justice in the Western New York food system. The GFBC uses the Good Food Purchasing Program as a framework to align the ways our public institutions purchase food with our communities. This year with the coalition, MAP supported coordinating and sponsoring the first ever Mayoral Candidate Food Forum, which gave registered Buffalo mayoral candidates the chance to speak about their food policy plans for the city. More about the coalition here.
Growing Urban Agriculture Policy & Education
As the first urban farm in the City of Buffalo, MAP naturally took up the “pitchfork of advocacy” to champion alongside community stakeholders and other urban growers the growth of urban agriculture programs, policies, education and resources that reflects the diverse cultures and communities who grow and eat food in Buffalo. MAP was instrumental in organizing for policy adoption that allows residents to own city chickens and we continue to organize for better urban farming policies. We partner with Grassroots Gardens WNY and Urban Roots Cooperative Garden Market to host gardening workshops for new and novice gardeners, host soil screening and testing clinics, and show up alongside our partners who fight for an end to food and social injustices for the most marginalized communities in Buffalo.
Buffalo Public School (BPS) Advocacy and Nutrition/ Farm-2-School Committee
MAP has long engaged with BPS to ensure students, school staff, and all food service workers have access to nutritious, culturally appropriate foods at school. MAP youth and organizers were key in connecting to BPS community and policy stakeholders in adopting the Farm to School (F2S) Program, actively engage MAP Youth in participating on the BPS Nutrition & Farm-2-School Committee specifically and still organize to prioritize youth voices are in engaged in every step of the process that determines what foods they eat in school.
Supporting Fully Refunding Mayor Summer Youth Employment Program
Due to a foreseen budget deficit, the acting administration of the Buffalo Mayor’s office has decided to make significant funding cuts to the MSIP. This program gives the opportunity for organizations like MAP to hire and employ Buffalo youth during the summer to advance their missions. As a result many organizations have been forced to find alternative funding to support hiring youth employees while others have had to close their youth programs altogether. We encourage you to contact your council members and the Buffalo Mayor’s Office to urge them to restore funding to the Mayoral Summer Youth & Internship Program.