DURHAM, N.H. — The NH Food Alliance, a statewide network coordinated by the University of New Hampshire, and the NH Department of Agriculture, Markets and Food announce the publication of the 2025 New Hampshire Food and Agriculture Strategic Plan, a first for the state. The strategic plan unites the state’s large and often fragmented food community with common language, goals and priorities and stands as a call to action for all Granite Staters to be active participants in ensuring local food remains a core value for the state. 

“The New Hampshire Food and Agriculture Strategic Plan brings together a series of complex and overlapping issues and lays them out in a way that is usable to anyone who wants to support the future of our food system,” said Nicole Cardwell, director of the NH Food Alliance. “The plan’s content has been optimized for many of those who are part of and support our food system—whether you’re a farmer, funder, researcher or legislator—to find the information you need and act on it, knowing that your efforts will be aligned with others across the state. It's the first step toward the true and deep collaboration needed to strengthen our food system.” 

The plan proposes more than 140 recommendations that address 27 agriculture and food-related topics. Each recommendation lays out a specific suggested task, from policy changes and funding opportunities to program expansion and technical assistance. The recommendations are also categorized by the stakeholders who are best suited to move the work forward. The tangibility of the strategic plan’s content puts thousands of professionals working across the food system in the driver’s seat, allowing them to deliver ideas for change to the right people at the right time and create positive impacts across the food system.   

“In order for food grown, raised and caught in New Hampshire to remain a fixture in the lives and culture of Granite Staters, everyone has a role to play. The strategic plan brings together many voices, opinions and experiences into one comprehensive playbook we can look to for guidance in the years ahead,” said Commissioner Shawn Jasper of the NH Department of Agriculture, Markets and Food.  

The next step in the process will come in May at the NH Food Alliance’s annual in-person networking event—the 2025 NH Food System Statewide Gathering. The event will bring together farmers, fishermen, business owners and food system professionals from across New Hampshire and New England to take a closer look at the strategic plan content and help make valuable connections—all aimed at catapulting the network’s collective work from strategic planning into strategic action. 

The strategic plan was spearheaded by the NH Food Alliance in partnership with the NH Department of Agriculture, Markets and Food, UNH Extension and more than 30 other food system organizations.  

“The plan provides a tangible, realistic outline for coordinating efforts across the many people, organizations and communities whose lives and livelihoods support and are supported by New Hampshire’s complex food system in order to make meaningful impacts on strengthening its resiliency,” said Anton Bekkerman, associate dean for research in UNH’s College of Life Sciences and Agriculture and director of the NH Agricultural Experiment Station. “In particular, it’s exciting to envision how our state’s land-grant university can make significant contributions to the plan’s success through a closer, directed alignment of its research, teaching and service expertise.”

The decision to create a plan for New Hampshire’s food system developed out of the NH Food Alliance’s participation in the New England Food System Planners Partnership, a collaboration between seven state-level organizations, six state agricultural, economic and environmental department representatives and Food Solutions New England. A 2023 report published by the partnership, titled A Regional Approach to Food System Resilience, explored what it would look like for New England to reach the goal of producing and consuming 30% of the region’s food by 2030. The development of a food system strategic plan by each New England state was a recommended strategy to move the region closer toward that goal. 

To learn more about the NH Food and Agriculture Strategic Plan visit the NH Food Alliance’s website: https://www.nhfoodalliance.org.  

About UNH:
The University of New Hampshire inspires innovation and transforms lives in our state, nation and world. More than 16,000 students from 50 states and 87 countries engage with an award-winning faculty in top-ranked programs in business, engineering, law, health and human services, liberal arts and the sciences across more than 200 programs of study. A Carnegie Classification R1 institution, UNH partners with NASA, NOAA, NSF, and NIH, and received over $250 million in competitive external funding in FY24 to further explore and define the frontiers of land, sea and space.