The MARC and Norwescap Honored by Feeding America for Innovative Fresh Produce Partnership

The Mid-Atlantic Regional Cooperative (MARC) is proud to share that we, alongside Norwescap Food Bank, were recognized by Feeding America with a 2026 Network Celebration Award for our collaborative work to expand access to fresh, local produce in New Jersey.

Presented at Feeding America’s annual conference in Dallas, the award honors innovative and impactful partnerships across the national network of more than 250 food banks. The MARC and Norwescap were recognized in the category of Enhanced Food Sourcing & Sharing for helping create a new regional model that keeps more locally grown food in the communities where it is grown.

The award recognizes a first-of-its-kind collaboration among the MARC, America’s Grow-a-Row, and all five Feeding America food banks in New Jersey. 

For years, America’s Grow-a-Row harvested more produce than New Jersey’s charitable food network could efficiently absorb. Recognizing this gap as a major opportunity to keep millions of pounds of fresh food in New Jersey, Norwescap built a statewide coalition to solve a longstanding challenge: the lack of centralized infrastructure to process and distribute bulk produce efficiently.

That challenge aligned directly with the MARC’s unique role within the Feeding America network. As a regional cooperative, the MARC helps food banks increase their impact by streamlining sourcing, warehousing, repacking, and transportation across multiple states. By leveraging shared infrastructure and economies of scale, the MARC helps member food banks access more food, move it more efficiently, and respond faster to community need.

By partnering with the MARC, the group unlocked the warehousing, repacking, and logistics capacity needed to move produce quickly and effectively through New Jersey's charitable food distribution networks.

The MARC helped clear longstanding barriers in transportation, storage, repacking, and distribution. They provided the missing logistics capacity needed to receive bulk produce, repack it into usable quantities, and distribute it quickly through charitable food networks across New Jersey. 

“We were thrilled to honor the MARC and Norwescap with a Network Celebration Award because of their collaborative work with America’s Grow-a-Row,” Feeding America said in a statement. “You and your colleagues are fulfilling our commitment to neighbors in a powerful way that is emblematic of our shared Network Strategic Framework priority to Enhance Food Sourcing & Sharing.”

“This recognition reflects what can happen when partners bring their strengths together in service of their communities,” said Beth Hamilton, Executive Director of the MARC. “By combining America’s Grow-a-Row’s incredible produce donations, Norwescap’s leadership, the strength of New Jersey's network of five food banks, and the MARC’s regional logistics network, we were able to help more fresh, nutritious food stay local and reach neighbors quickly and efficiently.”

At the MARC, we believe collaboration is one of the most powerful tools for ending hunger. This award is a reminder that when we combine expertise, trust, and shared purpose, meaningful change is possible.