Food insecurity is a growing problem in the United States. Approaches have been in place for decades to address it, but food insecurity rates show little change. Federal food assistance programs aim to reduce food insecurity by providing funding and nutrition education to low-income consumers that meet eligibility requirements. Further, work has been done to encourage use of these programs at farmers markets so that low-income consumers can access local products and other benefits like the ability to buy directly from farmers. However, the literature shows that persistent barriers related to transportation, convenience, price, exclusivity, and administrative burden prevent low-income customers from visiting farmers markets. Mobile farmers markets attempt to alleviate these barriers by bringing the farmers market to the customer, thereby increasing healthy food access and food security for vulnerable populations. Through a partnership with a nonprofit mobile farmers market in Michigan, this thesis will evaluate the effectiveness of this particular mobile farmers market toward these ends. Using participant observations, staff and customer interviews, and document analysis, we conducted an evaluability assessment to: (1) provide useful evaluation information about the customer experience to the partner organization, and (2) investigate if and how the mobile market provides traditional farmers market benefits while overcoming documented farmers market barriers for low-income consumers. Chapter 1 will detail the assessment of barriers, benefits, and connections to local food pathways to contribute to literature on food insecurity and food assistance. Chapter 2 will detail the use of evaluability assessment to contribute to staff capacity building, allay problematic organizational dynamics, and improve evaluation use.
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