Five students in Professor Shane Bowyer’s Principles of Management class at Bethany Lutheran College will be holding a fundraiser for Minnesota Valley Action Council (MVAC) Food Hub on November 8, 2014, from 6-9:30 p.m. at Buster’s Sports Bar and Grill in Mankato, MN. The event will feature live music by country musician Andrew Babcock, a silent auction with gift cards and items from local businesses, and an all-you-can-eat taco bar.

The Food Hub works with farmers within a 50-mile radius of Mankato to provide food to more than a dozen local institutions and to sell boxes of fresh, healthy food to families in southern Minnesota throughout the summer via a Community Supported Agriculture (CSA) plan. Since all of its produce is locally grown, the Food Hub helps reduce the environmental impact of food shipment and supports the local economy. Preparing the produce for distribution provides several jobs. A quarter of the farmers who grow the food sold at the Food Hub are low-income, so the Food Hub helps them earn additional money.

The Food Hub recently received a $100,000 grant from the U.S. Department of Agriculture so that it can begin processing local food. This will allow it to greatly increase the amount of food it can sell to area schools since schools need food to be sliced, diced, or chopped instead of whole. It will also create at least one new job. The proceeds from the fundraiser will be used to help the Food Hub raise $33,000 in matching funds for the grant.

For more information about the fundraiser, please call (507) 217-6141.