Current food sovereignty work led by Indigenous people with ancestral connection to EarthDance and the St. Louis area
Read the EarthDance Organic Farm School Land Acknowledgment
Read on to learn more about current-day food sovereignty work led by people whose ancestral land we now tend as EarthDance Organic Farm School
Peoria Tribe (Illiniwek/Illini descendents)
- The Peoria Tribe hydroponic greenhouse is a roughly 30,000–35,000 square-foot hydroponic greenhouse built to provide year-round produce to tribal meal programs, early childhood care, elder meals, and Peoria Fresh distributions. This full-scale hydroponic greenhouse scales tribal production capacity, creates jobs, and supports intergenerational training in controlled-environment agriculture. Includes culturally relevant crops and supply tribal meal programs directly.
- Peoria Fresh – Mission: Peoria Fresh will assist Peoria and Native American families with minimally processed foods to protect food sovereignty while benefiting socially disadvantaged farmers and producers through partnerships. This food security and distribution program is a tribally run food-access program that combines locally produced hydroponic greens from the tribe’s greenhouse with purchased staples to assemble and distribute food boxes to elders, families, and Title VI programs. This program replaces distant supply chains with local, tribal production and nutrition education, and it strengthens food sovereignty for Peoria citizens. This program integrates cooking demos and nutrition education and is tied to the tribe’s larger greenhouse production (read more below.)
- Peoria Tribe Food Distribution Center will be a centralized facility to store, coordinate, and distribute tribal food resources and potentially operate a tribal retail market. This program enables the tribe to operationalize larger distribution efforts and reach more citizens with fresh, culturally relevant food.
- Harvest Land is an Osage Nation farm and greenhouse complex. Osage Nation’s Harvest Land is a working farm located in Pawhuska, Oklahoma. During the COVID-19 pandemic 2020, the Osage Nation experienced a breakdown in food systems. When the Osage Nation received CARES Act funds, it became apparent that there was a significant need to build the infrastructure to increase food production capacity. In light of this, the Harvest Land contains a 40,000-square-foot greenhouse and a 44,000-square-foot program building. The program building contains a large aquaponics system, a food processing area, and a water lab. Also located on the farm is an orchard that contains fruit and nut trees. The farm is a significant development in tribal food sovereignty efforts by providing locally grown produce year-round to the Osage people.
Harvest land consists of greenhouses, aquaponics, orchard areas, a teaching kitchen, and processing infrastructure producing vegetables, herbs, eggs, and fish for Osage programs. Harvest Land provides employment for Osage citizens, reconnects communities to land-based foodways, and supplies schools, elders, and community markets. It also operates a Mobile Market to reach all Osage districts and hosts community workshops and farm-to-school activities.
- Prairie to Plate and Butcher House Meats is a tribal meat processing and distribution program that includes a USDA-certified tribal meat-processing facility paired with a Prairie to Plate program that packages and distributes locally processed beef, pork, and bison to Osage families and elders. This program aims to restore local processing capacity, support tribal ranchers, and ensure culturally appropriate, locally processed meats are available within the Nation. It also includes elder meat boxes and retail distribution and strengthens local livestock economies,shortening food supply chains.
- Osage CSA & FRESH and school/preschool garden partnerships include a Community/Indigenous Supported Agriculture program with locally sourced produce boxes, along with school and preschool garden plots and farm-to-school menu initiatives created in partnership with tribal health and education programs. These programs build food literacy among youth, improve early nutrition, and connect families to how food is grown and prepared. They use farm-based curricula in schools and distribute CSA boxes with recipes and nutrition information in the community.
To learn more, follow the Osage Nation on Instagram and Facebook
3. Otoe-Missouria Tribe (Missouria people represented)
- The Sustainable Food Project is a high-wind tunnel and hoop house program that includes tribal construction and operation of high-wind tunnels and hoop houses to extend growing seasons and produce cool-season greens and vegetables for the Senior Nutrition Program and community meals. This program demonstrates a climate-adapted production model that supplies elders, reduces seasonal gaps, and trains tribal growers in resilient practices. Initial hoop houses were completed with plans for expansion; crops include lettuce, kale, peppers, and planned orchard/bee projects.
- Nutrition and wellness integration (WIC, senior meals, diabetes prevention) is a group of tribal nutrition services that integrate greenhouse and garden harvests into WIC services, senior meal programming, and diabetes prevention education using culturally relevant recipes. This program treats food as medicine and ensures production links directly to improved health outcomes in the community. It includes nutrition education, recipe development, and distribution of fresh produce through existing tribal health programs.
- Indigenous garden collaborations and traditional plant stewardship consists of partnerships with regional centers and universities to establish Indigenous gardens that cultivate traditional, ceremonial, and medicinal plants for education and cultural preservation. These aim to preserve plant knowledge and ceremonial practice, support intergenerational transmission of traditional horticulture, and strengthen cultural identity through land stewardship.
To learn more, follow the Otoe-Missouria Tribe on Instagram and Facebook
Contribute to the Indigenous Seed Keepers Network (ISKN) through the Native American Food Sovereignty Alliance, which helps fund projects like regional seed hubs.
Click here to find a list of local activities in honor and celebration of this year’s Indigenous Peoples’ Day and Native American Heritage month (November!)
Published October 16, 2025