October 10, 2022
(press release)
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While these trends are sobering, we see them as a clear call to action. As the leading online grocery technology company in North America, we’ve not only become a staple in millions of households, we’re already naturally playing a major role in people’s health. We’ve seen firsthand via independent and partner research studies that online grocery delivery helps people get access to fresh food, adopt healthier eating habits, save time, manage their budgets, and eliminate transportation and mobility barriers to nutrition. As a company at the center of people’s relationship with what they eat, we have an opportunity – and a responsibility – to do more. That’s why today we’re announcing Instacart Health, a new initiative designed to deliver Starting with our strong foundation in food and nutrition access, Instacart Health will turbocharge our work in this space – including product innovations, new partnerships, cutting-edge research and policy advocacy across three key themes where we believe we can make the most difference: Nutrition Security, Making Healthier Choices Easier, and Food as Medicine. Nutrition Security: Increasing Equitable Access to Healthy Food First and foremost, we need to help people get nutritious food into their bellies – this is about access and affordability. While food insecurity is on the rise (5), online grocery delivery is poised to help by making it easier to get access to fresh food while saving on transportation costs and better managing your budget online. Today, we estimate that a large majority of the nearly 34 million people experiencing nutrition insecurity in the U.S. have access to delivery via Instacart, and we want to continue making it affordable to everyone. Everyone — every individual, every family, every community — should have access to healthy, nutritious food. Here’s how we’re doubling down on our efforts to continue increasing access and affordability: Over the past two years, we pioneered the EBT SNAP retailer onboarding process, which has enabled EBT SNAP payments nationwide with more than 70 retailers and banners, spanning more than 8,000 stores across 49 states and Washington, D.C. Today, we’re pleased to announce our commitment to work with the USDA to further increase EBT SNAP access – with a goal of expanding EBT SNAP payment access to all Instacart grocery partners by 2030. We’re also making it easy to shop with SNAP benefits inside the store. We now have the ability to integrate with retailers so that consumers can easily scan a product or its corresponding electronic shelf tag using new technology, and find out if it’s eligible for SNAP benefits, saving people time as they shop. In 2023, we expect to further expand access and affordability by allowing customers to shop via Instacart using their Temporary Assistance for Needy Families (TANF) benefits — a government cash assistance program that helps low-income families purchase everyday essentials. This will give many customers more ways to pay for household items – like diapers and toilet paper – and cover their service and delivery fees, which aren’t currently covered by EBT SNAP benefits. Our goal is to expand TANF access to all Instacart retail partners by 2030. For consumers who face nutrition access challenges – whether they lack reliable transportation, have mobility issues, or struggle to fit nutritious food into their budgets – bringing SNAP and TANF online and unlocking more ways to get what they need at an affordable price is an access game changer. Healthy Made Easy: Tools to Guide and Simplify Healthy Grocery Shopping Once people have reliable access to affordable and nutritious food, we believe we can help empower them to make more informed decisions and find healthy inspiration that meets their needs, tastes and budgets. We’re not here to tell people what to eat – if someone tells me I can’t eat chocolate, we’re going to have a problem. Rather, we’ll serve up in-app tools, expert-backed information and inspiration to help people more easily fulfill their personal health needs. To make healthy shopping easier, today we’re rolling out the following new products and partnerships: Food as Medicine: Modern Tools for Personalized Health & Collaborative Care The third area we care deeply about is about giving healthcare providers and their patients new tools to promote health, because we believe that food can play a major role in preventative care by helping to keep people healthier and reduce health care costs down the road. We’re committed to building technology and supporting technology platforms that can help organizations scale their food prescription and nutrition incentive programs, reach more people, and make it easier for patients to get the nutrition they need with the convenience of same-day delivery to their home. Here’s how: A variety of organizations and services are now using Care Carts in new and innovative ways to expand their offerings to their clients, including digital nutrition platform Good Measures in partnership with WellCare of Kentucky; hospital-at-home solution provider Medically Home; food solutions and care management platform NourishedRx in partnership with a number of health plans; and digital nutrition services Season Health and Foodsmart. Notably, Care Carts is enabling Instacart, Good Measures and WellCare of Kentucky to together take steps to enhance Medicaid benefits and make it easier and more convenient for clients to follow a prescribed nutrition plan. In the coming weeks, WellCare of Kentucky will begin offering its Medicaid members who have been screened for high blood pressure the option to participate in Good Measures’ Good Food Prescription program. A Good Measures registered dietitian will work with participants to personalize a nutrition plan for them, and will have access to Instacart’s Care Carts to deliver the groceries in the plan directly to the client. We see incredible potential in partnerships like this that span healthcare, nutrition coaching and grocery delivery to address the needs of low income communities – and are excited to continue expanding this work. Instacart Health Policy Agenda: Advocating for Real and Lasting Change In addition to developing new products and forming new partnerships, we also want to reach outside our organization and partner to help advocate for real and lasting change. We’re pleased to unveil the Instacart Health Policy Agenda, which outlines our top three policy priorities to help expand access to healthy food and address nutrition insecurity. We’re committed to working with policymakers, researchers, nonprofit leaders, private sector partners, and other stakeholders to help shape and enact policies at the federal, state and local level that: Further, with one of the world’s largest online grocery catalogs and a birds-eye view of consumer buying trends, we also believe we have a significant opportunity to lead and support groundbreaking research to better understand the impact of online grocery on food access, affordability, nutrition and health. For example, today Instacart, No Kid Hungry and the University of Kentucky published a new study examining the impact of online grocery for SNAP and non-SNAP households in rural and urban areas. We intend to continue pioneering cutting-edge research on food access gaps for food-insecure populations, racial nutrition disparities, and barriers to how people buy their groceries and feed their families. We look forward to inviting government leaders and every member of the Instacart community—from shoppers to customers to employees—to join us as we pursue this work together. ### Sources 1 USDA. “Food Security: Key Statistics & Graphics.” April 22, 2022. https://www.ers.usda.gov/topics/food-nutrition-assistance/food-security-in-the-u-s/key-statistics-graphics/#:~:text=The%20prevalence%20of%20food%20insecurity%20was%20unchanged%20from%202019%20to,to%2010.5%20percent%20in%202019. 2 The Washington Post. “Millions are suffering from diet-related diseases. What number will make us pay attention?” November 2021. https://www.washingtonpost.com/local/healthy-eating-obesity-diabetes-heart-diseases/2021/11/30/3b4e2cfc-51fe-11ec-9267-17ae3bde2f26_story.html 3 USDA. “USDA Actions on Nutrition Security.” July 2022. https://www.usda.gov/sites/default/files/documents/usda-actions-nutrition-security-infographic.pdf 4 The Washington Post, “The Real Reason the U.S. Spends Twice as Much on Health Care as Other Wealthy Countries.” March 2018. https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/wonk/wp/2018/03/13/the-real-reason-the-u-s-spends-twice-as-much-on-health-care-as-other-wealthy-countries/ 5 Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations. “The State of Food Security and Nutrition in the World 2022.” June 2022. https://www.fao.org/publications/sofi/2022/en/ 6 JAMA Network. “Association Between Receipt of a Medically Tailored Meal Program and Health Care Use” April 2019. https://jamanetwork.com/journals/jamainternalmedicine/fullarticle/2730768 7 Health Affairs. “Meal Delivery Programs Reduce The Use Of Costly Health Care In Dually Eligible Medicare And Medicaid Beneficiaries.” April 2018. https://www.healthaffairs.org/doi/10.1377/hlthaff.2017.0999 8 National Library of Medicine. “A Pilot Food Bank Intervention Featuring Diabetes-Appropriate Food Improved Glycemic Control Among Clients In Three States.” November 2015. https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/26526255/ 9 National Library of Medicine. “Comprehensive and Medically Appropriate Food Support Is Associated with Improved HIV and Diabetes Health.” February 2017. https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC5359179/ 10 National Library of Medicine. “Dietary Impact of Produce Prescriptions for Patients With Hypertension.” November 2018. https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/30447106/
the ingredients for healthier living.
In the coming weeks, we’ll be launching a Fresh Funds pilot with Partnership for a Healthier America, a leading nonprofit working to transform the food landscape in pursuit of health equity, to expand its “Good Food for All” nutrition access and incentive program, starting with a pilot in Indianapolis, with the goal of expanding nationwide in 2023.
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