Healthy Fluid Milk Incentive Projects

Healthy Fluid Milk Incentives (HFMI) projects were established by the 2018 Farm Bill to promote milk as part of a healthy, balanced diet consistent with the Dietary Guidelines for Americans.

Through HFMI projects, grantees develop and test methods to increase the amount of milk SNAP households purchase and consume by providing an incentive at authorized stores.

What types of milk can HFMI projects incentivize?

“Qualifying fluid milk” includes low-fat or fat-free pasteurized cow’s milk without flavoring or sweeteners, which contains vitamins A and D at levels consistent with the Food and Drug Administration, state, and local standards for fluid milk.

Grantees

• The 2024 HFMI grant was awarded to Auburn University’s Hunger Solutions Institute. The grant will allow for the development and testing of methods to increase the purchase and consumption of healthy fluid milk. Auburn is further expanding its Add Milk! incentive pilot project by partnering with two participating retailers. This expansion adds 438 participating locations across 18 states to the HFMI network. Auburn will continue implementing the automatic discount model, which will apply directly to the participant’s transaction at the time of purchase of qualifying milk. The project will run through Sept. 30, 2027.
• The 2023 HFMI grant was awarded to Auburn University’s Hunger Solutions Institute to develop and test methods to increase the purchase and consumption of healthy fluid milk. Auburn is expanding their incentive pilot project by adding 575 participating locations operated by 16 partnering retailers in 16 states, and shifting the model to an automatic discount at the time of purchase of qualifying milk.
• The 2022 HFMI grant was awarded to Auburn University’s Hunger Solutions Institute to develop and test methods to increase the purchase and consumption of healthy fluid milk. Auburn proposed to offer milk incentives at 116 retailers across Alabama, California, Georgia and South Dakota. The project will begin in February 2023 and run through Sept. 30, 2025.
• In 2021, FNS awarded a second grant to Baylor to continue and expand the project goals and objectives at eight Wakefern grocery stores in New Jersey and one Jubilee grocery store in West Texas. For more information, check out Baylor's Add Milk! project website.
• In 2020, FNS awarded the first HFMI grant to the Baylor University Collaborative on Hunger and Poverty to develop and test methods to increase the purchase and consumption of healthy fluid milk at four Lowe’s Supermarkets in West Texas. The project will expand to 30 additional store locations in 2023.