Vegan Brand Donates More Than 2,000 Meals to Navajo Nation Elders

This week, plant-based nutrition brand Kate Farms is distributing 2,352 vegan meal replacements to Native American communities throughout Navajo Nation—including elders in Tuba City, Chinle, Crown Point, Shiprock, and Fort Defiance—with the help of Johns Hopkins Center for American Indian Health (JHCAIH). “We commend organizations like the Johns Hopkins Center for American Indian Health for proactively serving Native American elders and their families,” John Hommeyer, chief experience officer at Kate Farms, said. “We are donating our formulas to partners who can deliver nourishment directly, quickly, and to the most at-risk. We hope other companies like ours step up likewise to support Native Americans in underserved and frequently ignored communities.” JHCAIH serves rural tribal communities, where 40 percent of families already experienced food and water insecurity prior to the COVID-19 pandemic. 

Kate Farms was founded in 2011 by Richard and Michelle Laver, whose daughter Kate—who was born with cerebral palsy—was failing to thrive because she could not tolerate any of the available feeding-tube formulas. The couple developed a nutrition formula using organic, plant-based ingredients without the synthetic ingredients and common allergens found in traditional formulas. Its products are now used by many of the leading adult and children’s hospitals across the country. 

In early April, the company donated $500,000 in product to hunger-relief organization Meals on Wheels to feed vulnerable seniors who are most at-risk amid the COVID-19 pandemic in California and made a donation of 20,000 vegan nutrition shakes to Brooklyn Borough President Eric Adams, who distributed the meals to at-risk seniors, particularly people of color, across Brooklyn in partnership with The Campaign Against Hunger. 

All of these efforts are part of Kate Farms initiative to donate $1 million worth of vegan meal replacements to those in need during the COVID-19 pandemic.