“Wild rice is culturally significant to the Ojibwe people. It’s one of the things that has been handed down from generation to generation and one of the primary food staples of the people who live here,” Mandie Aalto, development director for the Ojibwe tribe, said. “It serves as an economic benefit and cultural connection.”

Its significance to the tribe prompted the Leech Lake Band of Ojibwe to pursue a federal grant that would provide funding to establish a wild rice processing facility. The Economic Development Administration (EDA) awarded the $3.5 million grant to the tribe. Once the facility is built, it will give the tribe a new kind of economic and cultural independence while allowing it to offer processing support to other surrounding tribes.

“The hope would be to someday process rice for other tribes in the region. It’s the staple food source so it will just create sustainability. The greater Leech Lake’s ability to have control over food and what that looks like for the tribe is a benefit for the tribe,” said Aalto, who is not Ojibwe. “It’s one of those things that has been on the possibility list since 2016, so there is a lot of hard work from other folks that was put into place that will finally be finalized.”

After years of outsourcing manoomin processing, a new facility means that soon the tribe will be able to harvest and process the culturally-significant crop on its own.

The Power of Collaborative Technical Assistance

Support for the project originated from the North Central USDA Regional Food Business Center, one of 12 in the country. The center focuses primarily on improving small and mid-size agricultural value chains. Part of that effort involves providing technical assistance to create new value chain connections, expand capacity, and foster improved resilience. 

Those efforts are funded by the USDA as part of a five-year, $15 million project that engages partners throughout the region to support growers and agricultural operations. Sprout, a non-profit organization in central Minnesota, is one of those partners. The organization aims to improve and strengthen the local food system, and as part of that, it connected with the Leech Lake Band of Ojibwe to offer grant writing support for the wild rice harvesting facility.

Arlene Jones, the executive director at Sprout, said the three entities that worked together to provide technical assistance for the Leech Lake Band of Ojibwe had never worked together previously.  Their geographic expertise was critical to this project.

“We worked as a team to support the Leech Lake Band of Ojibwe staff in writing that application. We have agricultural experience and we’ve written EDA grants before, which are complicated,” said Jones, noting the success of the grant application. “It just shows what can happen when unsuspecting partners come together to do the work.”

Cheryal Hills, the Executive Director for Region Five Development Commission, said the beauty of the connections between Region 5 and other entities in the area is the wealth of opportunity that exists to partner in new ways. And ultimately, those partnerships create value for the communities and the individuals within them. 

“The system changes we’re instituting are new players, new roles, and more opportunities for people to be involved after this grant,” said Hills, looking ahead at the impact of the grant for the Ojibwe community.

“It will be a very exciting opportunity for families and businesses to process wild rice that they harvest every single year,” Hills added. “Wild ricing is a community effort for many families that come together and the money they earn is usually spent on kids and elders. This is a cultural slash food slash business approach to addressing needs.”