Blockspaces Announces House Bill 4119

For Immediate Release

April 19, 2021

BlockSpaces Announces Food Equity & Racial Disparities in Food Supply Chain Blockchain Pilot: St Petersburg

Tampa, FL— April 19 , 2021—Today, BlockSpaces unveiled that they have filed Florida House Bill 4119: Food Equity & Racial Disparities in Food Supply Chain Blockchain Pilot: St Petersburg in partnership with University of South Florida’s Center for the Advancement of Food Security & Healthy Communities. The appropriation, sponsored/co-sponsored by House Representatives Ben Diamond and Jackie Toledo, and championed by Senate Agriculture Chair Darryl Rouson, would be a community-based pilot program that would, in part, connect producer members of the Florida Black Farmers and Agriculturalists Association with citizens and minority-owned food-related businesses in a USDA-designated food desert in South St. Petersburg. If awarded, the pilot would be Florida’s first state funded blockchain project.

“As a Governor appointed member of the Florida Blockchain Taskforce, this is an exciting time for Florida” said Jason Holloway, government affairs advocate and member of the legislative committee for the Florida Blockchain Business Association, who recently announced hisrun for Florida House District 67 with blockchain technology at the center of hisplatform.“This appropriations project request has the potential to be Florida’s first blockchain pilot project that would not only prove as a successful use case for the technology, but also improve food tracking and traceability while solving the progressively worsening situation of food deserts in our most vulnerable communities”.

BlockSpaces proposes a mobile app that would directly connect minority farmers to minority consumers, a minority-owned grocery store, farmers market, restaurant, and food bank in the pilot area. The app would also provide a blockchain-based foundational, customizable food supply chain system that would allow for integration of a producer's legacy system with the ability to add on future features that meet the needs of FDACS departments: food safety, food worker conditions, food counterfeiting and traceability of regulatory compliance. The pilot includes a one year qualitative and quantitative study conducted by University of South Florida’s Center for the Advancement of Food Security & Healthy Communities. The study would measure and analyze outcomes on healthy eating behaviors in minority populations, as well as the impact on unequal market access for minority farmers to sell their goods.

“Blockchain technology is dependent on a network of incentivized participants cooperating for the benefit of the ecosystem, “ said Rosa Shores, CEO/co founder of BlockSpaces. “This technology shows enormous promise to uplift previously marginalized and underserved populations, and we look forward to offering a solution for food disparity and insecurity in one of our own local communities.”

To stay up-to-date with House Bill 4119 and see it’s progress as it moves through the Florida House, checkhere.

To read more about the impactthat food deserts have on the health of individuals and communities, check our blog posthere.

About BlockSpaces

BlockSpaces believes in a future where every business will transact with more trust, transparency and security. Our mission is to blockchain-enable traditional business applications to leverage the unique features and benefits that various enterprise blockchain networks provide. Through our B2B integration platform, we manage blockchain connections, data flow and configurations, so our customers can plug-and-play into any existing system. BlockSpaces is simplifying the blockchain integration experience for all business applications and use cases.

Contact: Rosa Shores rosa@blockspaces.io

For more information on BlockSpaces, please visithttps://blockspaces.io.