In central Illinois, the Green Top Grocery, scheduled to open in a “food desert,” would improve the diets of shoppers and the incomes of nearby farmers, says Iowa Farmer Today. “The purpose is to provide access to local, healthy food on a very consistent basis,” says Katie Novak, outreach director for Green Top in Bloomington. The idea was hatched three years ago when the organizer of the farmers market in Bloomington visited a food co-op in Urbana and heard growers say that in order to survive, they needed places to sell their products year-round. Twenty farmers in the Bloomington area are willing to supply the grocery store. A site for the store has been selected in downtown Bloomington. Now organizers are trying to raise $1.5 million for construction.