California · Nonprofit
San Diego Food System Alliance
San Diego Food System Alliance (California) receives grants from 40 organizations whose IRS filings report $4,654,892 to it, the largest being Builders Vision Foundation ($872,395). 22 of them have funded it in more than one year.
- Revenue FY2025
- $2.3M
- Funders on record
- 40
- Grants received
- $4.7M
- Net assets
- $1.5M
What San Diego Food System Alliance does
Mission
produce, distribute, prepare, serve, and eat nutritional and culturally appropriate food.
As stated on its FY2025 Form 990.
Programs
Local Food Economy Lab:The Local Food Economy Lab supports the viability of small-scale farmers, ranchers, fishermen, food business owners, and the communities they serve in San Diego County. Centering equity and community ownership, the Local Food Economy Lab is planting the seeds for a new economy, one built on justice and solidarity. The Lab nurtures spaces for collaboration and shared learning, provides holistic business stewardship and cooperative development services, and offers support for securing stable and equitable land tenure, capital, and markets.
$1,449,458 spent100% of program spendingFor the last five years, the Alliance has been mobilizing our region around San Diego County Food Vision 2030a shared vision, plan, and movement for transforming our regions food system over the current decade. With three goals, ten objectives, and detailed strategies to inform policy, program, planning, and investment opportunities, Food Vision 2030 serves as a call to action and political compass as we work together toward a more equitable and resilient future for all. Food Vision 2030 was published in the Summer of 2021, and is the work of many people. 3,000 residents of San Diego Countya majority of whom have been deeply impacted by inequitiesvoiced their needs and aspirations for the food system and provided essential input on the Vision.
The Annual Gathering:The Annual Gathering for San Diego County Food Vision 2030 takes place every fall, featuring inspirational speakers, interactive sessions, open space for dialogue and networking, and local food. At the Annual Gathering, San Diegans come together and share stories and ideas for how we can invest in our local food economy, preserve agricultural land and soils, elevate wages and working conditions for food and farm workers, increase ownership by Black, Indigenous, and People of Color, promote food sovereignty, and more.
The 3 programs described on its FY2025 Form 990, listed largest first by expense. Program spending in total: $1,449,458.
The organization over time
Each line starts at 100 in 2020, so what you read is the shape rather than the size: 150 means half as much again as 2020, 50 means half. The number beside each label in the key is where it ended. The shaded band is where the middle 50% of its peers' revenue would sit, given their growth.
Balance sheet
Total assets and total liabilities at each year end, in dollars. The largest one-year move in total assets was 2022 to 2023, from $436k to $1.2M (+183%).
How it's funded, over time
Each bar is one year's revenue split into where it came from, and every bar is the same height — these are shares, not amounts, so a year that raised twice as much looks the same size. Hover a bar for the split.
Government-grant reliance: 2020 8% · 2021 10% · 2022 27% · 2023 5% · 2024 48% · 2025 23%. Grants only. Government contracts and fees sit inside program revenue.
98% of San Diego Food System Alliance’s revenue is contributions — more donation-reliant than the typical peer (94% for the typical peer).
Surplus & reserves
Operating surplus or deficit each year, and months of liquidity in hand. 1 of the last 6 reported years ran a deficit.
reserve
Leadership and staff
The officers, directors, trustees and key employees listed on each return. Joined and no longer listed compare each filing with the year before, matching people by surname and first initial; a year after a gap, or a roster under three people, has no comparison.
Who funds it, year by year
2020 → 2023: the base broadened from 6 funders to 16 funders, grant income rose $120k → $1.7M.
10 of 40 of your funders are donor-advised or pass-through sponsors (tagged DAF) — 26% of grant dollars received. That money is really individual donors directing a sponsor; the institutions to cultivate are the non-DAF funders.
From the IRS filings of San Diego Food System Alliance’s funders (the co-funder graph). Top 30 of 40 funders by total. Association, not causation. Trends are read to FY2023, the last fiscal year that has finished arriving. FY2024–FY2026 are still being filed and are shown unshaded; they do not move any figure on this page.
How concentrated its funding is
San Diego Food System Alliance has a broad base — no single funder exceeds 19% of grant income, and it takes 4 funders to reach half.
the vertical line marks half of all grant income — 4 funders to its left
39% of the income these shares are computed over arrives through pass-through sponsors or from payers whose filings do not say what kind of payment it is. Concentration is still measured over all of it, because the money is real; what it does not support is a claim about how many institutions have chosen to fund San Diego Food System Alliance.
Largest funder’s share by year: 2020 42% · 2021 22% · 2022 23% · 2023 25% — diversifying over time.
“Effective funders” = inverse Herfindahl index (1 / Σ shareᵢ²) — the number of equal-sized funders that would give the same concentration. Trends are read to FY2023, the last fiscal year that has finished arriving. FY2024–FY2026 are still being filed and are shown unshaded; they do not move any figure on this page.
How long its funders stay
17% of San Diego Food System Alliance's funders are still giving 3 years after their first grant; 55% give in more than one year at all.
Share of funders still giving k years after their first recorded grant, pooled across every acquisition cohort. A funder counts as retained in a year only if it made a grant that year. Measured to FY2023, the last fiscal year that has finished arriving — a funder cannot be counted as lapsed in a year most filers have not reached.
Where its funders are
San Diego Food System Alliance draws 61% of its grant income from funders outside California, across 10 states in all.
In-state vs out-of-state, by year
Funder states come from each funder’s own filing. $1.2M arriving through sponsors registered in 5 states is excluded from the map and the split above: a sponsor holds money on a donor’s behalf, so its registered address would place those dollars somewhere no donor need ever have been. Trends are read to FY2023, the last fiscal year that has finished arriving. FY2024–FY2026 are still being filed and are shown unshaded; they do not move any figure on this page.
Against its field
San Diego Food System Alliance runs a healthier operating margin than three-quarters of the 655 food & nutrition nonprofits its size.
this organization peer median middle 50% of peers· 655 food & nutrition nonprofits $1M–$10M, FY2025
Government funding San Diego Food System Alliance receives
Grants and contracts to this organization from federal (USASpending) and state checkbooks, reconciled to its EIN. $3.2M on record.
- Department of Agriculture$3.2M
Federal grants vs contracts are distinguished; state line items keep their reported category. Matched by name + geography (the BMF), so coverage is partial and precision-first.
Organizations like San Diego Food System Alliance
Organizations whose mission and program text most resemble this one, by semantic similarity over every organization in the US filings — the closest peers, and often the clearest route to shared or prospective funders.
In California
Nationally
Read directly from this organization’s own Form 990, as neutral context.
Where the money goes
76% of spending goes to programs.
Governance
Public support
82%
Share of support from the public (Schedule A) — the basis for its public-charity status.
Footprint & structure
Files a return copy in 1 state
Screen this organization
A dated, signed PDF of the compliance screen for San Diego Food System Alliance: IRS status (Business Master File, Publication 78, auto-revocation), the OFAC sanctions lists, the Internal Revenue Bulletin, and California registration, with the Rev. Proc. 2018-32 §8.01 reliance elements stated element by element. Generated from the current files at the moment you download it.
Screens are triage, not determinations; a source that cannot be read reports not screened, never clear. Screen this nonprofit · How the screen works · on the API as GET /api/screening/{ein}?format=pdf
Questions and answers
- Who funds San Diego Food System Alliance?
- San Diego Food System Alliance (California) receives grants from 40 organizations whose IRS filings report $4,654,892 to it, the largest being Builders Vision Foundation ($872,395). 22 of them have funded it in more than one year.
- How many funders does San Diego Food System Alliance have?
- IRS filings report 40 organizations giving $4,654,892 in grants to San Diego Food System Alliance, 22 of which have funded it in more than one year.
- Who is the largest funder of San Diego Food System Alliance?
- Builders Vision Foundation is the largest funder on record, with $872,395 in grants. The full list of funders is on this page.
- How can an organization like San Diego Food System Alliance find more funders?
- Start with the funders already giving here, then look at the foundations that back similar organizations in California. The funding by cause and by state pages list the largest funders for a given area and how to approach them.
Play a game about who funds San Diego Food System Alliance →
These figures are read directly from IRS Form 990 / 990-PF e-file XML: this organization’s own return for FY2025 (financials across 2020–2025), and the filings of 40 funders that report grants to it. “On record” means captured in the filings we have parsed — a funder that does not e-file, or whose grant detail is not itemized, will not appear. Filings run roughly 12–24 months behind. Trends on this page end at FY2023, the last fiscal year that has finished arriving; later years are shown and marked, and move no figure. Data on this page was exported October 22, 2026. What this page cannot tell you · view filing