One of the busiest caterers on Martha’s Vineyard this summer is likely to be Island Grown Initiative, which is gearing up to provide about 2,500 packed lunches a week for school-age children.

“We think the total will be about 500 meals a day,” said Sophie Abrams Mazza, the food equity and recovery director for Island Grown Intitiative.

Nearly 200 families, with more than 350 children among them, have responded to a survey of interest in the free lunch program, Ms. Mazza said. Another 100 or so kids are enrolled in the Martha’s Vineyard Community Services early childhood education program or the Boys and Girls Club of Martha’s Vineyard, where their lunches will be delivered.

Ms. Mazza said there is room for a couple of dozen more children before the lunch program reaches its capacity. Parents can enroll through their children’s school.

Beginning July 6, two teams of chefs and a streamlined volunteer force will prepare and package the meals at Martha’s Vineyard Regional High School, five days a week.

“We’re using both kitchens at the high school, with two separate working teams to limit contact,” Ms. Mazza said. Only the food staff will be permitted in each kitchen, and every lunch will be wrapped to go.

“This is going to be a huge production, packing 500 meals every day,” she said.

While demand for the summer lunch program has never been higher, Island Grown is keeping the volunteer staff lean in order to reduce the risk of virus exposure, Ms. Mazza said. However, the lunch program may need more drivers to deliver meals to 35 families that indicated they would have difficulty getting to one of the pick-up spots, which are located at the high school, Edgartown School and West Tisbury School.

“We really don’t want lack of transportation to be a barrier to people getting food,” she said.

In the past, the summer lunch programs have been open to all ages with no pre-registration, but this season is based on advance enrollment, with drop-ins discouraged.

“We have to send site supervisors to the sites with meals, so we need to know what we’re expecting, and we also want to prevent food waste and over-ordering,” Ms Mazza said. “We are a nonprofit; we have to keep our expenses in check.”

To prepare families for the more than two-week gap between the last day of school lunches and the July 6 start of the summer program, a schedule of Island food distributions through Serving Hands, Good Shepherd Parish’s food baskets and the Island Food Pantry was included in the last school lunch bag on June 19, Ms. Mazza said.

The summer lunch program is scheduled to run through August 14.