CIIP: Week 4 🥓
Originally posted July 2, 2017
At our midpoint event this week, the main speaker, Marc Steiner, said
unless the work we’re doing changes the lives of the poorest folks for the better, then it is not worth doing”
and that really resonated with me.
From this, I thought about the work the network does while asking the question “is it worth doing?” based on the condition Steiner set. I think the answer is conditionally a yes. The work is 100% necessary as we push to empower church communities to take their diets and health into their own hands. It is very easy to overlook the power of gardening and its benefits. However this is only a partial solution (yet an absolutely necessary) to the larger food desert and food apartheid problems we are trying to tackle.
Before I explain that, here is a little background on my thoughts. This week, I and another coordinator of the network were featured in a graduate student’s research paper. This paper raised a few points that got me thinking. First, the network is helping churches. While there’s nothing wrong with that, not everyone goes to church. Sure a lot of these churches are integrated with their communities, but their reach is still limited. Who knows if the “poorest folks” Steiner talks about are even in these circles. While the network is growing, I am starting to think that a realistic goal the network should strive for is reaching beyond just churches.
The second idea raised is that ultimately food deserts are the problem and it is worth wondering if community garden would be able to sustain whole communities? One possible reason behind food deserts is in the conscience choice by grocery store companies on where to build these stores. While it remains unstated, it appears these choices are motivated by prejudices and discrimination towards a neighborhood. Food mirages and food apartheids describe areas where healthy food in the form of organic grocery stores and farmers’ markets is available, but unaffordable for the people in those communities. According to the Atlanta Black Star, “food apartheids affects people of all races, including poor white people, although black and brown people are affected disproportionately.” These neighborhoods are often “crippled by poor public policy, economic inequities, plagued with struggling schools,” and are under the influence of corporate divestment. As a component of this poverty trap, inaccessibility to quality food only compounds already strained environments.
It appears the only way to really solve this issue would be through policy within the city and perhaps the state as well. However, establishing and enacting policies raise their own set of challenges. Here’s where I think organizations like Black Church are doing it right. This network is developing a narrative for its members and the stronger and more impactful this narrative is, the easier it would be to pass policy to improve things for the better; at least that is how I am seeing it.
Ultimately, for a sustained change to occur, I am learning we need a few intangible things: hard work, a supportive community, patience, and a clear goal.