One Hundred Acres and a Tractor
Food and Health: the two go hand in hand. In many areas of the country, food insecurity, poverty and obesity are also terms that go hand in hand. Safeway is in the neighborhood one day and gone the next. This is the reality of urban communities where fast food restaurants dominate the food landscape. Corner grocery stores fill in the gaps for full stop supermarkets, but the pickings are slim to none when it comes to local and organic produce — and the fruits and vegetables are expensive and not exactly fresh. In these neighborhoods, hypertension, diabetes, and heart disease are pervasive and increasing.
Where is the food justice? One place to look is in Beltsville, Md.
The District of Columbia owns over 50 acres of land in Beltsville, which is managed by the University of the District of Columbia(UDC). There, UDC houses an agriculture experiment station used for research, investigation and experiments. Dr. James Allen, a UDC professor, was profiled in a recent Washington Post article on the benefits of pigweed, a leafy vegetable high in Vitamin A.
UDC, a land grant institution, stood to gain almost $10 million dollars from the recent farm bill for use with community outreach and research. While I truly appreciate and understand the need for research and experimentation, I also understand that 12% of households in DC suffer from food insecurity. And yet the majority of the land that DC owns is unused and unproductive.
This relatively unknown and underutilized gem in the coffers of the D.C. government can help decrease the incidence and prevalence of food insecurity in D.C.
