Mandela Farmers’ Market: promoting self-sufficiency!

Mandela Farmers’ Market: promoting self-sufficiency!

by Mama Earth


Mama Earth interviews the Scott family, whose farm is located in Fresno.
In keeping with the Black Panther focus this month, I took a trip to the Mandela Farmers’ Market, located in Oakland on Seventh Street, directly across the street from the West Oakland BART Station. Mandela Farmers’ Market is a fresh produce market that sells produce grown by African-American farmers. This healthy and revolutionary event that takes place every Saturday is an example of one of the major leadership qualities that the Black Panthers promoted: SELF-SUFFICIENCY within the African-American community.


Anushka with members of YO!BUGS
The Mandela Farmers’ Market, originally known as Mo’ Better Foods, was created by well-known community activist, teacher, husband, and father David Roach. He says his the whole inspiration for Mandela Farmers’ Market came from our ancestors. David realizes that African-Americans have always had programs for self-sufficiency.

When asked what kind of connection he sees between what he is spearheading and what the Black Panthers built within the African-American neighborhood, he stated, “The Panthers were definitely a major part of my inspiration. I have been a student of Black organizations that had their own self-determination and their own agenda that was established by us to help us. As we have somewhat assimilated more in this society, we have tended to allow others to determine how to solve our problems. But the Panthers, SNCC (Student Nonviolent Coordinating Committee, led by Stokeley Carmichael, Ella Baker and others in the 1960s) and UNIA (Universal Negro Improvement Association, led by Marcus Garvey in the 1920s) were pretty much established by us to help us. They were definitely a part of my inspiration.”

David, who is also the director of the Oakland Film Society, spoke about the energy that West Oakland in particular carries over from the Black Panther days. “Being here in West Oakland, where they really grew from, there is definitely an energy you pick up, just as you pick up when you go to Jubilee West. This is a place where Marcus Garvey was, and Liberty Hall also used to be there.” In addition, Brotha’ Roach acknowledged the fact that the Black Panther Party is still growing. He stated that there are organizations around the world still studying this political organization that was born right here in Oakland.

Another phenomenal component within the Mandela Farmers’ Market are the actual participants. They range from young people actively working at the market to seasoned farmers, who are veterans in tending to the land.

Three youthful members of YO!BUGS, Youth Opportunities through Butterfly and Urban Gardens, were present at the market. YO!BUGS is a component of OBUGS, an organization whose goal is to beautify and nourish the community of West Oakland. OBUGS, which stands for Oakland Butterfly and Urban Gardens, works with YO!BUGS in setting up gardens at various neighborhood and school sites within West Oakland. On Saturdays, YO!BUGS youth bring produce from their gardens and sell it at the Mandela Market. YO!BUGS also makes refreshing smoothies at their stand.

I asked these beautiful, intelligent students to share what it is like working with YO!BUGS. Sharee Grant, who is 16 and attends McClymonds High School, said, “Well, there’s a garden on 32nd and Linden and I live right behind the garden. And my little sister used to go there all the time and work there. Then I used to go there a little bit.

“Then they (OBUGS) asked me if I wanted to work there for a job. I said yes. At first it was just like having a job. But then I got into it. It’s like helping out the community. I learned more about health and stuff - and that organic is better. I started talking to my family and friends about it. All this organic food is cheap, and it shouldn’t be, because this is for your soul. It’s what you need.

Tola Williams, a 17-year-old student at Street Academy who recently began working with YO!BUGS, told me, “I really like it. It’s not just about making money any more. I know I am making a difference and I am doing something positive with my time. I am also being educated. It’s really wonderful, because you go to the gardens and all the kids come.” Tola explained that the young people tend the gardens, plant the seeds, pick the crops and prepare the harvest for market.

The youngest member present at the YO!BUGS stand was 14-year-old Latasha Palmer. “I have learned how to plant stuff and get along with other people,” she said.

Under a revolutionary arrangement that YO!BUGS negotiated with a liquor store on Ninth and Chestnut, two blocks from the Mandela Market, the liquor store will be carrying organic produce on an ongoing basis that comes from YO!BUGS and some of the other farmers who use the market. The liquor store does not have to come out of its pocket at all. YO!BUGS just requests that they sell the produce at cost.

It is an astonishing that in all of West Oakland there are 30 liquor stores and only one grocery store to serve the community. So the efforts of YO!BUGS bringing organic produce to West Oakland needs to be commended!

Anushka, who works with the People’s Grocery and also supervises YO!BUGS at the Mandela Farmers’ Market, recognizes that West Oakland, like other urban communities, lack “food security.” Years ago, the majority of African-American families lived close to the land and to their food supply. They did not have to travel to buy tomatoes, greens, potatoes, etc. Fresh produce was abundant in people’s back yards.

In these “modern days,” people are dependent on the grocery chain stores to supply them with all of their dietary necessities. With this dependency comes the lack and the loss of knowledge of how to live and work with the land in order to produce healthy food.

There was a time when everyone in the family knew the basics of farming. It was like breathing. You know how to breathe? You know how to make food grow. Even in the worst-case scenario such as the father losing his job, the family would not go hungry because everyone knew how to plant and grow their own food. In today’s society, having the ability to grow food is not even valued.

Will Scott Jr., president of the African American Farmers Association, understands in a very intimate way the importance of having control over your own food supply. He has been farming for the past 30 years in Fresno. While he was growing up, his father worked as a sharecropper. Therefore, farming and producing one’s own food was never new to Mr. Scott.

I asked him what it was like to produce his own food. “I can taste the difference in the food,” he said. “I can taste the difference between produce that has been in the store and the produce that comes directly from the land and into my hands.”

Two of Scott’s adult children work with him at the market. His daughter Michelle told me about growing up close to the land and learning to farm: “It’s been great. Ever since I was a little girl, my dad and mom and brothers would get out there playing around. Then my dad would say we’re going to plant something today.

“I remember taking this little seed and putting it in the ground. You watch it grow, and you baby it. Then when it actually produces,” she explained, “we would take it to market and watch people buy it. It’s exciting! Not only was growing it exciting, but you’re helping bring food to a community. That’s a powerful thing. So as a little girl, I understood the importance of that.”

Wouldn’t be a beautiful reality if all children could experience and understand the importance of tending to the land, growing their family’s food, eating the harvest as well as bringing it to their community? OBUGS, YO!BUGS, People’s Grocery and David Roach’s Mandela Farmers’ Market are creating a dynamic health and self-sufficiency movement within the Oakland community. With their continued strides, our children as well as our communities will grow to be self-sufficient and self-reliant and develop a much closer relationship with the earth!

Support the Mandela Farmer’s Market every Saturday, 10 a.m. to 4 p.m., on Seventh Street, across the street from the West Oakland BART Station.

Email Mama Earth at mamaearth [at] sfbayview.com.