Access to Nutritious Food Should Not be a Luxury

By Anonymous / Fall 2019

An essential part of life, right next to oxygen, is food. Food plays many parts in the “life” of humanity. It helps shape our cultures, it can bring people together, it can be a tool for expressing art, and most importantly it is vital in sustaining life for us. Food provides the necessary energy for us to perform our daily tasks, and offers essential vitamins that our bodies use for a variety of reasons. Having access to safe, nutritious and healthy food is absolutely important, and I don’t believe there are many, if any, people that would argue against that. With that said, there is an ever growing problem, and that is that people do not have equal and achievable access to food. When discussing food access, I am not talking about just any food source; I am concerned with foods that can allow people to maintain a healthy and active lifestyle. Without this, we are condemning those that do not have access, the poor and marginalized, to a possible lifetime of preventable illnesses, a shorter life span, and depression.

There are many different groups that are affected by this growing problem, but those that are affected the most are low income neighborhoods, communities of color and rural areas (Bell). Some of the reasons why these areas may be affected the most can possibly be linked to events and ideologies from our past, which lead to the development of these communities in the first place. Tactics such as redlining, which is an underhanded move, that cities used to keep neighborhoods segregated after emancipation, forced African Americans and the poor to reside in less desirable areas of town (Twohig). The reigning ideology of white supremacy, the belief that white people are superior to those of other races and color,  kept bigger, white controlled business out of these areas. We still see the effects of this causing problems in some of these neighborhoods today. Let us consider West Oakland , a city in the bay area of Northern California. Do to its zoning, resulting in a high concentration of poor and minorities, new businesses such as groceries have steered clear of opening shops there. In turn, it is what the United States Department of Agriculture would categorize as a food desert. A few variations defining what a food desert is exist, but it can be summed up as low income neighborhoods that have a large number of people that share a lack of access to retail stores that sell healthy and affordable food (Dutko). Over a decade ago, in 2007 people in this community became angry that they were being overlooked in the ongoing development around them. From protesters and street art where signs read, “welcome to West Oakland--enjoy our 53 liquor stores”, the 30,000 residents of West Oakland demanded to be heard, because not having a single grocery store was no longer an option (Id). It wasn’t until the spring of 2019 that they have finally had a grocery store put up in their community, a local Community Foods Market that they funded themselves (Hossaini). This is just one example of a low income community of color’s struggle to put fresh and healthy whole food on their tables, and there are many others out there.

The two largest obstacles keeping this problem from being a thing of the past is money, or lack of access to it, (low income communities) and our current state of economic growth that is governed by a rise in capitalistic ideals, that promote a lack of regulation in the markets and measure their success with the gross accumulation of wealth and power. This monster is referred to as neoliberalism. In the current state of our world it takes money to put plans into action, and in the neighborhoods that need change the most money is a rare resource. For those that are able to overcome this first obstacle, they will find themselves at odds with organizations that will not want them to succeed, people or groups  that subscribe to the neoliberal doctrine of accumulating the most wealth and power. One such example a community being challenged after taking control of their neighborhood is the creation of the South Central Garden in LA. It was acquired by the city under eminent domain in 1986, and was zoned to be used for incinerators, and an energy project (Kennedy), (the zoning was also do to a type of red lining). The community fought to overturn the project, and achieved the impossible, and in 1994 the city granted the community a permit to use the lands that turned into the largest urban community garden in existence (Kennedy). This small community had united in solidarity and was now in a position to provide healthy, and affordable whole food to its people. In 2004 the city sold the land to one of the original partners who had previously owned it. Although the sale was legal, it had taken place in a manner that was driven by backroom deals. He fought to have the farmers removed off the land and eventually won. In 2006 the plot was bulldozed to become warehouse. The plot remains empty to this day. The actions taken against the community can be explained by a theory in the documentary “Requiem for the American Dream”. In it, Noam Chomsky outlines steps he believes are used to amass wealth and power.  Numbers 5 and 8 are attack solidarity, and keep the rabble in line (Hutchison). This community not only bonded together in solidarity, under an idea of bettering themselves, but they also took on the city to control their own destiny. This is true power, and a community that can harness and meaningfully wield that power to make changes, is a potential threat. If this community was allowed to succeed it could provoke potential mobs of communities to follow in their steps taking power away from the already powerful. They had to be stopped. But just because you are knocked down, it doesn't mean you can’t get up again, and maybe try something new. 

Access to healthy and nutritious food should not be a thing of luxury, and the people living in the United States of America, one of the wealthiest countries in the world, should not be starving. The options shouldn’t be just sugar, salt, fat. What can be done to overcome the obstacles that are keeping communities from an essential part of human existence? I think the overall grand scheme of the solution here, is to come together in solidarity. The masses need to bond together and take back what is rightfully theirs. But to do this, we, the proletariat, the working class, the middle class, and everyone in between need to set aside other differences. Forget about racial, religious, and gender divides, and consider what unites us. “I am human and therefore nothing human is alien to me”, we are a brotherhood of man, and we can not let the “few”, the wealthy and powerful continue to hold our food hostage. If the United States of America were truly a democracy then it would serve its people, and not the wealthy that continue to manipulate our government. We must elect officials that value the people over the dollar. Officials that can be strong enough to go to bat for the people, and shut down lobbyists that pray on the already wounded and weak communities. We need to support each other in this process of change, because if we do not, we will surely fail. 

If we can adopt this principle of solidarity, and stand together in unity, the sky's the limit. If we adopt these principles, those in power will fight us at every corner, tooth and nail, but if we stand strong, and continue to let our voices sound we will overcome. We are the many and they are the few. Those that had formerly embraced the neoliberal values will have to make changes, and abandon their old ways. They will have to join the fold, and redefine their ideas of success. No longer will they be able to amass gross accumulations of wealth from the sweat of our backs. But we must not reject them when they come to our side, because they are still us, and we are still them. We must help them, and others understand the importance of the “whole”.

It is important that the world take this problem seriously for many reasons. For starters, human lives are at risk. People are starving to death all over the world, or developing preventable diet related chronic diseases such as diabetes and obesity. Is human life no longer valuable? What would be the point of all that wealth and power if there is no one left to share it with? Efforts to turn this problem around should be supported because of the clear fact that “we” are all we have. We need each other if you are to survive as a species in this cold dark corner of the universe. If we abandon each other, than we abandon our humanity, and we are undeserving of this little paradise we were placed upon, condemning not only the poor and marginalized, but the entirety of the human race. 

Works Cited

Bell, Judith, et al. "Access to healthy food and why it matters: A review of the research." Philadelphia, PA: The Food Trust 5 (2013): 1413-1413.

Dutko, Paula, Michele Ver Ploeg, and Tracey Farrigan. Characteristics and influential factors of food deserts. No. 1477-2017-3995. 2012.

Hossaini, Sara. “Full-Service Grocery Store Set to Open in West Oakland Food Desert.” KQED, 14 Apr. 2019.

Hutchison, Peter D, et al., directors. Requiem For The American Dream. PF Pictures, Naked City Films, 2016.

Id, Dave. “West Oakland: 53 Liquor Stores, 0 Grocery Stores, Detour Commuters, & Street Art Activism.” Indybay.

Kennedy, Scott Hamilton, director. The Garden.

Rothstein, Richard. “Racial Zoning” and “Own Your Own Home.” The Color of Law. Liveright,

2017. Twohig, Niall. “WCWP 100: Systemic Analysis for Everyday Life.” UC San Diego Bookstore, 2019