Urban Seeds is Bringing Farm Fresh Nutrition to Meet City Needs By Emma Ault
There is a hidden injustice in Evansville, Indiana: food inequity. Downtown Evansville is known as a “high priority food area”, a place that lacks access to fresh produce and foods with higher nutrition. Multiple organizations around Evansville are working to put nutritious foods onto the plates of those living in healthy food priority areas. One such organization is Urban Seeds, a non-profit organization with a focus to attack food inequity within the city. Registered nurse and director of Urban Seeds, Robin Mallery, sees a distinct need for the many services Urban Seeds offers to fight food injustice in the Evansville area. “40% of Evansville is in the footprint of having no grocery store and only convenient foods or fast foods available, and about 20% of our community lives in poverty,” she states. “Food Desert” is a term commonly used for high priority food areas. Ms. Mallery prefers the use of “High Food Priority Area” because “desert” brings to mind a picture
Crescent Magazine 27
of a barren wasteland, but the reality of deserts is that they are vibrant and filled with life. “The two words ‘food desert’ bring to mind this area that is devoid of commitment, or love, or activism, or self-worth, and even though the phrase high priority food area does not easily roll off the tongue, it is so much more descriptive of reality,” Mallery says. “It takes the responsibility away from those people live in that neighborhood and puts it where it belongs, which is the broken food system.” When a group of mothers noticed a need for more nutritious food in schools, they decided to organize. Urban Seeds, then called Urban Sisterhood, developed community gardens and shared meals with their neighborhoods. Gradually, their ideas grew, and as they became a 501C3, funding for larger projects flooded in. Urban Seeds is now the main fiscal agent for a number of events and sub-organizations around the Evansville area. Around 2015, they shifted their focus to PSE, which stands for Policy, Systems, Environment, and teamed up with Purdue Extension to execute community projects and grow their non-profit organization. “Your non-profit must be mission driven if you’re going to succeed,” Mallery says. Through their partnership with the Welborn Baptist Foundation, they developed the program Nourish. Nourish buys nutritious foods wholesale and resells those items at 40% off from what they paid. People can go online and buy themed grocery bags with different kinds of produce, meats, and dairy products, and pick them up locally. “I think we have an opportunity to expand our outreach with the Nourish program. Not only in the food access space, but more importantly the education opportunity,” states Mallery. Once people have these products though, they need to know how to prepare it. Urban Seeds offers cooking classes as well. One of Robin Mallery’s favorite events is Book n’ Cook. Families with children come to the Evansville Vanderburgh Public Library to receive books
