Press Release
♦Beginning on July 1, Mobile Farm Fresh, a mobile farmer’s market, will begin serving Food Deserts of Rowan County with four market locations. In August, Mobile Farm Fresh will debut a fifth market location in East Spencer.
Mobile Farm Fresh will debut at Novant Health Rowan Medical Center, the Community Care Clinic, the Lafayette Circle Community, and the Pine Hill Neighborhood. Currently, the market will be located in a tent. As funds are raised, the market will move into a one-aisle grocery mobile farmer’s market on wheels, built in a retrofitted city transit bus which will then travel between food deserts.
“Health disparities caused by poor nutrition and lack of access to fresh fruits and vegetables are a problem no family should face. As a partner in Mobile Farm Fresh, we are hopeful that more families, especially vulnerable citizens, will achieve healthier lifestyles,” commented Dari Caldwell, President of Novant Health Rowan Medical Center.
Mobile Farm Fresh is a nonprofit organization, whose primary purpose is to address the needs of our communities with hunger, food insecurity, and the lack of access to healthy, affordable fruits, vegetables, and other wholesome food staples. The market especially focuses on those living in food deserts.
“Food deserts might be more appropriately called ‘food wasteland’. For people without transportation in a populated community to have to travel up to one mile to access a full service grocery store is a challenge (a store that offers produce, meats, and a full complement of dairy products) . In a largely rural area, like the Food Deserts identified in Rowan County, the quantifier is 10 miles to a full service grocery store. In a county with a farm heritage that runs deep, where some of the finest produce, meats, dairy products and honey in North Carolina originate, how can we ignore people who are hungry? Everyone should have ready access to the best tasting, healthy foods possible – and education – to encourage and support healthy eating,” explained Mobile Farm Fresh board member, Reverend Candis Burgess on the necessity to provide locally grown food produce to the food deserts of Rowan County.
In May 2013, the USDA released a study on food deserts based on 2010 census information. They revised the original 2006 food desert definition of low income area where a significant number or share of residents is either 1 mile away from a supermarket in urban areas or 10 miles away supermarket in rural areas. The new definition expanded for new indicators, such as vehicle availability. According to the USDA Food Desert standards released in May 2013, to be a food desert a census tract must meet at least one of the four criteria below:
- Low income census tracts where a significant number or share of residents is more than 1 mile (urban) or 10 miles (rural) from the nearest supermarket.
- Low income census tracts where a significant number or share of residents is more than 1/2 mile (urban) or 10 miles (rural) from the nearest supermarket.
- Low income census tracts where a significant number or share of residents is more than 1 mile (urban) or 20 miles (rural) from the nearest supermarket.
- Low income census tracts where a significant number of households have low vehicle access or a significant number or share of residents are more than 20 miles from the nearest supermarket.
Nine (9) census tracts in Rowan County meet at least one of the criteria listed above, thereby making each tract a food desert.
“The Mobile Farm Fresh market will be so convenient for our patients who don’t always have access to personal transportation. Many of our folks use the bus line in front of the Clinic, walk, or catch rides. We hope that by having the market in our parking lot, our patients and the surrounding neighborhood will take advantage of fresh, local produce. Additionally, the majority of our population struggles with diabetes, hypertension, and obesity. We work hard to encourage our patients to eat healthy foods, drink lots of water, and exercise. The Mobile Farm Fresh market will help in making these goals easier for our patients to achieve,” stated Krista Woolly, who is the Executive Director for the Community Care Clinic of Rowan County.
Four of the new market locations are located within food deserts of Rowan County. The Community Care Clinic, the West End Neighborhood, and East Spencer are located in four of the nine food deserts.
Mobile Farm Fresh’s partnership with these market locations reflects a shared emphasis on not only providing healthy food to areas in need, but also working to improve the communities.
“In 2010, The Salisbury Housing Authority, in partnership with the City of Salisbury, applied for and received a Choice Neighborhood Planning Grant. The grant was a part of the White House Choice Neighborhood Initiative (CNI) to transform impacted neighborhoods into ‘neighborhoods of choice.’ Our CNI transformation plan concentrates on the West End which includes our public housing community called Civic Park. Choice Neighborhood grants requires transformation plans which address housing, people, and neighborhoods while trying to solve obstacles related to education, transportation, recreation, employment, and health. One need related to health and transportation emerged as a critical component to our plan; the need for residents to have access to fresh foods. Mobile Farm Fresh seems to be the answer we were looking for! Mobile Farm Fresh’s ability to bring locally grown fresh fruits and vegetables into our public housing communities, at affordable prices, overcomes two obstacles at once. With Mobile Farm Fresh, our residents can access fresh, nutritious foods without having to take public transportation to stores. This will be a wonderful advantage for our families and especially the children of our neighborhood,” commented Sam Foust, Executive Director of the Salisbury Housing Authority.
Mobile Farm Fresh of North Carolina is a mobile farmers market and educational resource center designed to restore healthy food access to communities who do not have access to fresh, affordable, sustainable food. Visitors to the market will have access to local fruits and vegetables. They will also be given healthy recipes for their produce. The public is invited to visit and purchase from any of these markets.
Mobile Farm Fresh will initially accept cash, major credit cards, debit cards, and EBT. Mobile Farm Fresh plans to offer WIC and senior nutrition vouchers as a payment option in the future.
To learn more on Mobile Farm Fresh, review market times and location, or to find out how to get involved, visit their website at http://www.MobileFarmFresh.com.
Weekly Mobile Farm Fresh Market Schedule
