FEEDING THE FUTURE
We’re building relationships with growers, producers, aggregators, packers, distributors, and markets to build a new food economy. Along the way, we’re supporting aligned organizations and institutions to solve complex food system problems. We’re interested in engaging in transformative work that is deliberate and builds an off ramp from current oppressive and extractive systems. We’re engaged in rethinking our food system while piloting pathways that allows us and other organizations to lead from the front in scaling and replicating sustainable, liberating and dignified models of sovereignty work.
Along with our partners and collaborators, we’re building an aligned food value chain that:
Promotes land sovereignty and environmental sustainability
Supports local economies through market access for habitually excluded growers and producers including QTBIPOC farmers
Serves our communities with dignity, respect and joy
Shift power and narrative control to communities
Our Collaborators
Black Farmer Ecosystem (NEFOC, Black Farmer Fund, Black Farmers United NYS, Farmschool NYC, Soul Fire Farm)
CDC Foundation
Daisa Enterprises
Upstream Impact Consulting
Boston Medical Center
Center for Health Law and Policy Innovation, Harvard Law School
Partner Farms
Corbin Hill practices equitable procurement, a method of intentionally sourcing from minority businesses, farms and organizations that are not only historically left out of the process, but have suffered disproportionately from social, environmental, and structural externalities. Historically and systematically, Black, indigenous and people of color have not received the same opportunities as given to white-owned farms.
“Recognizing racism as foundational in today’s capitalist food system helps explain why many of the promising alternatives such as land trusts, farmers’ markets, and community supported agriculture tend to be dominated by people who are privileged by whiteness (pg 164)"
While the majority of our fresh produce comes from hubs of local and regional farms primarily located in the Northeast, our commitment is to source directly from small, family-operated farms to increase their viability and become more economically sustainable.
Farm Fresh Carribean Growers
Location: Montgomery, New York
Farm Fresh Caribbean Growers strives to provide the freshest of produce that is not widely available at the grocery store. Farmer Delroy and his Business Associate Nita are really an A team, who with support from their community cultivate beautiful specialty crops like giant Callaloo, squash, and zucchini. FFCG partners with Food Pantries, Social Service Agencies and Youth Programs to provide fresh produce to lower income individuals in an effort to fortify their minds, spirit and community with unity and pride. Per FFCG – Pride should be Shared.
Mi Oh My Farms
Location: Bronx, NY
Mi(crogreens) Oh My(celium) Farms is worker-owned urban farm and educational organization, producing incredibly delicious, vibrant and 100% organic microgreens and mushroom products. Produced locally in The Bronx, their mission is to provide the community with a high-quality product at a low-cost while promoting healthy diets and lifestyles. As a worker-owned business, every grower earns a living wage, sharing the risks and profits of the business. Supporting worker cooperatives means you are saying no to the exploitation of labor and yes to the empowerment of workers. See our piece on them here.
Choy Commons
Locations: Chester NY, Chatham NY, and Charlotteville NY
Choy Commons is a nonhierarchical cooperative of Asian-led farms (Choy Division, Gentle Time Farm, Star Route Farm) engaging our communities in building food sovereignty for the Northeast. They build capacity for small farms through collaboration, grow ancestral foods for community, redistribute resources to provide food to those in need, and gather community to practice cultural traditions in the present. Choy Commons weaves and sustains relationships between farms, community-led organizations, mutual aid groups, food purveyors, and cultural practitioners to nurture a community of interdependence and self-determination. They primarily grow East-Asian crops that both look and taste incredible.
Forest Fringe
Location: Bethel, NY
Forest Fringe is a small-scale regenerative farm at the edge of the Mohican forest bringing people together around fresh food and the arts. Multi-talented Farmer Kamra is passionate about ecological relationships, as well as protecting the biodiversity of the land they steward. Kamra focuses on building human relationships with the uncountable local species assemblies, waters, and energies that sustain them and the people they serve. This is done through working with nature, contributing to the local food system and revering the food they grow. At Forest Fringe, they love to feed people, show them a good time, and nurture inspiration.
Rocky Acres Community Farms
Location: Freeville, NY
Rocky Acres Community Farm, located in Freeville, NY, is a 30 acre farm that focuses on education and the sustainable production of local vegetables, eggs, and meat for low-resourced communities. Farmer Rafa Aponte combines the knowledge and spirit of social justice with the transformative healing aspects of nature and agriculture to promote equity in both urban and rural food systems. He spearheaded the Harvest Box program, an affordable farmshare to serve the needs of underserved residents of Tompkins County.
Catalyst Collaborative
Location: Millerton, NY
Catalyst Collaborative Farm is a land-based, income-producing project that centers queer and BIPOC land stewards, entrepreneurs, and allies to grow food and make value-added products with, and for the community they serve. The farm was founded by Monti Lawson, a Black and Gay beginner farmer who has been a community gardener and urban farmer in NYC for over a decade. They operate as a group of Collaborators exploring solidarity economics to achieve liberation by building Community Wealth. CC is building the social, financial, and operational infrastructure needed to create a sustainable enterprise with Catalyst being a hub.
Moss Fresh Fruits & Vegetables
Location: Albion, NY
Collaborate and envision with us a new food system that is inclusive, equitable, and sustainable where our communities thrive.