After launching its mobile farmers market in June 2021, the Center for Land-Based Learning’s West Sacramento Urban Farm Program now strives to add culturally inclusive produce to better serve the city’s diverse community.
Heather Lyon, West Sacramento Urban Farm Program coordinator, explained that “there are people here from all over the world” and argued that the center should strive to make culturally relevant produce available in its mobile farmers market.
“A lot of our customers are from Afghanistan, a lot are from Eastern Europe,” Lyon said. “One of the things we’re trying to do is work with them and then work with our sponsors to identify vegetables or fruits that they would like to have access to that are important to them culturally.”
After doing this, Lyon hopes to work with the center’s farmers to grow these fruits and vegetables so that they can have them available on the truck.
“I think a really fun part of the truck is, as we’re getting to know the community, it’s becoming more culturally diverse with all kinds of produce, especially from the Middle East,” she emphasized.
Additionally, the center is attempting to source as much produce as possible from its beginner farmers participating in its farm incubator program, most of which are conveniently located in West Sacramento and in its headquarters in Woodland.
“Last year, we purchased from about two of those farms,” Lyon recounted. “This year, it’s looking like five of those farms will be working with us, which is really exciting because that’s one of the goals of our program. To be a good, reliable sales outlet for those beginning farmers, especially the urban farmers.”
The mobile farmers market operates exclusively in West Sacramento’s Broderick/Bryte neighborhood, which Lyon said is because of the community’s designation as low-income/low-access by the USDA.
“We see huge disparities in human life expectancy and rates of nutrition-related diseases among people in the Broderick/Bryte neighborhood versus West Sac as a whole, and especially compared to other cities in Yolo County like Davis,” Lyon highlighted.
The mobile market has also been taken to major events – including Sacramento’s Farm-to-Fork Festival in September – in an attempt to spread awareness about food insecurity in the Greater Sacramento region.
Beth Del Real, Caring for our Watershed coordinator for the center, welcomed event-goers in September and shared the importance of the mobile market, arguing that the “impetus for the mobile market was getting fresh produce into areas where they didn’t have it , specifically sites with low-income housing.”
However, Lyon noted that another important reason the mobile farmers market operates in this neighborhood is that the program is based in the neighborhood.
“Of our five farm sites, three of them are in the Broderick/Bryte neighborhoods so that’s the community that our farmers are a part of and where the funds are, so it just made a lot of sense to focus our program in those neighborhoods, she remarked.
Lyon highlighted the center’s hopes to expand the mobile market’s season from 21 weeks to 24 weeks this year with it running from mid-May through October.
“Our current plan is to stick with our four-weekday stops in the Broderick/Bryte neighborhood,” she explained. “I think scheduling is going to change to better serve what people are wanting in terms of timing.”
Additionally, the market plans on continuing its weekly Sunday stop outside of Franquette located at 965 Bridge St. in West Sacramento.
Lyon explained that this stop is important because it allows students in the center’s farm training program to manage staff and grow most of the produce that will be sold outside of Franquette.
“So it’s also kind of an educational opportunity for our student farmers,” she emphasized.
The mobile farmers market is funded by the USDA, the city of West Sacramento, Wells Fargo and Bayer, according to Lyon.
A second mobile market is in the works and will operate in Woodland starting in 2024.
“That will be funded largely by the city of Woodland and Yolo County,” Lyon said.
If interested in learning more about the mobile market and the specific schedule of stops when they are released, visit landbasedlearning.org/followthetomato.