Churches And Farmers Unite To End Food Deserts

Baltimore is home to more than 600,000 people, and while most of them have easy access to grocery stores and food markets across this city, there are places where poverty and geography and a history of racism have combined to create so-called “food deserts.”  One in four city residents live in neighborhoods where it’s difficult to find any fresh, wholesome food. Tom's first guest this morning is someone who's trying to fix that. The Reverend Dr. Heber Brown is the senior pastor at Pleasant Hope Baptist Church in North Baltimore. He decided to address the problem of food deserts by creating the Black Church Food Security Network. His work to bring food from local farmers to city neighborhoods by way of a network of churches has earned Heber Brown numerous accolades, including being named one of the 50 best and brightest people working to save the planet, by the online environmental journal, GRIST. And he's won kudos as well for his many other initiatives, including a residential solar project, an orchard program, and a freedom school that teaches youth about growing and cooking their own food.