The Farm to Table Program is a community-based project that aims to get black and brown people of all ages connected to the land, increase healthy food access, and resist food segregation.

Black Health New Mexico began its food sovereignty work in 2020, at a moment when the world was ripe for change. We began by running a farm to table program that purchased fresh produce directly from mostly women and people of color owned northern New Mexico farms and delivered this food to 45-50 Black families a month in our region. Within the first 18 months of the COVID pandemic, we essentially served as a free CSA for Black families to prioritize their health, wellbeing and sense of community in a time that was unprecedentedly isolating and full of threatening unknowns. We prioritized our elders, pregnant people, and single parents through this program. To learn more, click here. (Insert video).

In 2022 we decided to grow this program in the direction of sustainability, by bringing Black people and families in central and northern New Mexico back to the land together to grow their own organic and pesticide free food to feed their own households. This was iteration 2.0 of our Farm to Table Program. From April 2022-October 2022, we gathered under the leadership of our Farm to Table Coordinator and several committed elders to build, tend to, and harvest two community gardens in Bernalillo and Santa Fe counties. Within this work several themes emerged including:

• Intergenerational participation

• Praying on land, reconnecting with regenerative practices and the traditional cultural relevance of farming for Black families

• Building relationships between communities to reduces isolation

• Skill sharing, a safe space for trial and error, increased self-sufficiency and resourced problem solving

• Team building and coordination

• Capacity building and leadership development

• Coming together and intentionally building love

• Serving the land, community, and our own health: being a part of something bigger than ourselves

• Building connection beyond human-to-human interaction; more care for the earth/climate

• A safe and deeply relevant place for Black people to address historical trauma given our history of sharecropping and enslavement in the United States and the African Diaspora

Our Farm to Table Program exists with the intention of growing healthy food and gathering within our communities for mental, physical, social, and spiritual health. Whether grown together or purchased and distributed, we use this program to combat health disparity areas that disproportionately impact Black people, families and communities over the life course. To learn more about our land-based practices click here.

If you are unfamiliar with the high health disparity rates that Black people face in New Mexico and nationally, please consult the New Mexico Department of Health and the National Institutes of Health.

The Black Health New Mexico Farm to Table program serves Black elders, women, and childbearing people. Based on organizational capacity, we serve roughly 50 households in central and northern New Mexico. Would that we could, we would do more. That said, we are thrilled to provide this delicious organic and/or pesticide free, straight-from-the-farm food to our community. During the slow season, because of crop limitations, we prioritize elders and recipients living in close proximity to the farms.

Please contact us if you want to:

• Receive a weekly delivery of farm fresh produce to your household;

• Make a tax deductible monetary donation to this program;

• Donate your farm fresh goods to this program;

• Volunteer your time.