“We know now that lack of access to healthy food—fresh vegetables, fruits, and grains—is a big factor in many health problems common in low-income communities. We’re learning that childhood obesity, heart disease and asthma, in particular, can be avoided or lessened with a healthy diet, but for many of the people in Oakland and Detroit, food access is an issue.”  Sarah Treuhaft, the Policy Link Senior Associate talking with us at the PolicyLink office in downtown Oakland (they also have offices in New York and Washington, DC) sits quietly as she shares this information, but she’s one of the organization’s leaders in supporting both changes to Federal, state and local policy to make healthy food more accessible(and affordable), and working with local Oakland organization like the HOPE Collaborative to turn policy recommendations into action.

Treuhaft, along with Michael J. Hamm and Charlotte Litjens of Michigan State University is one of the authors of the recently released Healthy Food For All: Building Equitable and Sustainable Food Systems in Detroit and Oakland, a new report by PolicyLink, the C.S. Mott Group for Sustainable Food Systems at Michigan State University, and the Fair Food Network. 

To write this report, Treuhaft and her colleagues interviewed over 151 people, 71 of them in Oakland, about their experience and expectations around eating out, shopping, purchasing and preparing food. The report is filled with fascinating facts and powerful quotes that dispel the myths that low income people and people of color spend all their time eating out and gobble fast food; most of the interviewees reported that they prepare and eat the majority of their meals at home, describing  home-cooking as healthier, tastier, and cheaper.

“I was surprised at how aware the teens we talked to about health issues, and the connection to healthy food,” says Treuhaft, who observed many of the focus groups in East and West Oakland where researchers talked to local residents to collect the information to use in this report. “Kids saw people in their families having problems with their health, and were determined to try to avoid behaviors and conditions that could create the same problems for them.”

The PolicyLink report does a very through job of reporting on the problems Oakland and Detroit face in making healthy food accessible. Among the issues highlighted are the following:

   •    Two areas of the city—East Oakland and West Oakland—are underserved by full-service grocery stores
    •    A 2005 study found that these neighborhoods had a substantial amount of retail leakage (resident spending outside of the neighborhood): $23 million in West Oakland, $338 million in East Oakland
   •    The HOPE Collaborative conducted an analysis of retail food access in the Flatlands located south and west of the 580 Freeway compared to the hills and found enormous disparities: one supermarket for every 93,126 people living in the Flatlands and one supermarket for every 13,778 people residing in the Hills.
    •    Depending on age, family structure, employment status, and government benefits, people shop from twice a month, to every day.
    •    Most people are unhappy with local options, and transportation is an issue
    •    People shop at the local liquor story/corner store often because they don’t have access to another location, and they see these stores as problematic.
    •    School food is seen as “nasty” and of poor quality.
    •    Immigrant communities have different preferences and immigrant neighborhoods with ethnic markets provide more food shopping options.
    •    Mexican and Asian residents prefer to shop at culturally specific stores.
    •    Vietnamese participants are satisfied with the food options in their neighborhood; they remember food scarcity in Vietnam and view food as comparatively cheap and plentiful in their neighborhoods

Much of the work PolicyLink is trying to support with this report is to create change and solve the problems. Among the solutions the report recommends, which PolicyLink supports locally, but are also advancing as part of a Federal policy initiative, are the following:

    •    Developing or attracting new neighborhood grocery stores
    •    Expanding local food production through urban farms and community gardens
    •    Enabling the use of Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program (SNAP) benefits at farmers’ markets
    •    Establishing food policy councils, as Oakland has just done
    •    Linking low-income residents to jobs and entrepreneurial opportunities in food businesses
    •    Developing transportation strategies to link residents of underserved areas with healthy food retailers.

If we can make these things happen, says Treuhaft, Oakland’s food access problems would lessen.

“Education and outreach are critical factors for change,” says Treuhaft, pointing out research in the report that West Oakland and Fruitvale residents who know about efforts such as community supported agriculture (CSA) boxes and community gardens use these programs and seek them out.

The Healthy Food For All report maps 64 organizations, including nonprofit and and businesses engaged in access to healthy food and sustainable food systems issues that are working to address these issues, but Treuhaft acknowledges it’s a slow process. 

“We know what needs to be done, and we are supporting groups working in the field that are doing the work, but it’s not an overnight shift,” she explains. “And yet, it’s clear that every new project that works helps to solve the problem and makes a difference.”
OL community: What do you think are the most pressing problems in the current food system in Oakland?  What is working well? What isn’t? Comment here, please or send your comments to feedback@oaklandlocal.com

For more information: 
Download Healthy Food for Al at  the PL web site, or take the file right here,