food processing facilities that contract with the city of Detroit and are also owned, operated, or even employ African-American Detroiters. Apart from the predominant role of consumer, and part-time, low-earning service positions, like cashier, bagger and stock person, African-American Detroiters have been mostly absent from the food system. This arrangement typifies a wealth extraction model versus a community cooperative model. In the wealth extraction model we see an outside force pour a large amount of resources into a single entity that provides a limited amount of food with none of the profits being reinvested into the community being “served.” This model perpetuates a divided economy, with the dominant white economy benefiting disproportionately. Unlike in a community cooperative model, where a mutually agreed upon food-production system generates new wealth that is then distributed and re-circulated within the community for its own betterment. This model builds a holistic economy where everyone benefits equally.
WE ALL KNOW Buffalo’s storied tale of industry, manufacturing and race. The crippling impact of deindustrialization on Buffalo’s economy has made it one of the poorest cities in the country. “White flight” during the first decade of the 21st century has only recently (practically) equalized minority and majority stakeholders, in one of the most MAP provides green-jobs training and urban agriculture racially segregated cities in the country. On the urban agriculture front, Buffalo has been keeping outreach through their Growing Green program for young up pace, if not exactly following in Detroit’s massive foot- adults, ages 14 to 20. As part of their training, students gain steps. The city of Buffalo has dozens of community gardens knowledge of food sources, learn how to grow, process, and and nearly 20 food-producing farms, three of which pro- market organic food, as well as the impact of food on indiduce food for sale to the public—the largest being the Com- viduals and their community. Extensive social education is also an integral part of the program. munity Action Organization (CAO) on Harvard Place. Grassroots Gardens of Buffalo is a community-led garBuffalo, like Detroit, has copious amounts of vacant lots (13 percent of the city’s total land mass) available for the dening program lending a hand to the revitalization of neighborhoods and building quality of life through the repurpose of urban agriculture and gardening. So far, initiatives in the city of Buffalo—many on the reuse and beautification of vacant land. It functions in a West Side—have made strides in adapting vacant land for liaison capacity between the city of Buffalo’s administration and Buffalo’s avid community of gardeners. agricultural use. A few in particular have seen growth: Through Grassroots Gardens’ efforts, there are now more In the spring of 2003, the Massachusetts Avenue Project (MAP) transformed a vacant West Side lot into a vegetable than 70 recognized community gardens—from ornamental garden, and they have been “cultivating the revolution” ever to food-producing, and from the East Side to the West Side. since. Lauded as one of Buffalo’s leading urban farming ef- The demand for this adaptive re-use model is clear. Meanwhile, the Farmers & Builders co-op addresses forts, MAP has made great inroads in nurturing a more equitable and diverse local food system in the center of a food the divided economy by presenting a strategy for people to “opt out” of the mainstream economy. Farmers & Builders desert on Buffalo’s West Side. 36 BCM 29