The issue of food deserts across the world is a growing ecofeminist one. Food deserts can take the form in multiple different ways. As described by Georgia’s Rural Health Innovation Center, food deserts are, “a region where the people who live there have limited access to healthy and affordable food, such as fresh fruits and vegetables. Many factors contribute to the presence of food deserts today, such as the traveling distance necessary to find healthy food options, having a low income, or a lack of transportation” (GRHIC, 2020 – Merrit Daniels). The logistics of food deserts include but are not limited to these guidelines, “in urban areas, a food desert is an area where at least 500 people or 33% of the population must live more than 1 mile from the nearest large grocery store. Whereas in rural areas, at least 500 people or 33% of the people must live more than 10 miles from the nearest large grocery store” (GRHIC 2020 – Merrit Daniels). 

 

 

 

Who Do Food Deserts Hurt Most?

One of this week’s readings focused on the idea of a more holistic perspective to ecofeminism having been derived from “deep ecology” meaning that the earth is to a degree independent of the living things here. However, because of the (at times) intentional mishandling of the earth by humans under oppressive conditions like capitalism, patriarchy, and other societal things ,  “environmentalism began as a reaction to the destruction of the environment made legitimate by instrumentalism” (Ecofeminist Intro).  Under what can also be labeled as factors like  human’s cultural individualism and instrumentalism on this earth has negatively impacted the earth and subsequently the environment, because “environmentalism aims to make the planet suitable for long-term human use: we preserve it for our needs. Its goal is to preserve; however, it is human-centered (anthropomorphism)” (Ecofeminist Intro).

 

**Like the complexities I spoke about above, food desserts are the manifestations of all of these things too.**

 

 

Some statistics of Food Deserts

• A food-desert neighborhood may lack a supermarket or large grocery store because of the costs food retailers face when building and/or operating a store in those locations. 

 

• One trend in supermarket development has been increasingly larger stores, such as supercenters. This store model relies on substantial parcels of land for the store and adequate parking, as well as roadways to accommodate large delivery trucks and customer access. Supercenters and other very large stores may not be as feasible in dense urban environments or in small rural towns that lack sufficient transportation infrastructure.

 

If humans in specific places particularly women because they are more likely to be the homemakers and caretakers of their households and communities under a heteronormative patriarchal society, even across cultures, they are more likely to suffer because of food deserts. This point was made in our intro reading. It says, “However, ecofeminists argue that we must look at our relationship with the environment through a feminist perspective. Environmental degradation is not just brought about by human-centered thinking, it is brought about by male-centered thinking (androcentric thinking). We must look, instead, to our patriarchal culture for the roots of the domination of nature.” (Eco Intro). 

There is a link between how food deserts come to pass in both rural and urban cities. In our Hobgood reading our writers illustrated a point on maldevelopment, environmentalism and ecofeminism. Food deserts as a gender issue will likely impact the environment and women simultaneously. 

 

“Maldevelopment militates against this equality in diversity, and superimposes the ideologically constructed category of western technological man as a uniform measure of the worth of classes, cultures, and genders… Diversity, and unity and harmony in diversity, become epistemologically unattainable in the context of maldevelopment, which then becomes synonymous with women’s underdevelopment (increasing sexist domination), and nature’s depletion (deepening ecological crises)… (Healing the Wounds, 83).” (Ecofeminism: Historic and International Evolution, Page 6). (Hobgood Oster).

 PBS  DOC ON FOOD DESERTS

 

 

Full access to the documentary: https://www.pbs.org/video/food-deserts-luboex/ 

 

Excerpts from the doc: Shirley explains that the food she receives from the church she counts on but is more accessible and affordable  to her then a supermarket because she does not drive and is only getting $16 a month on food assistance. She says without the food from the church “herself and the other would not be eating very well”. There is also an indigenous levels that the PBS doc takes a look into: a director of AICHO tells her perspective of the food deserts she serves, focusing on local nutritious food to give. The documentary does show case multi-views of women living and serving in and around this food deserts.

 

INFO ON HOW TO FIND THE NEAREST FOOD DESERT TO YOU:

https://www.npr.org/sections/thesalt/2013/03/13/174112591/how-to-find-a-food-desert-near-you