Among the groups of people who arguably will have the toughest road ahead as we (if we?) emerge from the pandemic are Black farmers. There are many stories to be told from just the numbers. In 1920 there were 925,000 Black-run farms in the United States, making up a total of 14 percent of total farms in the country, according to The New York Times. But in 2017, that number had shrunk to less than two percent, at 35,000 farms. Then, as we know, things got more complicated, as COVID changed our lives and work.
Farmers applied for pandemic aid, but as the New York Times reports in this story, “Black Farmers Fear Foreclosure as Debt Relief Remains Frozen," lawsuits have blocked $4 billion from aid that was supposed to go to Black farmers from the American Rescue Plan.
One thing we can do this Black History Month is to understand the complexities of the legislation and regulation that could change the outcome for Black farmers and their livelihoods in America, and listen to the voices and stories of the Black farmers themselves. This weekend, we are airing our show “Growing Justice,” where we talk with some of the people who are making change in this area, including farmer Leah Penniman, executive director of the Land Loss Prevention Project Savi Horne, gardener and minister Venice Williams and historian Marcia Chatelain.
“Land really is the basis of everything,” Penniman says about her work at Soul Fire Farm in New York. “Without land we can't build our homes, we can't grow our food, have our businesses, have security for the future.”
–Shannon