LOUISVILLE, Kentucky
Tiffany Bellfield El-Amin, the founder and director of the Kentucky Black Farmers Association (KBFA), leads the Urban BIPOC Farms Mentoring Program through a Southern Sustainable Agriculture Research and Education (SSARE) On-Farm Research grant. The grant involves three urban farmers in different parts of Kentucky, each with unique soil conditions and farming practices. The goal is to research regenerative agriculture methods to improve soil health in urban settings. She emphasizes the importance of supporting urban agriculture as a means of providing food access to underserved communities.
Bellfield El-Amin expressed concerns about the lack of recognition and support for urban farmers in Kentucky, particularly those living in micropolitan areas. The research experiences, including both challenges and opportunities related to urban agriculture, particularly in Kentucky, have caused her to consider that there is a need for a third definition of urban and rural areas to better support farmers in these regions.
“Many BIPOC urban farms have no knowledge or limited interaction with Natural Resource Conservation Service. Limited engagement from agriculture entities also limits soil science classification and education,” said Bellfield El-Amin.
The project is a mentoring program that will conduct research and education for the BIPOC urban farm community in soil health management and various sustainable agriculture practices in Kentucky. The research aims to improve soil and crop health in BIPOC urban agriculture communities and provide education on the benefits of utilizing natural resources to increase sustainable agriculture and organic soil science.
The workshops evaluated the needs and educated on the research variables, the benefits of organic elements added to soil to change the soil matter for healthy, sustainable farming, and what elements BIPOC farmers need to implement findings from the research for their urban farm to plan a sustainable soil management plant and crop production.
Bellfield El-Amin also co-lead the Kentucky Black Farmers Conference (KBFC) in Louisville, which brought together Black farmers from across the region. She emphasized the importance of supporting urban agriculture as a means of providing food access to underserved communities. Southeastern Outreach Coordinator Brennan Washington, participated in a panel discussion at the KBFC and spoke about SSARE programs.
Photo credit: Chimere Hampton
“We are probably one of the few programs that is doing face to face contact right now. Even if we can't provide funding, I think just showing up and speaking with folks, especially producers, helps to increase our legitimacy with the groups we serve. There's a lot of uncertainty and despair out there and the more we can interact with folks and provide an ear, it does help people,” said Washington.
Photo credit: Chimere Hampton
Bethany Harris, the new director of the Center for Urban Agriculture at the University of Georgia Griffin campus, highlights the importance of connecting with local land-grant universities for resources and agreed with Tiffany on the complexity of defining urban agriculture and its impact on communities, noting that it's currently still somewhat undefined.
Harris mentions that she has been reading through the project and agrees with the author's points about urban agriculture. She pointed out that there are similarities between urban and rural agricultural challenges. She also emphasized the need for research in urban settings, as conditions may differ from rural areas, including challenges in urban agriculture, such as soil erosion, pollinator conservation, and the importance of soil health and management in urban agriculture. In her work with the Center for Urban Agriculture, which offers educational programs, including the Journeyman Farmer program, Harris expressed the Center's interest in supporting and being part of this project and noted the importance of connecting with and supporting farmers in Kentucky.
“Providing fresh local produce to underserved communities like the work Tiffany is doing is so essential to making cities stronger, more sustainable, and more resilient,” said Harris.
The project intends to share research on the impact of urban agriculture on communities, providing fresh local produce to cities, schools, and the public. Both Bellfield El-Amin and Harris agree and intend to work collaboratively towards highlighting the importance of community involvement in urban agriculture, as well as environmental stewardship and conservation in urban farming and collaborations between different organizations working on sustainable agriculture. This action will be connected to Kentucky Black Farmers Association’s ongoing project: The Southeast Jesup Resource Wagon, intentionally similar to the Jesup Agricultural Wagon used by Thomas Monroe Campbell, a trailblazer of the Cooperative Extension Service who was a protégé of George Washington Carver.
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For more information on this project visit https://projects.sare.org/sare_project/os23-161/.
View Related SARE Grant:
- Urban BIPOC Farms Mentoring Program (os23-161)