City Harvest Programs
Healthy Neighborhoods
The Problem
Obesity and diabetes affect millions of New Yorkers each year, with the highest rates of these diseases often occuring in low-income communities. Research increasingly shows that the foods we eat and the neighborhoods we live in have a dramatic impact on personal and family health. The Robert Wood Johnson Foundation's Commission to Build a Healthier America stated that "More than one in every 10 American households do not have reliable access to enough food, and the foods many families can afford may not add up to a nutritious diet. Nutritious food is a basic need to start and support an active, healthy and productive life."
City Harvest’s Response
Healthy Neighborhoods is a City Harvest strategy to focus resources on specific low-income communities to increase healthy food knowledge and access to affordable options. Our comprehensive approach in working on supply, demand, and access to healthy foods helps to create sustainable improvements to the local food systems that serve these communities.
Healthy Neighborhoods seeks to support the availability of affordable fresh produce in targeted areas of New York City where poverty is high and healthy, low cost food is not always available and to encourage healthy nutritional behaviors among those at risk for diet-related diseases. We aim to:
• Identify and publicize gaps in the local availability of healthy food and nutrition knowledge through Community Food Assessments conducted with residents and vendors.
• Support various market mechanisms that introduce healthy options to consumers.
• Increase awareness of diet-related diseases and healthy dietary behaviors through nutrition education and healthy eating communications campaigns.
• Build and empower neighborhood networks of emergency food providers to strengthen their capacity and provide support services for their community.
How Healthy Neighborhoods Works
Healthy Neighborhoods is increasing the availability and accessibility of affordable fresh produce in targeted communities. The program works in several ways, taking into account the unique needs of a specific neighborhood.
Current neighborhoods of focus include:
Melrose and Mount Hope, Bronx
Melrose, in the Bronx, has a poverty rate of more than 40 percent. According to Department of Health data, more than 25 percent of adults in the area are obese, while 16 percent have diabetes. In Mount Hope, nearly 40% of the population lives below poverty level. Department of Health data indicates that one in four adults in Mount Hope are obese and more than 1 in 10 have diabetes, while according to local school data, nearly 45 percent of children are overweight or obese.
Stapleton, Staten Island
The Stapleton section of Staten Island exhibits poverty rates as high as 31 percent and in the area where City Harvest holds Staten Island Mobile Markets, the median household income is only $17,019 – more than three times lower than Staten Island as a whole.
Bedford-Stuyvesant, Brooklyn
The poverty rate in Bedford-Stuyvesant, Brooklyn, is 37%. Acccording to a NYC Department of Health report, over 60% of adults and one-third of high school students are either obese or overweight, and nearly 80% of adolescents and 90% of adults report eating fewer than five servings of fruits and vegetables every day.
Funds for this program have been provided by:
Congressman José Serrano
New York City Council
Richmond County Savings Foundation
The Indian Point Foundation
The New York Community Trust
The New York State Department of Agriculture and Markets – Food and Agriculture Industry Development Program
The Staten Island Foundation
The United States Department of Agriculture – Cooperative State Research, Education and Extension Service
