June 27, 2024 • 26 mins
Join us as we chat with Sarah Salvatore, Farm Director of Eartha's Farm and Market, part of the Clara White Mission. Learn about the background of this important Jacksonville institution, and how the Farm is using regenerative agriculture to nourish and support the community members in this historic neighborhood.
https://www.clarawhitemission.org/earthas-farm-market
Mark as Played
Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Speaker 1 (00:00):
Welcome to Sustainable North Florida.
I'm your host, LorianneSantamaria.
Speaker 2 (00:05):
We submitted produce samples from our site to the
Bionutrient Food Association.
So what we learned was that ourfarming practices actually
produce more nutrient-densefoods, and compare it to farms
that were farming conventionally.
Speaker 1 (00:21):
Hi, welcome to Sustainable North Florida.
I'm Lorianne Santamaria, chairof the Jacksonville Climate
Coalition and host of thepodcast.
Today we're talking about avery special place in
Jacksonville.
Eartha's Farm and Market, whichis part of the Clara White
Mission, is a community leaderin sustainable agriculture.
At the core of their work is adedication to providing
education and access toresources for farmers and
(00:42):
agricultural entrepreneurs.
Education and access toresources for farmers and
agricultural entrepreneurs yes,it's about farming.
Yes, they focus on sustainablepractices, but as you speak with
anyone involved at Earthas,you'll quickly learn that the
common passion that drives themis the desire to restore
meaningful, dignified lives tothose in need within their
community, and sustainableagriculture is just one way in
which they are doing this.
My guest today is SarahSalvatore, who is the farm
(01:04):
director at Earthas.
Sarah, welcome, thank you.
So I'd like to start with yourbackground.
Can you tell us your story andwhat brought you to Earthas?
Speaker 2 (01:14):
Yeah, so I am not originally from northeast
Florida, I'm actually from asmall town in Ohio.
I grew up in rural America, inthe country.
I actually lived on a farm, butwe were not the farm owners.
We rented the farmhouse but Iwas surrounded by acres and
acres of corn, soybean and wheat.
(01:36):
My dad was a fisherman, he wasa deer hunter, he had a garden.
I sort of just grew up aroundagriculture and the world and I
grew up cultivating land and Igrew up living this way and not
knowing that it was kind ofunique.
So when I went away to college Imoved to the big city and I
(01:56):
started studying sustainability,urban agriculture and English.
I actually have a full degreein English and sociology and so
when I was studying sociology Irealized that cities really did
not have as much access to foodand agriculture as I imagined
that they did.
So from there I kind of took mylove of growing food, my rural
(02:21):
upbringing and my desire to havecommunity and to bring food to
the cities together.
I started working in communitygardens.
I worked in a group home there,I worked with youth and
installed a community gardenthere as well for the youth, and
I just realized that the more Idid this, the more I felt
really connected with people.
I felt like it was a greatopportunity to not only bring
(02:46):
food into the cities but bringthat connection that I was
really missing in rural America.
So from there, you know, I kindof delved in urban agriculture
for maybe like five to sevenyears and then I wanted to move
to the South.
So I moved to Jacksonville andwhen I was moving here I was
looking for a job and I said Iwould love to stay in this world
(03:06):
of agriculture and I foundEarth is Farm and Market and
since then I've been here.
I'm going on five year in Julyand I have just spent my time
here really, you know, learningso much about Jacksonville and
being able to do my work herefor this community.
Speaker 1 (03:24):
That's.
That's really great.
It really sounds like from thebeginning, from the very early
stages of your life andeverything up until then, you've
been walking this path to whereyou are right now.
Speaker 2 (03:33):
Yeah, absolutely.
I really think this is a dreamjob for me.
I couldn't imagine like abetter career for myself.
Speaker 1 (03:41):
So Earth is Farmer is a program of the Clara White
Mission, which was founded by DrEartha White.
She was really a remarkablewoman.
Can you tell us about her?
Speaker 2 (03:49):
Eartha M M White.
She was the daughter of ClaraWhite.
So Clara White was actually aslave and she, when slaves were
free, she actually fed men andwomen returning from war.
She fed unhoused women withchildren from war.
(04:09):
She fed unhoused women withchildren.
She used to have an old folkshome, a soup pigeon model, and
she adopted Eartha White.
So Eartha White was Clara's13th child and Eartha learned
everything from her mother andwas so inspired by the work that
she did that she incorporatedthe Clara White mission in her
mother's honor and she spent therest of her life really
following in those footsteps.
Eartha White started an oldfolks home here on the north
(04:31):
side that's still standing today.
She opened a spring fedswimming pool for the Black
community on Moncrief Road.
Moncrief Creek, which dividesthe farm, used to actually be
Moncrief Springs and people werebaptized in that pool and so
it's a really cool story.
(04:52):
But Irva, the land that we farmon, she actually purchased this
from AL Lewis.
Al Lewis was the firstAfrican-American millionaire in
the state of Florida.
During the big great firedowntown in Jacksonville, ertha
actually went in to his business, which was the African American
Business Association.
She went in and saved all ofhis business records during this
(05:13):
fire and as a thank you he gaveher about 10 acres on the north
side for pretty cheap, and thisis the land that we farm today.
So it's full of rich legacy.
But I like to think that Erthawas a woman who did anything and
everything for people.
What an incredible legacy.
Speaker 1 (05:30):
So your role is as the farm director right.
So you're focused onsustainable practices in the
farming that you do today.
You're helping people getthrough and overcome some of the
issues that they might havetoday, but you actually kind of
go back in time and write someof the wrongs that have been
done in the past.
Can you tell us a little bitabout the history of the farm?
Speaker 2 (05:50):
Okay, so Bertha's Farm Market.
We are located on a former ashdump site which was called the
Brownsfield Dump.
Excederator ash was dumped onthis land that we farm from the
late 1940s to the mid 1950s andit sat there all the way until
the early 2000s, so about 50years this land was sitting with
(06:15):
incinerator ash.
So if you can imagine, in thelate 40s until about the mid 60s
, all of a sudden this bustling,really successful Black
community on the north side justkind of got a lot dumped on it,
literally dumped throughincinerator ash.
The spring was closed down aspart of a water improvement plan
(06:36):
, so a lot of businesses left, alot of people left.
They didn't want to be hereanymore, and this is a story
that happens all over the globe.
Minority communities areaffected the most by
environmental issues, and so wekind of deal with this very
heads on.
And so the EPA came to the cityof Jacksonville in about 2006
(06:58):
with a request to clean up thedump site and then from 2010
until about 2012, the propertysort of set bank it and then our
CEO wanted to create a farmhere.
Jacoby Pittman reached out tothe Florida Department of
Environmental Protection Agencyand they were able to basically
clear us to start the farm.
(07:21):
We get our soil testedbiannually with the EPA to make
sure that we are safe to farm.
I'm proud to say that the farmwe are below residential
standards, which means that myfarm here is probably a little
safer than your backyard.
So we do a lot in terms of ourfarming practices to ensure that
(07:43):
we do not bring up anycontamination.
Speaker 1 (07:46):
That's really remarkable to see such a
transformation like that.
So when all this remediationhappened, I believe you guys
were focusing on conventionalagriculture and then at some
point in time you switchedtowards regenerative agriculture
.
Can you tell us about that?
Speaker 2 (08:00):
Yeah.
So from 2012 until about 2018,the farm was far, very
conventionally so tractors,herbicide, pesticide, chemical
fertilizers.
Really, the goal was just tostart farming the land.
But then in 2018, jirobiPittman, our CEO, and Alan
Skinner from Soil Life Organicsthey got together and started to
(08:24):
talk about how can we make thisfarm organic, how can we make
it more environmentally friendlyfor the neighborhood.
So Alan, with his expertise,wrote an NRCS grant.
We were rewarded this grant.
So this grant is a conservationand innovation grant and it
focused on transforming the soilfrom this very conventional
(08:50):
bare soil, I was saying.
It didn't have much microbiallife.
So Alan was specialized inthermophilic composting.
He is trained under the SoilFood Web from Dr Elaine Ingram,
who is one of the leadingexperts on microbial farming
kind of techniques.
She is all about increasing themicrobial life in farming and
(09:13):
agriculture and rehabilitatingsoils through natural processes.
We do thermophilic composting,which is essentially hay and
straw and wood chips and leaves,some clippings from cover crop
that we grow on the farm, somehorse manure that's brought in
from a local horse farm, and wemix all those ingredients
(09:35):
together in this perfect ratioand it heats up really quickly.
What's really great aboutthermophilic composting is,
those temperatures kill offpathogens, but they also
increase the rate at which thematerials break down.
So we were able to make a lotof compost really quickly and
apply it to the field.
So for three years we were on aresearch project where we did a
(09:58):
lesson compare beds.
So we would have, for example,like six sets of kale planted
with just organic fertilizer andtraditional compost, and then
we would have six sets thatdidn't use much fertilizer but
used a lot of thermophiliccompost.
And then we would compare andwe found really three main
things.
One, the plants were muchhealthier and stronger and had
(10:21):
less disease much healthier andstronger and had less disease.
Two, they would produce at amuch faster rate, sometimes one
or two weeks sooner than thecrops that were in the
traditional beds.
And the third thing that welearned is that the beds would
stay more hydrated.
They would have a lot moreactivity, a lot more worms, a
lot more bugs and less weedpressure.
(10:42):
So this is something that wedid for about three years and we
were able to reduce ourfertilizer use by 30% in those
three years and we were able toincrease our production on the
farm for these techniques, andso it's something that we've
since adopted.
One of the practices that weadopted out of that study was
(11:04):
also no-till farming.
No-till is very important, notonly for the biodiversity and
the soil biology, but it wasalso very important because it
reduced our chances of bringingup any former contaminated soils
.
Speaker 1 (11:19):
Do you have any data on the nutrients of the food
that is grown?
Is that different when you useconventional methods or regular
fertilizer versus what you'redoing right now?
Speaker 2 (11:29):
We've submitted produce samples from our site,
as well as soil samples, to theBionutrient Food Association.
So what we learned by sending insamples was that our farming
practices actually produce morenutrient-dense foods and,
compared to farms that werefarming conventionally, you can
buy an entire clamshell ofspinach from the grocery store
(11:51):
and consume that when it has thesame amount of nutrients that
two or three pieces from aregenerative, sustainable farm.
Or even farms that were organicbut still using herbicide
pesticide, farms that wereorganic but still using
herbicide pesticide, traditionalfertilizers and compost.
So we submitted kale samples wasone of the main crops we were
submitting at the time, and ourkale tested in the 98th
(12:20):
percentile for antioxidants andpolyphenols, compared to 3,500
samples submitted worldwide.
And so that's really justtestimony to how important soil
biology and biodiversity is infarming, and I think that is
really going to be the future ofnutrient density studies and
increasing nutrient density inour foods is going to be this
correlation between our farmingtechniques and the nutrient
(12:44):
density.
And I will say for me, you know, working in a nonprofit farm in
a food insecure community, itis really important that every
bite of food that this communityeats comes from a farm that is
growing in a way that is notonly sustainable for their land
that they live near, but alsothat is giving them the most
(13:06):
nutrients that they can possiblyreceive.
That's really important.
I think often that people whoare food insecure are getting
the worst food honestly expiredfood, food that's about to go
bad and really if you are themost in need in our community,
you should be receiving the foodthat is most nutrient dense.
Speaker 1 (13:28):
I did not realize that.
There are many places where youcan buy you know I'm using air
quotes here organic, organicfood.
But the fact that it's sonutrient dense and you guys are
so far ahead of everybody elsein the country, that that's
really quite impressive.
We're lucky to have access tothat resource in Jacksonville,
absolutely.
So you mentioned a little bitabout no-till farming.
Why do we usually till ingeneral?
(13:49):
Why is that the standardpractice?
Speaker 2 (13:50):
Yeah, so tilling is really born out of big
agriculture.
If you have 300 acres that youneed to plant, the easiest
method is going to be mechanicalintervention.
And when weed pressure is veryhigh, you know a fallow field is
full of weeds.
Weed pressure is very high, youknow a fallow field is full of
weeds.
Tilling it under, bringing upnew soil, just makes it really
(14:13):
ready to plant.
Also, tilling often breaks upcompaction.
In many parts of the world yousee heavy compaction layers
through either clay or some sortof sediment, and so tilling
helps bring it up, makes thesoil pretty aerated and brings
out any of those weeds, turnsthem under and kills them.
(14:34):
So the field can be immediatelyplanted.
The problem with tillage is itcauses many issues.
For example, if you think of theDust Bowl, that was primarily
caused through heavy tillage.
So it causes not only topsoilerosion, it causes water runoff
and the more loose soil is whenit doesn't have structure like
(14:56):
roots holding it together, themore likely you're going to see
that wash away.
So I would say, if anything,minimize tilling.
That's the way to go, andthere's really a lot of
innovative ways to do that.
So you can tarp your soil for aperiod of time just to kill off
the weeds.
You can lay down wood shiftsand mulch pretty heavy.
(15:20):
There's so many differentmethods.
We actually here on the farm,practice high intensity planting
, which means that our crops areprobably two or three inches
closer than typical, becausetherefore there's not as much
surface space available forweeds to grow and for the sun to
degrade the soil, so it staysnicely shady and moist and also
(15:41):
blocks the sun from lettinganything grow up in that soil.
And not only does that increasethe microbial life because they
prefer a moist, dark conditionthen it also reduces that weed
pressure and it's going to beyour number one competitor for
nutrients in the soil.
Speaker 1 (15:59):
So I understand from what you've described the
benefits of regenerativeagriculture with respect to
nutrient density and how you'recreating this environment for
the microbes that are going tobe more beneficial for the plant
as far as being able to haveregenerative agriculture at a
large scale.
The two questions that I stillhave in my mind from what you
just described was how do youaddress compaction?
(16:21):
I understood one of the reasonsfor tilling was compaction, and
how do you address that withregenerative agriculture?
And then the other questionwould be the reason that the
tilling is used is because it'seasy and it's efficient.
So how do you scale up thepractices that you're talking
about?
Speaker 2 (16:36):
So how do you deal with impaction in agriculture?
I think when you're immediatelybreaking ground, it is
absolutely okay to use some kindof mechanical intervention like
tilling, but the goal is to getrid of the habitual tilling.
So the way to do that issomething that I've learned, you
know, working here at the farmis through cover cropping.
(16:57):
So cover crops are a mixture ofdifferent crops and species
that sort of live on land.
When you're not growing avegetable for profit, you can
also grow cover crops as feedfor animals.
And so what cover crops do?
Which is really interesting, isthat there's many varieties.
So, for example, one that weuse for compaction here at the
(17:20):
farm is called the tillageradish.
It's also a daikon radish, sothat very long, deep-rooted
radish.
So when you plant those out inthe field they will push
themselves in and sort of loosenup that soil and aerate it, and
then when they decomposethey're leaving these really
nice long divots.
And I will say also, compactionis often solved by having a
(17:42):
healthy microbial population.
So microbes, these littleorganisms, and even worms
population.
So microbes, these littleorganisms and even worms, when
you can go all the way up frommicroorganisms to worms and
nails and lizards that we havehere in North Florida.
When they burrowing in theground and the worms are there,
they're creating channels in theearth.
So again, when you're tilling it, you're tilling everything and
(18:05):
leaving it, you know, as a blanksoil.
It's the same thing thathappens on the beaches or the
sand.
When you walk on the beach it'svery compacted.
You're not going to be able todig down unless you have a tool
in certain parts of the beach.
Same thing is true.
So when you're tilling andtilling and tilling, that soil
actually over time will becomemore compacted.
The more you can keep your soilalive and you can keep it full
(18:30):
of vegetation, the moreopportunity that you're going to
have below the soil Becauseagain, those microbes are going
to be there creating thosechannels.
Those roots are going to bethere decomposing and when
they're decomposing they'recreating air holes.
And I would also say one of theimportant things too is
including a lot of organicmatter in your soil.
(18:50):
The more organic matter, theless compaction you're going to
have over time.
So wood chips and leaf molds,anything that sort of you know,
has a little bit of decomposingmatter.
It goes a long way.
You want to prevent having justdirt you, you know, with
nothing else in it that compactsvery easily.
(19:11):
Any kind of cover crop isreally going to do.
Work on your soil and keep itloose and then mow it down.
Don't pull it up.
Leave those roots on the groundand those will help create air
pockets and loosen theircompaction.
Speaker 1 (19:25):
Sarah, are you familiar with Project Drawdown?
I am not.
I actually love to take a lookat their website anytime I'm
looking at different climatesolutions when I want to learn
about what the actual impactmight be.
So they have a list of severaldifferent things that we can do
as a society or as an economy toimpact carbon emissions, either
to help to draw down or toprevent future emissions.
(19:46):
So if you look on their website, under regenerative annual
cropping, it actually statesthat, if we move to the types of
practices that you're talkingabout, there's a potential to
reduce or sequester 23 gigatonsof carbon emissions between now
and 2050, which is prettysubstantial.
You know, agriculture makes upa really big part of our carbon
(20:07):
emissions.
One of the things that I thinkabout, though, when I hear the
practices that you're talkingabout.
I understand it for a smallerfarm and some of the things I'm
going to implement in my owngarden, in my backyard, but how
do you scale that up on a largerfarm?
Speaker 2 (20:22):
That's a challenging question, and that is one that I
sit with often, because I dobelieve it has to change on the
large scale, because themajority of farms are hundreds
of thousands of acres big.
I would say a very simplemethod that can be incorporated
immediately on any farm is covercropping, so growing these
(20:42):
cover crops for two or threeseasons on land that may be got
a lot of nutrients taken out ofit from intense farming.
Grow cover crop for a coupleseasons, and you will see a
tremendous amount ofrehabilitation to the soil.
And then I think also, we haveto make regenerative agriculture
(21:04):
and sustainable agriculturejust as affordable as
conventional farming.
I will say you know, we've beenfarming this way since about
2018, and I am just now seeingthe payoff from that, meaning
that I can stop investing somuch money on this transition,
and now I can start reaping therewards.
And I think often farmers do nothave the luxury of waiting, you
(21:28):
know, five to 10 years for thechange to happen in order for
them to recoup their money thatthey invested.
So, again, this goes back to howcan we incentivize farmers?
I would also argue, though,that large-scale farming is a
problem of itself.
Regenerative agriculture is away that we did things before
modern times that have led us toa lot of our climate crisis and
(21:49):
a lot of our problems.
So I would say a return tolocal food, eating locally,
shopping local, supporting thedevelopment and the growth of
small farms, being willing tosay, hey, why don't we put some
money here and see what happens?
Or, hey, why don't we grow moresmall farms and see if we can
do this model maybe just inJacksonville, and I think it's
(22:12):
possible in Jacksonville let'ssee if we can become a
sustainable local food economyand then we can scale out.
There's got to be investmentsand buy-in from the larger
community and from our communityleaders, and so I think that
the work we do here is veryimportant, and to me, I always
say that my work is important,but sharing my work is the most
important part of what I do,because that's what's going to
(22:34):
influence the change.
Speaker 1 (22:36):
So it's perfect segue there, sarah.
So sharing your work, if wecould leave off with how people
can get involved with the workthat you're doing or how can
they engage more with the farm,what parting thoughts do you
have for our listeners?
Speaker 2 (22:47):
Yeah, so I would love anyone in North Florida to come
visit our farm.
Like I said, we havevolunteering three days a week
Wednesday, Friday and Saturday.
We teach classes and all ofthese you can find on
eventbritecom hours to ourupcoming workshops.
(23:13):
The first Saturday of everymonth is intro to organic
gardening.
The third Saturday of the monthis always compost 101.
And then the last Saturday ofthe month is always a youth day,
where we teach the youtheverything you need to learn
about agriculture.
It's like a crash course forthem.
And then we have special events.
We have a fall celebrationcoming up this November which is
going to highlight the one-yearanniversary of our Farmers
(23:36):
Market opening, as well as ourfounders' birthday and Veterans
Day.
So it's one of the majorpopulations we serve at the
Clara White Mission of Veterans.
So that opportunity is going tobe available to the community
to come and take classes andworkshops and enjoy the farm to
pork dinner.
So there's a lot of ways to getinvolved and I always tell
people whether it's just comingand volunteering to give back,
(24:00):
or spending your time getting toknow your neighbors here on the
north side or shopping at ourfarmer's market, anything you
can do, make the difference andmake sure that this farm can be
here for years to come.
With that, I will also say ourmarket is open every Saturday.
We double snap benefits throughpartnership with Feeding
(24:20):
Northeast Florida's Fresh AccessFlux Program and so that food
is here.
We have about 10 to 20 othervendors who also provide
agricultural goods.
We have herbalists, we have aguy who makes pickled veggies,
we have a juice lady, we havehot food, arts and crafts a lot
(24:40):
of cool things happening, but Iwill say my final thing I always
say is that you should thinkglobal and care deeply about
what's happening to all ofmankind, but you should really
start to activate locally inyour own community and what you
can do here in your ownneighborhood and I think that
Earth is Farmer Market is anawesome opportunity for the
(25:02):
Jacksonville community to giveback and to continue this
movement for years to come.
Speaker 1 (25:06):
I absolutely agree with that.
Thank you so much, sarah, foryour time, and I definitely will
see you this Saturday at themarket.
Thank you so much, sarah, foryour time, and I definitely will
see you this Saturday at themarket.
Thank you so much.
Thank you for tuning into thisepisode.
The Sustainable North Floridapodcast is brought to you by the
Jacksonville Climate Coalition,whose mission is to work
collectively to propel equitableand proactive solutions that
address the cause and effects ofclimate change through advocacy
(25:29):
, education and communityinvolvement.
To learn more, follow us onsocial media or check out our
website at wwwjaxclimateorg.
Thank you.
Welcome to Sustainable North Florida.
I'm your host, LorianneSantamaria.
Speaker 2 (00:05):
We submitted produce samples from our site to the
Bionutrient Food Association.
So what we learned was that ourfarming practices actually
produce more nutrient-densefoods, and compare it to farms
that were farming conventionally.
Speaker 1 (00:21):
Hi, welcome to Sustainable North Florida.
I'm Lorianne Santamaria, chairof the Jacksonville Climate
Coalition and host of thepodcast.
Today we're talking about avery special place in
Jacksonville.
Eartha's Farm and Market, whichis part of the Clara White
Mission, is a community leaderin sustainable agriculture.
At the core of their work is adedication to providing
education and access toresources for farmers and
(00:42):
agricultural entrepreneurs.
Education and access toresources for farmers and
agricultural entrepreneurs yes,it's about farming.
Yes, they focus on sustainablepractices, but as you speak with
anyone involved at Earthas,you'll quickly learn that the
common passion that drives themis the desire to restore
meaningful, dignified lives tothose in need within their
community, and sustainableagriculture is just one way in
which they are doing this.
My guest today is SarahSalvatore, who is the farm
(01:04):
director at Earthas.
Sarah, welcome, thank you.
So I'd like to start with yourbackground.
Can you tell us your story andwhat brought you to Earthas?
Speaker 2 (01:14):
Yeah, so I am not originally from northeast
Florida, I'm actually from asmall town in Ohio.
I grew up in rural America, inthe country.
I actually lived on a farm, butwe were not the farm owners.
We rented the farmhouse but Iwas surrounded by acres and
acres of corn, soybean and wheat.
(01:36):
My dad was a fisherman, he wasa deer hunter, he had a garden.
I sort of just grew up aroundagriculture and the world and I
grew up cultivating land and Igrew up living this way and not
knowing that it was kind ofunique.
So when I went away to college Imoved to the big city and I
(01:56):
started studying sustainability,urban agriculture and English.
I actually have a full degreein English and sociology and so
when I was studying sociology Irealized that cities really did
not have as much access to foodand agriculture as I imagined
that they did.
So from there I kind of took mylove of growing food, my rural
(02:21):
upbringing and my desire to havecommunity and to bring food to
the cities together.
I started working in communitygardens.
I worked in a group home there,I worked with youth and
installed a community gardenthere as well for the youth, and
I just realized that the more Idid this, the more I felt
really connected with people.
I felt like it was a greatopportunity to not only bring
(02:46):
food into the cities but bringthat connection that I was
really missing in rural America.
So from there, you know, I kindof delved in urban agriculture
for maybe like five to sevenyears and then I wanted to move
to the South.
So I moved to Jacksonville andwhen I was moving here I was
looking for a job and I said Iwould love to stay in this world
(03:06):
of agriculture and I foundEarth is Farm and Market and
since then I've been here.
I'm going on five year in Julyand I have just spent my time
here really, you know, learningso much about Jacksonville and
being able to do my work herefor this community.
Speaker 1 (03:24):
That's.
That's really great.
It really sounds like from thebeginning, from the very early
stages of your life andeverything up until then, you've
been walking this path to whereyou are right now.
Speaker 2 (03:33):
Yeah, absolutely.
I really think this is a dreamjob for me.
I couldn't imagine like abetter career for myself.
Speaker 1 (03:41):
So Earth is Farmer is a program of the Clara White
Mission, which was founded by DrEartha White.
She was really a remarkablewoman.
Can you tell us about her?
Speaker 2 (03:49):
Eartha M M White.
She was the daughter of ClaraWhite.
So Clara White was actually aslave and she, when slaves were
free, she actually fed men andwomen returning from war.
She fed unhoused women withchildren from war.
(04:09):
She fed unhoused women withchildren.
She used to have an old folkshome, a soup pigeon model, and
she adopted Eartha White.
So Eartha White was Clara's13th child and Eartha learned
everything from her mother andwas so inspired by the work that
she did that she incorporatedthe Clara White mission in her
mother's honor and she spent therest of her life really
following in those footsteps.
Eartha White started an oldfolks home here on the north
(04:31):
side that's still standing today.
She opened a spring fedswimming pool for the Black
community on Moncrief Road.
Moncrief Creek, which dividesthe farm, used to actually be
Moncrief Springs and people werebaptized in that pool and so
it's a really cool story.
(04:52):
But Irva, the land that we farmon, she actually purchased this
from AL Lewis.
Al Lewis was the firstAfrican-American millionaire in
the state of Florida.
During the big great firedowntown in Jacksonville, ertha
actually went in to his business, which was the African American
Business Association.
She went in and saved all ofhis business records during this
(05:13):
fire and as a thank you he gaveher about 10 acres on the north
side for pretty cheap, and thisis the land that we farm today.
So it's full of rich legacy.
But I like to think that Erthawas a woman who did anything and
everything for people.
What an incredible legacy.
Speaker 1 (05:30):
So your role is as the farm director right.
So you're focused onsustainable practices in the
farming that you do today.
You're helping people getthrough and overcome some of the
issues that they might havetoday, but you actually kind of
go back in time and write someof the wrongs that have been
done in the past.
Can you tell us a little bitabout the history of the farm?
Speaker 2 (05:50):
Okay, so Bertha's Farm Market.
We are located on a former ashdump site which was called the
Brownsfield Dump.
Excederator ash was dumped onthis land that we farm from the
late 1940s to the mid 1950s andit sat there all the way until
the early 2000s, so about 50years this land was sitting with
(06:15):
incinerator ash.
So if you can imagine, in thelate 40s until about the mid 60s
, all of a sudden this bustling,really successful Black
community on the north side justkind of got a lot dumped on it,
literally dumped throughincinerator ash.
The spring was closed down aspart of a water improvement plan
(06:36):
, so a lot of businesses left, alot of people left.
They didn't want to be hereanymore, and this is a story
that happens all over the globe.
Minority communities areaffected the most by
environmental issues, and so wekind of deal with this very
heads on.
And so the EPA came to the cityof Jacksonville in about 2006
(06:58):
with a request to clean up thedump site and then from 2010
until about 2012, the propertysort of set bank it and then our
CEO wanted to create a farmhere.
Jacoby Pittman reached out tothe Florida Department of
Environmental Protection Agencyand they were able to basically
clear us to start the farm.
(07:21):
We get our soil testedbiannually with the EPA to make
sure that we are safe to farm.
I'm proud to say that the farmwe are below residential
standards, which means that myfarm here is probably a little
safer than your backyard.
So we do a lot in terms of ourfarming practices to ensure that
(07:43):
we do not bring up anycontamination.
Speaker 1 (07:46):
That's really remarkable to see such a
transformation like that.
So when all this remediationhappened, I believe you guys
were focusing on conventionalagriculture and then at some
point in time you switchedtowards regenerative agriculture
.
Can you tell us about that?
Speaker 2 (08:00):
Yeah.
So from 2012 until about 2018,the farm was far, very
conventionally so tractors,herbicide, pesticide, chemical
fertilizers.
Really, the goal was just tostart farming the land.
But then in 2018, jirobiPittman, our CEO, and Alan
Skinner from Soil Life Organicsthey got together and started to
(08:24):
talk about how can we make thisfarm organic, how can we make
it more environmentally friendlyfor the neighborhood.
So Alan, with his expertise,wrote an NRCS grant.
We were rewarded this grant.
So this grant is a conservationand innovation grant and it
focused on transforming the soilfrom this very conventional
(08:50):
bare soil, I was saying.
It didn't have much microbiallife.
So Alan was specialized inthermophilic composting.
He is trained under the SoilFood Web from Dr Elaine Ingram,
who is one of the leadingexperts on microbial farming
kind of techniques.
She is all about increasing themicrobial life in farming and
(09:13):
agriculture and rehabilitatingsoils through natural processes.
We do thermophilic composting,which is essentially hay and
straw and wood chips and leaves,some clippings from cover crop
that we grow on the farm, somehorse manure that's brought in
from a local horse farm, and wemix all those ingredients
(09:35):
together in this perfect ratioand it heats up really quickly.
What's really great aboutthermophilic composting is,
those temperatures kill offpathogens, but they also
increase the rate at which thematerials break down.
So we were able to make a lotof compost really quickly and
apply it to the field.
So for three years we were on aresearch project where we did a
(09:58):
lesson compare beds.
So we would have, for example,like six sets of kale planted
with just organic fertilizer andtraditional compost, and then
we would have six sets thatdidn't use much fertilizer but
used a lot of thermophiliccompost.
And then we would compare andwe found really three main
things.
One, the plants were muchhealthier and stronger and had
(10:21):
less disease much healthier andstronger and had less disease.
Two, they would produce at amuch faster rate, sometimes one
or two weeks sooner than thecrops that were in the
traditional beds.
And the third thing that welearned is that the beds would
stay more hydrated.
They would have a lot moreactivity, a lot more worms, a
lot more bugs and less weedpressure.
(10:42):
So this is something that wedid for about three years and we
were able to reduce ourfertilizer use by 30% in those
three years and we were able toincrease our production on the
farm for these techniques, andso it's something that we've
since adopted.
One of the practices that weadopted out of that study was
(11:04):
also no-till farming.
No-till is very important, notonly for the biodiversity and
the soil biology, but it wasalso very important because it
reduced our chances of bringingup any former contaminated soils
.
Speaker 1 (11:19):
Do you have any data on the nutrients of the food
that is grown?
Is that different when you useconventional methods or regular
fertilizer versus what you'redoing right now?
Speaker 2 (11:29):
We've submitted produce samples from our site,
as well as soil samples, to theBionutrient Food Association.
So what we learned by sending insamples was that our farming
practices actually produce morenutrient-dense foods and,
compared to farms that werefarming conventionally, you can
buy an entire clamshell ofspinach from the grocery store
(11:51):
and consume that when it has thesame amount of nutrients that
two or three pieces from aregenerative, sustainable farm.
Or even farms that were organicbut still using herbicide
pesticide, farms that wereorganic but still using
herbicide pesticide, traditionalfertilizers and compost.
So we submitted kale samples wasone of the main crops we were
submitting at the time, and ourkale tested in the 98th
(12:20):
percentile for antioxidants andpolyphenols, compared to 3,500
samples submitted worldwide.
And so that's really justtestimony to how important soil
biology and biodiversity is infarming, and I think that is
really going to be the future ofnutrient density studies and
increasing nutrient density inour foods is going to be this
correlation between our farmingtechniques and the nutrient
(12:44):
density.
And I will say for me, you know, working in a nonprofit farm in
a food insecure community, itis really important that every
bite of food that this communityeats comes from a farm that is
growing in a way that is notonly sustainable for their land
that they live near, but alsothat is giving them the most
(13:06):
nutrients that they can possiblyreceive.
That's really important.
I think often that people whoare food insecure are getting
the worst food honestly expiredfood, food that's about to go
bad and really if you are themost in need in our community,
you should be receiving the foodthat is most nutrient dense.
Speaker 1 (13:28):
I did not realize that.
There are many places where youcan buy you know I'm using air
quotes here organic, organicfood.
But the fact that it's sonutrient dense and you guys are
so far ahead of everybody elsein the country, that that's
really quite impressive.
We're lucky to have access tothat resource in Jacksonville,
absolutely.
So you mentioned a little bitabout no-till farming.
Why do we usually till ingeneral?
(13:49):
Why is that the standardpractice?
Speaker 2 (13:50):
Yeah, so tilling is really born out of big
agriculture.
If you have 300 acres that youneed to plant, the easiest
method is going to be mechanicalintervention.
And when weed pressure is veryhigh, you know a fallow field is
full of weeds.
Weed pressure is very high, youknow a fallow field is full of
weeds.
Tilling it under, bringing upnew soil, just makes it really
(14:13):
ready to plant.
Also, tilling often breaks upcompaction.
In many parts of the world yousee heavy compaction layers
through either clay or some sortof sediment, and so tilling
helps bring it up, makes thesoil pretty aerated and brings
out any of those weeds, turnsthem under and kills them.
(14:34):
So the field can be immediatelyplanted.
The problem with tillage is itcauses many issues.
For example, if you think of theDust Bowl, that was primarily
caused through heavy tillage.
So it causes not only topsoilerosion, it causes water runoff
and the more loose soil is whenit doesn't have structure like
(14:56):
roots holding it together, themore likely you're going to see
that wash away.
So I would say, if anything,minimize tilling.
That's the way to go, andthere's really a lot of
innovative ways to do that.
So you can tarp your soil for aperiod of time just to kill off
the weeds.
You can lay down wood shiftsand mulch pretty heavy.
(15:20):
There's so many differentmethods.
We actually here on the farm,practice high intensity planting
, which means that our crops areprobably two or three inches
closer than typical, becausetherefore there's not as much
surface space available forweeds to grow and for the sun to
degrade the soil, so it staysnicely shady and moist and also
(15:41):
blocks the sun from lettinganything grow up in that soil.
And not only does that increasethe microbial life because they
prefer a moist, dark conditionthen it also reduces that weed
pressure and it's going to beyour number one competitor for
nutrients in the soil.
Speaker 1 (15:59):
So I understand from what you've described the
benefits of regenerativeagriculture with respect to
nutrient density and how you'recreating this environment for
the microbes that are going tobe more beneficial for the plant
as far as being able to haveregenerative agriculture at a
large scale.
The two questions that I stillhave in my mind from what you
just described was how do youaddress compaction?
(16:21):
I understood one of the reasonsfor tilling was compaction, and
how do you address that withregenerative agriculture?
And then the other questionwould be the reason that the
tilling is used is because it'seasy and it's efficient.
So how do you scale up thepractices that you're talking
about?
Speaker 2 (16:36):
So how do you deal with impaction in agriculture?
I think when you're immediatelybreaking ground, it is
absolutely okay to use some kindof mechanical intervention like
tilling, but the goal is to getrid of the habitual tilling.
So the way to do that issomething that I've learned, you
know, working here at the farmis through cover cropping.
(16:57):
So cover crops are a mixture ofdifferent crops and species
that sort of live on land.
When you're not growing avegetable for profit, you can
also grow cover crops as feedfor animals.
And so what cover crops do?
Which is really interesting, isthat there's many varieties.
So, for example, one that weuse for compaction here at the
(17:20):
farm is called the tillageradish.
It's also a daikon radish, sothat very long, deep-rooted
radish.
So when you plant those out inthe field they will push
themselves in and sort of loosenup that soil and aerate it, and
then when they decomposethey're leaving these really
nice long divots.
And I will say also, compactionis often solved by having a
(17:42):
healthy microbial population.
So microbes, these littleorganisms, and even worms
population.
So microbes, these littleorganisms and even worms, when
you can go all the way up frommicroorganisms to worms and
nails and lizards that we havehere in North Florida.
When they burrowing in theground and the worms are there,
they're creating channels in theearth.
So again, when you're tilling it, you're tilling everything and
(18:05):
leaving it, you know, as a blanksoil.
It's the same thing thathappens on the beaches or the
sand.
When you walk on the beach it'svery compacted.
You're not going to be able todig down unless you have a tool
in certain parts of the beach.
Same thing is true.
So when you're tilling andtilling and tilling, that soil
actually over time will becomemore compacted.
The more you can keep your soilalive and you can keep it full
(18:30):
of vegetation, the moreopportunity that you're going to
have below the soil Becauseagain, those microbes are going
to be there creating thosechannels.
Those roots are going to bethere decomposing and when
they're decomposing they'recreating air holes.
And I would also say one of theimportant things too is
including a lot of organicmatter in your soil.
(18:50):
The more organic matter, theless compaction you're going to
have over time.
So wood chips and leaf molds,anything that sort of you know,
has a little bit of decomposingmatter.
It goes a long way.
You want to prevent having justdirt you, you know, with
nothing else in it that compactsvery easily.
(19:11):
Any kind of cover crop isreally going to do.
Work on your soil and keep itloose and then mow it down.
Don't pull it up.
Leave those roots on the groundand those will help create air
pockets and loosen theircompaction.
Speaker 1 (19:25):
Sarah, are you familiar with Project Drawdown?
I am not.
I actually love to take a lookat their website anytime I'm
looking at different climatesolutions when I want to learn
about what the actual impactmight be.
So they have a list of severaldifferent things that we can do
as a society or as an economy toimpact carbon emissions, either
to help to draw down or toprevent future emissions.
(19:46):
So if you look on their website, under regenerative annual
cropping, it actually statesthat, if we move to the types of
practices that you're talkingabout, there's a potential to
reduce or sequester 23 gigatonsof carbon emissions between now
and 2050, which is prettysubstantial.
You know, agriculture makes upa really big part of our carbon
(20:07):
emissions.
One of the things that I thinkabout, though, when I hear the
practices that you're talkingabout.
I understand it for a smallerfarm and some of the things I'm
going to implement in my owngarden, in my backyard, but how
do you scale that up on a largerfarm?
Speaker 2 (20:22):
That's a challenging question, and that is one that I
sit with often, because I dobelieve it has to change on the
large scale, because themajority of farms are hundreds
of thousands of acres big.
I would say a very simplemethod that can be incorporated
immediately on any farm is covercropping, so growing these
(20:42):
cover crops for two or threeseasons on land that may be got
a lot of nutrients taken out ofit from intense farming.
Grow cover crop for a coupleseasons, and you will see a
tremendous amount ofrehabilitation to the soil.
And then I think also, we haveto make regenerative agriculture
(21:04):
and sustainable agriculturejust as affordable as
conventional farming.
I will say you know, we've beenfarming this way since about
2018, and I am just now seeingthe payoff from that, meaning
that I can stop investing somuch money on this transition,
and now I can start reaping therewards.
And I think often farmers do nothave the luxury of waiting, you
(21:28):
know, five to 10 years for thechange to happen in order for
them to recoup their money thatthey invested.
So, again, this goes back to howcan we incentivize farmers?
I would also argue, though,that large-scale farming is a
problem of itself.
Regenerative agriculture is away that we did things before
modern times that have led us toa lot of our climate crisis and
(21:49):
a lot of our problems.
So I would say a return tolocal food, eating locally,
shopping local, supporting thedevelopment and the growth of
small farms, being willing tosay, hey, why don't we put some
money here and see what happens?
Or, hey, why don't we grow moresmall farms and see if we can
do this model maybe just inJacksonville, and I think it's
(22:12):
possible in Jacksonville let'ssee if we can become a
sustainable local food economyand then we can scale out.
There's got to be investmentsand buy-in from the larger
community and from our communityleaders, and so I think that
the work we do here is veryimportant, and to me, I always
say that my work is important,but sharing my work is the most
important part of what I do,because that's what's going to
(22:34):
influence the change.
Speaker 1 (22:36):
So it's perfect segue there, sarah.
So sharing your work, if wecould leave off with how people
can get involved with the workthat you're doing or how can
they engage more with the farm,what parting thoughts do you
have for our listeners?
Speaker 2 (22:47):
Yeah, so I would love anyone in North Florida to come
visit our farm.
Like I said, we havevolunteering three days a week
Wednesday, Friday and Saturday.
We teach classes and all ofthese you can find on
eventbritecom hours to ourupcoming workshops.
(23:13):
The first Saturday of everymonth is intro to organic
gardening.
The third Saturday of the monthis always compost 101.
And then the last Saturday ofthe month is always a youth day,
where we teach the youtheverything you need to learn
about agriculture.
It's like a crash course forthem.
And then we have special events.
We have a fall celebrationcoming up this November which is
going to highlight the one-yearanniversary of our Farmers
(23:36):
Market opening, as well as ourfounders' birthday and Veterans
Day.
So it's one of the majorpopulations we serve at the
Clara White Mission of Veterans.
So that opportunity is going tobe available to the community
to come and take classes andworkshops and enjoy the farm to
pork dinner.
So there's a lot of ways to getinvolved and I always tell
people whether it's just comingand volunteering to give back,
(24:00):
or spending your time getting toknow your neighbors here on the
north side or shopping at ourfarmer's market, anything you
can do, make the difference andmake sure that this farm can be
here for years to come.
With that, I will also say ourmarket is open every Saturday.
We double snap benefits throughpartnership with Feeding
(24:20):
Northeast Florida's Fresh AccessFlux Program and so that food
is here.
We have about 10 to 20 othervendors who also provide
agricultural goods.
We have herbalists, we have aguy who makes pickled veggies,
we have a juice lady, we havehot food, arts and crafts a lot
(24:40):
of cool things happening, but Iwill say my final thing I always
say is that you should thinkglobal and care deeply about
what's happening to all ofmankind, but you should really
start to activate locally inyour own community and what you
can do here in your ownneighborhood and I think that
Earth is Farmer Market is anawesome opportunity for the
(25:02):
Jacksonville community to giveback and to continue this
movement for years to come.
Speaker 1 (25:06):
I absolutely agree with that.
Thank you so much, sarah, foryour time, and I definitely will
see you this Saturday at themarket.
Thank you so much, sarah, foryour time, and I definitely will
see you this Saturday at themarket.
Thank you so much.
Thank you for tuning into thisepisode.
The Sustainable North Floridapodcast is brought to you by the
Jacksonville Climate Coalition,whose mission is to work
collectively to propel equitableand proactive solutions that
address the cause and effects ofclimate change through advocacy
(25:29):
, education and communityinvolvement.
To learn more, follow us onsocial media or check out our
website at wwwjaxclimateorg.
Thank you.
Popular Podcasts
Las Culturistas with Matt Rogers and Bowen Yang
Ding dong! Join your culture consultants, Matt Rogers and Bowen Yang, on an unforgettable journey into the beating heart of CULTURE. Alongside sizzling special guests, they GET INTO the hottest pop-culture moments of the day and the formative cultural experiences that turned them into Culturistas. Produced by the Big Money Players Network and iHeartRadio.
On Purpose with Jay Shetty
I’m Jay Shetty host of On Purpose the worlds #1 Mental Health podcast and I’m so grateful you found us. I started this podcast 5 years ago to invite you into conversations and workshops that are designed to help make you happier, healthier and more healed. I believe that when you (yes you) feel seen, heard and understood you’re able to deal with relationship struggles, work challenges and life’s ups and downs with more ease and grace. I interview experts, celebrities, thought leaders and athletes so that we can grow our mindset, build better habits and uncover a side of them we’ve never seen before. New episodes every Monday and Friday. Your support means the world to me and I don’t take it for granted — click the follow button and leave a review to help us spread the love with On Purpose. I can’t wait for you to listen to your first or 500th episode!
Crime Junkie
Does hearing about a true crime case always leave you scouring the internet for the truth behind the story? Dive into your next mystery with Crime Junkie. Every Monday, join your host Ashley Flowers as she unravels all the details of infamous and underreported true crime cases with her best friend Brit Prawat. From cold cases to missing persons and heroes in our community who seek justice, Crime Junkie is your destination for theories and stories you won’t hear anywhere else. Whether you're a seasoned true crime enthusiast or new to the genre, you'll find yourself on the edge of your seat awaiting a new episode every Monday. If you can never get enough true crime... Congratulations, you’ve found your people. Follow to join a community of Crime Junkies! Crime Junkie is presented by audiochuck Media Company.