http://peoplesgrocery.org/brahm Brahm Ahmadi's Personal Blog Sun, 12 Apr 2009 01:05:32 +0000 http://backend.userland.com/rss092 en We just got an enlightening message on People’s Grocery’s facebook page from an extraordinary woman named Joan Tarika Lewis who, in addition to being a jazz violinist, visual artist, historian, lecturer and teacher, identifies herself as the “first female recruit of the Black Panther Party for Self Defense”. With a rich knowledge of ... http://peoplesgrocery.org/brahm/peoples-grocery/the-importance-of-food-in-social-struggle In the summer of 2008, after 6 years of building People's Grocery and developing small-scale enterprises and urban agriculture projects in West Oakland, I came to the realization that these projects were ultimately too small to make a significant impact on the magnitude of food and nutrition needs ... http://peoplesgrocery.org/brahm/peoples-grocery/the-imperative-of-scaling-up The OneCalifornia Foundation, a local nonprofit organization here in Oakland, runs an online marketplace called Oakland Unwrapped! with the goal of making it very easy for community members to support our local economy by shopping at Oakland-owned independent businesses and artists. Oakland Unwrapped recently expanded its marketplace to include Oakland ... http://peoplesgrocery.org/brahm/peoples-grocery/peoples-grocery-on-oakland-unwrapped One of our Grub Box customers told us about a very interesting story about how a friend of his had argued that Whole Foods Market has more affordable produce than People's Grocery’s Grub Box. Our customer’s friend wanted to challenge the premise that People's Grocery’s $12 Grub Box ... http://peoplesgrocery.org/brahm/peoples-grocery/the-grub-box-whole-foods-comparison Yesterday the new Agriculture Secretary, Tom Vilsack, announced an initiative to create a community garden at each USDA facility worldwide. Vilsack is calling these gardens "The People's Gardens" in honor of Abraham Lincoln who had referred to the USDA as "The People's Department". Vilsack stated that these gardens will promote "green ... http://peoplesgrocery.org/brahm/peoples-grocery/usda-unveils-the-peoples-garden Many of us who working at the community level in Oakland to push for entrepreneurial solutions to the many economic, social and health needs of our communities have known for a long time that Oakland presents strong retail market opportunities that can support local economic development and job creation. But ... http://peoplesgrocery.org/brahm/peoples-grocery/oaklands-markets-are-a-hidden-gem On Saturday January 17 we held the first People's Grocery Grub Party of 2009. The event was a huge success, with many residents turning out and enjoying a great program, conversation and, of course, great food. But January’s Grub Party was not just a success in terms of ... http://peoplesgrocery.org/brahm/peoples-grocery/grub-party-signals-a-new-level-of-change Many people have asked us about our relationship to the Mandela Foods Cooperative effort here in West Oakland. I want to quickly tell people about People's Grocery's past relationship to this effort and our support for it. People's Grocery was a part of this effort about 4 years ago under what ... http://peoplesgrocery.org/brahm/peoples-grocery/peoples-grocery-mandela-foods-cooperative Once in a while we receive some great feedback from a client/resident that really reveals the difference that People's Grocery is making. The following is a letter we received in December from Pamela Deering, who is a West Oakland resident and a Grub Box customer. Her letter was very uplifting ... http://peoplesgrocery.org/brahm/peoples-grocery/a-boost-of-inspiration Happy 2009 everybody! I got kind of slack in my blogging toward the end of '08. So my new year's resolution is to blog more in order to respond to the great feedback and interest I get from this blog. We recently learned about an amazing rap song and video called ... http://peoplesgrocery.org/brahm/peoples-grocery/hood-diet-rap-video