The Trustees: Mobile Market
The Trustees of Reservations (The Trustees) is a Massachusetts nonprofit with a mission to protect places of exceptional scenic, historical, and ecological value, while preserving access for all to enjoy. Across the state of Massachusetts, The Trustees stewards over 120 properties, 56 community gardens, more than 350 miles of trails, and nearly 50,000 acres of protected land. The organization welcomes more than 2 million visitors annually and offers over 5,000 programs and events. The Trustees is a vibrant and growing network of people who are committed to preserving the Commonwealth’s landscapes and keeping open space open for everyone, forever. Over the past 10 years, the organization has expanded their outreach and engagement in Boston through their Urban Outdoors initiative, which includes The Trustees’ Mobile Market.
THE MOBILE MARKET:
The Mobile Market provides under-resourced communities with affordable, healthy, and locally sourced produce.
Since 2017, The Trustees’ Mobile Market has provided under-resourced communities with a reliable source of healthy, local produce at an affordable price. They believe that everyone should have access to that food—and the land on which it grows—to nourish the body and spirit. The Mobile Market carries a wide variety of vegetables sourced primarily from their very own farms, Powisset and Appleton. Working closely with community partners for the upcoming 2023-2024 season, the Mobile Market will make weekly stops in Boston, Chelsea, and Revere. Target neighborhoods are those in which both incomes and supermarket sales are low, indicative of economic and geographic barriers to healthy foods. These same neighborhoods also experience some of the city’s highest levels of diet-related disease, including obesity, heart disease, diabetes, and hypertension. The Mobile Market offers weekly shares to subscribers who use SNAP/HIP benefits, with an average of 350 shares distributed per month from mid-June through the end of January.
In addition to the SNAP/HIP shares, The Trustees' Mobile Market offers home delivery shares, which are delivered to food-insecure households that do not qualify for benefits. These shares are donor-supported and are free for enrolled customers. The East Boston Neighborhood Health Center (EBNHC) identifies participating customers, and The Trustees plan to continue this program in 2023.
The Mobile Market is expanding its services to offer a more traditional farmers' market setup, allowing customers to select individual items using their SNAP benefits. The pop-up market locations include the City of Revere, the City of Chelsea, East Boston Neighborhood Health Center (EBNHC) Summer Market, Whittier, Dimock, and Roxbury YMCA.
The Trustees have been sharing recipes with their Mobile Market customers since 2017 as they have a strong passion for cooking and obtain a wide range of culinary skills and knowledge. These recipes are truly special as they reflect the customers’ unique backgrounds and cultural heritage, bringing together dishes from all corners of the world with locally sourced produce from Trustees farms. In 2022, we forged a partnership with the East Boston Neighborhood Health Center (EBNHC) and gogobytes to support their free cooking classes for elderly residents in East Boston. By providing free produce, they were able to increase the frequency of these classes from monthly to bi-weekly. This not only allowed them to provide more opportunities for seniors to learn and connect through cooking, but also to promote community engagement in a meaningful and impactful way.
The pandemic has continued to highlight social and economic inequality throughout the country, and in Boston, similarly, food insecurity and the need for open space for mental and physical wellbeing are evident, especially in low-income, high-density communities. The program was fully subscribed in 2022 and is again this year. The Mobile Market continues to be an important and valued resource, contributing significantly to the food access needs of the communities it serves.
$.50 per every bowl of ramen sold during the month of April will be donated directly towards supporting access to affordable, fresh, locally sourced produce. To learn more, please visit, www.thetrustees.org/mobile
*You are donating directly to The Trustees: Mobile Market. Eat Justice receives 0% of the proceeds.