Giovanna Velazquez
Environmental Justice: Food Deserts
Have you ever wondered why America is so fat? Well a lot of that has to do with what most of America is eating. With fast food joints every other corner of the city it’s no wonder why people are going to these cheap, fast, and convenient “restaurants” and gaining weight. According to Agriculture Department guidelines, neighborhoods more than a mile from a grocery store (and meeting certain below – average- income requirements) qualify as food deserts. 
There are areas all over the state, some more than others, that have no accessibility to healthy foods and if there is a grocery store in town its bound to be miles away from nearby census tracts. This can be a hardship because not every one has transportation to get to and from grocery stores. Many counties around California and even out of our state do not have access to full- service grocery stores and instead rely on small neighborhood stores for many of their daily needs.
Walking through the east bay I can count off how many super
markets and grocery stores I see as opposed to all the liquor stores. The
problem with having so many liquor stores and fast food corporations is people
begin to get used to eating un healthy. A high school student will learn to go into
a store and grab a bag of chips instead of fruit. Just like we can be
accustomed to ordering unhealthy take out instead of preparing healthy meals at
home. The lack of having healthy foods around us is making us unhealthy, lazy
and fat!
Not having access to healthy foods in our neighborhoods is
environmental justice and no community should have to live with the burdens of
not being able to provide their families with healthy foods because there are
no near grocery stores in their area or the ones that are like Trader Joes for
example are in-affordable to lacking communities.
