Planting Seeds for the Future
THE ALTERNATIVE DAILY
Obesity rates among American children and adolescents continue to soar, with more than twice the number of children and over four times the number of adolescents weighing in as obese, as opposed to children from 30 years ago.
The non-profit organization Common Vision is dedicated to improving the status of the roughly 6.5 million children who live in the midst of food deserts and are more susceptible to obesity. According to the U.S. Department of Agriculture (USDA), food deserts are areas in which at least 33 percent of the population lives more than a mile from a large grocery store or supermarket. These areas are often in lower income areas where transportation is difficult to access, and residents tend to suffer from more medical complications than those in other areas.
Common Vision combats food deserts in California by working with schools to plant free orchards that provide students with fresh food. Its recent campaign launched via Indiegogo has exceeded its goals of $60,000 that will enable the organization to engage 15,000 more kids in planting 1,000 barren lots with fruit trees that are ripe — and free — for picking.
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