We The People Opportunity Farm Tour: Keesa V. Johnson and Lawanda Hollister

Hey everyone. My name is Keesa V. Johnson, and we are here at the We The People Opportunity Farm. Where I am the Food and Farming Instructor, and here is our farm intern. Yes, I am the LaWanda Hollister, and I am a intern turn here at We The People Opportunity Farm. I’m going to give a little tour of our farm, and I appreciate you watching. Come on Ms. Keesa. All right. This is the pollinated flower bed. This was placed to attract monarch butterflies, which help the beet to grow and the vegetables and keep other insects and things away. Then we have roles of collard greens, kale, and a different kale down here is called rainbow kale.

These are the collared greens, and these are the biggest greens that I have ever seen. We are in the process of harvesting, so we snapped him at the end and collect them. They’re really good. They are really really good. Even my people who were skeptical about them when I cook them, because I am a chef, and I cook some of the greens, and they came out perfect. They’re very good, put a little turkey egg in there, and they’re delicious. These are absolutely gorgeous, beautiful, and they taste well. There’s many different types of greens.

This is collard, turnips, mustard, other ones, we grow them because they’re quite nutritious, especially for African American, black people, we like the taste in the field because it gives us nutrients that’s needed from our body. It also gives us a good dose of vitamin D. Many don’t understand, and we cook them in a variety way. Yeah. Miss LaWanda, she had cook some, I kept say, can I see a picture of them? Because I knew from the beauty of this, how they would taste, and how they’d be when it was time to eat. What we do here, is that we sell our produce because we’re building a sustainable business for the community.

We also do a giveaway every month of these beautiful plants, especially beautiful collard green, and everyone’s speaks highly of this variety here. I just wanted to open this opportunity up for people to understand that even in Ypsi, not always Detroit because Detroit is Detroit, and Detroit will always be. But there are also other black farmers within the area where you can purchase nutritious food, and this is one place that you can purchase food from. This is garlic. I believe that there is a proper name for Miss Keesa which will be [OVERLAPPING] Garlic scapes. Garlic scapes, and we’ve been harvest these. These are one of our first harvest.

The reason why we grow these varieties that we do with our [inaudible] tomatoes, the type of kale, the type of collard greens that we grow, and also the garlic scapes, because it’s in demand within area and urban Ypsi. We try to grow what people like because we do a sell our food to different stores within the community, and we also give it away as community drive. Because we just want people to understand that you can actually eat and grow your own healthy sustained food. We just really trying to get back to the Earth and the environment in a way.

Having more farms, levels, the carbon that is currently going on in the air with the climate crisis that we’re experiencing as well as the racial up rising, everything, and growth, and growing for your community is extremely important. I think that’s something that has been lost over time due to all the big egg practices. Having a community-driven farm that’s here, that provide jobs for our citizens, whether they’ve been here, or they’re returning is extremely important for us as an organization.