Malik Yakini is executive director of the Detroit Black Community Food Security Network, a coalition of people and groups that promotes urban agriculture, co-operative buying, and healthy eating. His organization is helping Black people in the city take matters into their own hands by creating their own grocery store, The Detroit People's Co-op. The grocery will sit in the city's North End neighborhood, where about 92 percent of residents are Black and nearly 40 percent have a household income less than $15,000.

Food deserts are usually found in low-income areas, forcing residents either to travel to the suburbs for fresh groceries or settle for one of the many nearby convenience stores and fast food restaurants. Since transportation and time is an issue for low-income families, the impact is a health epidemic. According to the Kaiser Family Foundation, Black American adults have the highest overweight and obesity rates in the country.

In Detroit, the solution is coming from the neighborhoods themselves. Owners of the grocery cooperative will be the people who use it -- neighborhood residents.

To read more of J. Gabriel Ware, YES! Magazine's article, visit: http://www.truth-out.org/news/...thy-food-co-op-style