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Navi Johnson, founder of the RVA Black Farmers Market, with her brother Nyles Johnson and mother, Benita Johnson.
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The Johnsons are growing jalapeños, squash, tomatoes, cabbage and more in their backyard garden.
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Navi Johnson says she can envision the market continuing to grow in the future, with the potential addition of workshops, more vendors and food trucks.
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Nyles Johnson has been tending to the garden daily since first planting with his mother and sister in April.
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Herbs growing in the backyard of the Johnsons' house
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Navi Johnson waters plants in the yard.
“I used to garden with my grandmother when I was a little girl, she kind of gave me my first love of putting my hands in the dirt,” says 27-year-old Navi Johnson.
“She grew flowers, cucumbers and tomatoes, everything. This feels like an old flame rekindled.”
Johnson, a Richmond native, recently returned to the soil with her mother, Benita Johnson, and younger brother, Nyles Johnson, tending a garden in the backyard of their home at 23rd and Marshall streets.
Navi will share the fruits of their labors with the community on Aug. 15, when she debuts the RVA Black Farmers Market. “[People] are excited," she says, "and they’re telling me they need this.”
When the pandemic hit, Navi noticed friends, neighbors and family investing in the earth. People were spending more time at home and in their backyards, taking fewer trips to grocery stores and becoming more self-sufficient
“It gave us the time to do this, forced us to sit down and say, 'We gotta take care of our home and now deal with what's in front of us,' ” says Navi, also a local artist and Syracuse University journalism graduate known as “V the Writer."
Among this new surplus of growers, Navi saw an opportunity to cultivate a shared space, especially for African American growers, where seeds and ideas could be exchanged, and the concept of mutual aid and community embraced. When she mentioned the idea to a family friend, Pastor Ellis Henderson, he offered to host the market at his church in Randolph, The Way of the Lord Fellowship.
“I want to be able to put as many Black growers on the map and under one roof as I can,” says Navi, who works part-time at Richmond's Soul Taco. “I know people are looking for them, they want to buy, especially in my community, and they want to support other Black growers.”
According to the 2017 Census of Agriculture, the typical farmer is a 58-year-old white male who has been farming on his land for over 20 years. Less than 5% of American farmers are Black.
While intended to support and uplift the Black community, the market, which will be held on the third Saturday of each month through November, welcomes growers of all levels from commercial farms to backyard ventures, as well as people of all colors.
“We’re not excluding anyone at all,” Navi says, “but it’s for us to have that space, so we know its there.”
Earlier this week Navi, Nyles and Benita showed off their garden, proudly pointing out cinder blocks sprouting with basil, fennel, oregano and mint; fruit-bearing tomato plants lining their home; and a thriving abundance of peppers and squash.
“I love seeing things grow,” says 21-year-old Nyles, pointing out a blueberry bush. “I’ve never done something like this before. ... I check on it every day, especially now with how hot it is.”
The small space in their backyard has laid the foundation for a project with the potential not only to showcase Black growers, but to offer representation in a pursuit where they are lacking, along with providing much needed access to food.
“When you think about the food deserts, the majority are in predominantly minority neighborhoods,” says Benita, who returned to Richmond after being furloughed from her job in Raleigh, North Carolina, a few months ago. “We can’t rely on anyone for a store or market; we have to create our own.”
“Create our own and take care of each other,” Navi responds, a phrase she repeats more than once.
Benita, the founder of subscription-based wine group The Vine Wine Club as well as The Exclusive Blacklist, a weekend-long event highlighting African American winemakers and chefs that would have turned 5 this year, is excited to see her daughter’s vision come to fruition.
Navi says her mother and grandmother, part of a long line of strong Black women, have been incredibly influential in her life.
“Both just guided [me] — Mom gave me that entrepreneurial spirit, and Grandma handed down that more traditional stuff, like gardening and taking care of yourself,” she says, noting that she expects Grandma to attend the first market.
Navi also hopes to connect African Americans to community garden spaces, which she says are often under-maintained and under-utilized. “It’s about giving that information so we can continue to feed ourselves, having the resources to do it and putting it all in one space to help each other survive.”
RVA Black Farmers Market vendors include a mix of growers, purveyors and artists such as Zozo’s Jams, A Space Between, Sweet T’s Cakes, Noel Customs, Maroon Grove Freedom Farm, In Da Lab personal chef, Best Life Beauti, Karmalita’s Confections, Smoking Ice Catering, Heart Community Garden and more.
“I want to emphasize: buy, sell, trade,” Navi says, “that sense of sharing and connecting with each other through land and bringing that organic sense of humanism back. You come here to be taken care of, and that’s what I want the farmers market to be about.”
The first RVA Black Farmers Market will be held Saturday, Aug. 15, from 9 a.m. to 3 p.m. at 1700 Blair St. Face masks are required for entry.
