Mercy Corps Northwest Refuge Gardens

Greetings and happy summer, everyone!  Today I'm pleased to be writing a post about my work this season with Mercy Corps Northwest (MCNW).  You may recall that in previous summers I was uploading new blog posts about once a week, but it's going to be less frequent this summer (as you can already tell).  I hope you still enjoy the photos and posts I am able to upload!

You may have heard of Mercy Corps, the international development agency that works in countries around the world.  MCNW is the domestic partner of Mercy Corps, and both are headquartered in Portland.

The mission of MCNW is to work together to build more just, productive, and resilient communities in the Pacific Northwest.  MCNW has its hands in a wide variety of projects, including small business development programs and re-entry transition programs for formerly incarcerated adults.  I specifically work with the agriculture program, also known as Refuge Gardens.  

Go Refuge Gardens staff!

In the Refuge Gardens project, we work with refugee families who are transitioning to life in the States.  We connect families to land, technical assistance, and local direct markets.  The project gives the families a chance to earn supplemental income through produce sales, grow food for their own families, and create community with other families.  This year, we are working specifically with Karen families from Burma and Nepali families from Bhutan. 

Refuge Gardens grows food on three different sites: two in inner SE Portland and a larger site in Damascus.  I work at the two SE Portland sites with our three Nepali families in the program (pictured below).  

As the Garden Field Assistant, I do a variety of tasks.  On Tuesdays and Fridays, I coordinate the harvest at our SE Portland sites, which is combined with the harvest from our Damascus site to be sold at two farmers markets in Portland and through our small 13 member CSA.  On Wednesdays, I help sell produce at market in downtown Portland.

CSA box from June

Portland Farmers Market @ Shemanski Park

Portland Farmers Market @ PSU

In addition to harvest and farmers market duties, I help coordinate plantings at the SE sites according to our crop plan and perform general field maintenance (weeding, bed building, etc).  I also enjoy taking photos of our beautiful crops and produce! 

I have immensely enjoyed my work with MCNW so far.  I am constantly inspired by the resilience and generosity of the families that I work with and have really liked getting to know them so far.  Seth, the program director, has been a great mentor with a wealth of agricultural knowledge and ability to work compassionately with program participants.  What I really like about this job is that not only do I have skills and passion to contribute to the project, but I also I learn new things every day - about intercultural communication, about growing food, and about agriculture projects with social missions.

As I've mentioned, in addition to a small CSA we sell Refuge Gardens produce at two farmers markets, both of which are managed by the Portland Farmers Market (PFM).  On days when I'm not working for MCNW, I just so happen to work for the PFM as a crew member.  Stay tuned for a post about my work with PFM later this summer.