These Kids Just Dropped The SICKEST Beats On Urban Farming

Urban farming is getting lit in this new music video.

Appetite for Change, a nonprofit organization in Minneapolis that uses food to build health and social change, released a rap music video called “Grow Food,” produced in collaboration with Beats and Rhymes and Chancellor Tha Beast.

The video was created as the result of the group’s Summer Youth Employment and Training Program. Youth in the program created the music video to share the important message of actively choosing healthy foods to their peers and friends.

Photo: Appetite for Change

The rap itself is pretty catchy and has a great beat, but also has some pretty powerful messages regarding urban farming – and particularly why it’s important for kids.

One of the first lines of the video is particularly powerful:

See in my hood, there ain’t really much to eat. Popeye’s on the corner, McDonald’s right across the street.

This testament to how food is in a lot of communities is powerful – much of America resorts to unhealthier foods or fast food when it comes to eating. Low-income communities especially find eating healthy a hard challenge, since often they’re in food deserts – or areas lacking a grocery store.

In urban areas – where this video focuses on – there’s also a problem in the low-income neighborhoods, since fast food and cheap, processed food is the staple diet of those areas. Fresh produce is more expensive, so families resort to cheaper, high-calorie foods – which often link to diseases like diabetes and obesity.

For many children, the easy choice has become to just get the fast food – it’s convenient, much cheaper, and wildly popular despite the unhealthiness associated with it. To eat healthy at that level of convenience is expensive – but the benefits of growing your own food are great, since you can save money and get tasty nutrition at the same time.

So while the kids in this video are entertaining with dance moves like “chop it up” or “whip it in the kitchen”, they’re also sending out an important message regarding this issue – and offer up the solution of growing food in local communities, vacant lots, and in homes as a way to save money (something we’ve recently gone over).

Enjoy this dope music video and rap, but take home the message that is literally the title of the video – and grow food!