Sarnia’s Inn of the Good Shepherd Mobile Market back on the road

The Inn of the Good Shepherd’s seasonal Mobile Market is back on the road in Sarnia and across Lambton County with two additional stops this year.

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Staff from the Inn and volunteers set up each week at 17 locations to distribute fresh produce to those in need.

The Mobile Market began the first week of July and continues into the fall.

It added stops in two areas “that weren’t well served in the county for food access,” said Myles Vanni, executive director at the Inn of the Good Shepherd.

A stop in Florence has been added on Wednesday, as well as one at the Sombra Library on Thursday, he said.

A small food store in Sombra closed and the new stop “also helps support Walpole Island,” Vanni said.

Other stops include Petrolia, Corunna, Aamjiwnaang First Nation, Forest, Thedford, Kettle and Stony Point First Nation, Wyoming, Watford, Alvinston and several Sarnia locations.

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The schedule can be found online at theinnsarnia.ca.

“Last year, we saw 1,200 people a week accessing the market,” Vanni said. “It’s all about getting fresh, healthy food to folks” beyond monthly visits to food banks, he said.

“You need fresh and healthy more than that. This was a really good way of getting out to folks on a weekly basis when there’s an abundance in the fields and the farms and greenhouses are good at donating.”

The Inn expects to distribute about 3,175 kilograms of produce a week this season, he said.

“We always try to have eight to 10 different items so there’s good variety,” Vanni said.

The produce comes from several sources, including donations from local farms and greenhouses, he said.

After the Sombra stop Thursdays, the truck continues to the Leamington area to pick up donations from greenhouses there, Vanni said.

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Some is also purchased and “we get a lot of produce coming in from folks and their home gardens or group gardens,” he said.

The Inn came up with the idea more than a decade ago when there was a large amount of donated produce at its Sarnia food bank, Vanni said. They loaded up a truck and set up in a city neighborhood with social housing to pass the produce out while it was still fresh.

“People loved it, so we did that in September and October that year” and requests came in to add more neighborhoods, he said.

“The next year we got a grant and were able to go to eight locations and it has just grown from there,” Vanni said.

At market stops children’s Snack Packs are also distributed with at least 21 items to provide three snacks a day for elementary school-aged youngsters.

It includes such items as fresh fruit, yogurt tubes and cheese strings to fill “that gap in the summer when there’s no student nutrition programs” in schools, hesaid.

Health promoters from local agencies may also be available at stops to pass along information for market users, Vanni said.

[email protected]

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