Ital Idana Community Food and Nutrition
Idana: we take inspiration from the Yoruba word for kitchen to mean our natural (ital) kitchen full of goodness and as we would care for ourselves at home we care for the community
Founded in 2021 as Ital Idana, we set up to provide culturally appropriate food and nutritional education for the Black community in Nottingham. Over the past few years we have created resources and distributed fresh food within our community, this has all been self-funded.
We support holistic health and wellness for all people harmed by the state, access to food, understanding nutrition and access to land is part of a wider constellation of support that a person needs. Projects cannot be isolated or provided without being connected to radical campaigning, understanding and helping support the entirety of what a person and community needs to be safe, protected and alive. When someone comes to one of our nutrition education sessions, we will not be speaking as if we all have the same access to the same food, or the same ability to cook, clean or manage our own nutrition.
Food justice as a movement talks about our right to have access to nutritious, culturally appropriate and affordable food as marginalised people. We have to look at the disparity in food access between white and Black communities in England. When our food is relegated to the ‘ethnic’ food aisles and white and British foods are unlabeled, unquestioned and therefore considered the ‘norm’, how does that affect the eating habits, nutrition and access to culturally appropriate foods for those of us who are ‘othered’?
Ital Idana looks at the levels of food poverty and deprivation locally, and sees a way we can help out whilst also bringing lots of tasty, nutritious, cruelty-free and Afrikan- Caribbean flavour and a safe space for the Afrikan and Afrikan diaspora community.
Nottingham Nourishment Network CIC 