Nestled among names like Barack Obama, Oprah Winfrey, Conan O'Brien, Steve Jobs, and those of two doctors working toward a vaccine against cancer, you'll find one you don't know on the Time 100 Most Influential People list.
Unless, that is, your knowledge of Hurricanes basketball goes back to before the current crop of Miami students were born.
But Will Allen, 62, didn't make the list because he ranks second all-time in rebounds for Miami, or 17th on the all-time scoring list. It has nothing to do with his short pro career or years spent in marketing for Proctor & Gamble or being named a 2010 ACC Men's Basketball Tournament Legend.
No, Allen is influencing the world one neighborhood-grown meal at a time -- and changing the way healthy foods are cultivated, produced, and distributed to underserved, low-income urban populations.
Allen was helping some neighborhood kids with a gardening project in 1995 when he began developing the methodology and techniques now championed by Growing Power, Inc., the Milwaukee non-profit he co-founded and directs. Recognizing that health problems and poor diets in low-income urban neighborhoods can be tied to a lack of fresh and affordable healthy food, Allen began helping city folk not only grow, but distribute, their own.
"Everybody, regardless of their economic means, should have access to the same healthy, safe, affordable food that is grown naturally," says Allen, whose in-city farm houses 20,000 plants and vegetables, thousands of fish, and chicken, goats, ducks, rabbits, and bees in less than two acres of space -- and provides a weekly basket of fresh produce to neighborhood residents at a reduced cost.
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His internship and educational programs help feed the know-how to minorities and immigrants who have begun establishing similar initiatives in their own communities elsewhere. And the techniques he's championed, such as raised beds, aquaculture, vermiculture, and greenhouse heat via composting, are helping people across America join the sustainable agriculture movement without having to leave their urban neighborhoods.
"The movement's aim is not just healthier people but a healthier planet," wrote Green For All founder Van Jones at Time.com. "Food grown in cities is trucked shorter distances...more greenhouses in the 'hood equals less greenhouse gas in the air. Just as important, farm projects grow communities and nourish hope.
"The best ones will produce more leaders like Allen."
