BBG Writer Wins $3K for Project MANNA — Connecting Black Farmers & Mothers Across Appalachia

By Black By God – The West Virginian

Remember that incredible article Aliyah Smith-Gomis wrote for us? “Reclaiming the 40 Acres Promise: Black Farmers in Appalachia Plant Seeds of Justice and Equity” traced the broken promise of land redistribution after emancipation—when 40,000 freed slaves were promised 40 acres each, only to have it stripped away by Andrew Johnson. She showed how that betrayal launched centuries of systematic racism, land theft, and barriers that dropped Black farm ownership from 14% in 1920 to just 1% today.

But her article wasn’t just history—it showed us Appalachia as a climate refuge and proving ground for the next generation of Black agrarians.

But Aliyah wasn’t just writing about change — she’s out there growing it.

Her work through the Appalachian Resource Conservation & Development Council earned her first place and a $3,000 award for Project MANNA, an initiative connecting Black farmers with Black mothers across Appalachia.

She calls it an intervention—connecting Black mothers with Black farmers in Appalachia. As Jason Tartt, farmer and owner of T&T Organics in McDowell County, West Virginia (featured in her article “Reclaiming the 40 Acres Promise”), puts it: honey, fruit, and berries are things we do very well in central Appalachia. Her project seeks to give mothers what they need and farmers payment for what they’re already great at. Communities get stronger. Everybody wins.

Why this matters:

Black women are three times more likely to experience postpartum depression than their white counterparts, yet they’re 57% less likely to start treatment. Black infants face mortality rates more than twice as high as white infants. And in Appalachia? Resources for maternal health are even harder to come by.

That’s where kindred practitioners like Femeika Elliott, founder of The Lotus Program Experience and Appalachian Foodways Practitioner Fellowship winner, come in. Elliott, a Knoxville-based food educator and herbalist with Creole roots, combines ancestral wisdom, holistic care, and nourishing food to support Black mothers through fertility, pregnancy, postpartum, and loss. Projects like the Lotus Project and MANNA are connecting these dots in Appalachia, showing how food justice and maternal health go hand in hand.

In West Virginia, advocates like Rhonda Rogombé are leading the charge through the WV Black Infant and Maternal Health Working Group at WV Policy, addressing these disparities head-on. Aliyah’s Project MANNA is part of this vital ecosystem—food as medicine, farmers as partners, and mothers as the center of it all.

The judges saw what we already knew—Aliyah’s not just researching public health, she’s making real change happen on the ground, feeding people and reclaiming space.

Read the full story at ETSU.

Watch her presentation below!

BBG is so proud of Aliyah — she’s planting seeds that will feed and heal generations to come. Through Project MANNA, Aliyah reminds us what BBG Ag stands for: reclaiming land and legacy, empowering Black farmers and agripreneurs, healing through food and health, and honoring the ancestral forest medicine and folk practices that continue to root, nourish, and guide our communities across Appalachia.