Rachel Opio remembers when her mother’s garden was overrun with weeds. It sat fallow, covered in tall grass. She couldn’t step foot in it without sobbing.
Her mother was a haphazard gardener, Opio said, and didn’t care to cook or eat what she grew. She just loved the hobby and its associated bragging rights: Look! I grew this.
The garden was untended after her mother passed from cancer. Opio cared for her until the end, with the help of hospice nurses. It was here in the same house where Opio was raised, which she later purchased from her parents, where her mother had gardened.
In 2022, Opio began clearing out the weeds and grass, feeling it was disrespectful to leave it unattended. She initially thought there was ample space to grow food for her family and quickly realized she could feed the neighbors as well. Eventually, she saw she could feed an even greater number.
Today, she operates Little Lighthouse Farm, born from her late mother’s garden.
Getting Started
In Phoenix’s Alhambra neighborhood, just north of the city center, Opio gave me a tour of her quarter-acre backyard farm bursting with produce in the mild winter temperatures—radishes, kale, collard greens, dill, cabbage, mint, thyme, celery, kohlrabi.
She pointed to the chili peppers growing late into December. It should be too cold for them, but thanks to the long summer they were popping up among the cooler-weather vegetables.
“When I first started,” she said, “it was all about making sure that what I was growing and what I would sell would be accessible.”
One of her first priorities was to ensure she could accept nutrition assistance programs such as SNAP, WIC and the Senior Farmers Market Nutrition Program. She also participates in Friends on the Farm, an Arizona Food Bank Network program that purchases from growers both large and small.
Opio has always been interested in agriculture and wanted to start a farm. One reason why she hadn’t, she explained, is that farming is a denigrated profession, particularly within the Black community.
A self-described lifelong learner with a career in the tech industry, she earned a master’s degree in psychology from University of Phoenix, focused on statistics and research; also a master’s in beekeeping from the University of California at Davis and plans to pursue a PhD as well. She jokes that she likes to collect academic degrees.
When searching for resources to start Little Lighthouse Farm, she stumbled upon Kiss the Ground, a 2020 documentary on regenerative agriculture, an approach popularized by the Rodale Institute since the 1980s. Regenerative agriculture combines a variety of sustainable and organic farming techniques that seek to repair natural systems and increase biodiversity.
The documentary piqued her interest and inspired her to research more. She learned about regenerative techniques and how potassium, nitrogen and other elements are recycled through the ecosystem, playing an important role in agriculture and health.
A few regenerative practices she incorporates are no-till farming, cover cropping and pasturing her chickens to collect their droppings for fertilizer. Rather than simply refraining from chemical applications, she works to improve soil health and the surrounding ecology.
Little Lighthouse Farm is currently undergoing the organic certification process by California Certified Organic Farmers, one of the largest organic certifiers in the United States. In 2022, CCOF piloted a Regenerative Organic Certified program that Opio hopes to participate in eventually.
Her career in tech and as an analyst has proved useful, since tracking data and creating spreadsheets is a necessity.
“One of the biggest things with [farming] organic and maintaining an organic certification is the record keeping,” she said. “There’s a lot of data involved.”
It is also expensive. Opio has received grants from cost-sharing programs that help mitigate the expenses incurred in the certification process.
“I am fortunate that I got a grant from one of the certifying bodies, so that I had a lot of fees waived for me, especially for being historically underserved. I’m a Black female farmer,”
Opio said. “Plus, I’m a beginner farmer.”
Receiving the Certified Organic designation will open new opportunities to sell to retail produce outlets, hospitals and schools.
Little Lighthouse Farm’s website lists seasonal, organic produce for purchase with times for either pickup or delivery. Eggs, tea blends and spices are also available, and Opio offers consultation services for businesses or individuals interested in starting or expanding their garden.
“I think there’s a lot of opportunity,” Opio said. “Phoenix is really focused on strengthening the food system, especially the local food system.”
In addition to partnering with food banks and nutrition assistance programs, she has collaborated with JUNTOS, a Phoenix-based organization that promotes accessible, sustainable food through community events.
With the help of a city grant, JUNTOS held a series of cooking workshops with Little Lighthouse Farm in Phoenix’s East Lake community, a historically Black neighborhood close to the city’s central core where Opio’s mother was raised. The workshops used produce from the farm to teach people how they can strengthen the local food system by creating community gardens.
“There’s a lot of power in growing your own food.”
Facing Uncertainty
I visited Opio’s farm again in April as Phoenix reached its first 100° day of the year. She added a considerable number of planting beds to her front yard and installed tomato trellises on the side of the house, enjoying the visibility it created for neighbors and passersby. Maybe they’d get curious, ask questions, feel inspired to start their own garden.
Although less obvious, even greater changes had come to Little Lighthouse Farm since my December visit. I asked Opio how her contract with the food bank and the cost sharing program for organic certification were going.
“It hasn’t been going very well,” she replied.
In March, the USDA cut over $1 billion for two programs that funded schools and food banks: Local Food for Schools, and the Local Food Purchasing Assistance Cooperative Agreement. The two programs were designed to shore up supply chain resiliency by purchasing food from local and regional farmers, then redistributing it to remote or underserved communities.
“One of the biggest things that’s been impacted for me is a lot of the different cost share programs that were available,” Opio said. “That’s a huge one for me to not have that help anymore.”
Friends of the Farm, which supplies the Arizona emergency food bank network with local produce, will also lose federal funding. Since its 2020 launch, the program has supported dozens of small farmers in each of Arizona’s 15 counties.
Opio described many of these programs as workforce and economic development initiatives that provide resources for historically underserved communities, for people like herself.
“It gives me an opportunity to have a farm and have a business and do things for my community,” she said. “It gives me that viable opportunity as far as financials, but at the same time it’s also helping the underserved population.”
For other programs where funding is not affected, timelines are greatly delayed. She worries what will happen when current funds run out, noting that food bank networks, schools and small farmers rely heavily on this distribution.
In the backyard, Cinnamon Queen hens and Easter Egger chickens clucked in two different chicken coops. Opio listed their names: Hennifer Lopez, Goldie Hen, Vera Wing, Meryl Cheep, Angelina JoPeep, Amelia Egghart, Yolko Ono.
The younger chickens that didn’t grow up with the others were separated from those more temperamental and easily spooked. If placed together too soon, the chickens would fight with one another, so she is slowly introducing them to the flock.
Despite the uncertainty, Little Lighthouse Farm continues to grow. Opio plans to build a new, bigger coop where the chickens will all live together. Soon, they’ll learn to get along.
Follow Rachel’s work @littlelighthousefarm and https://www.littlelighthousefarm.com/.
