For International Black Women’s History Month, organic farmer, Theresa Marryshow, talks with theGrio about why she wants more people to eat healthy food from the soil and how Grenada’s women farmers have partnered with hotels for winning farm-to-table strategies.
Theresa Marryshow remembers a time when reaching the age of 100 was perfectly normal in her community.
“We have to start to look back and get back into the land,” she says from her island home in Grenada, a country located in the West Indies. “Preparing it in the minimum way possible so that you could maintain all the nutrients.” With her signature head wrap, glasses on her face, and Grenadian accent, Marryshow smiles and teases that she won’t reveal her age because it’s hard to tell it.
“When you eat your fresh fruits and vegetables you’ll get all the nutrients that the body needs and once you get the nutrients that the body need, you stay strong, you stay healthy, your looks come out.”
Marryshow, an organic farmer from a generational bloodline of farmers, believes there is a direct link between eating fresh, healthy food and people’s overall health and longevity, and she’s made it her life’s mission to give them the tools to eat better.
It’s a ministry that has many believers, and it’s doing wonders for both tourism and the economy in Marryshow’s home country of Grenada.
Organic farms have become a major draw for visitors who frequently seek out authentic local experiences on their trips to the island. Marryshow, who owns the farm T’s EcoGarden, has partnered with local hotels in Grenada—such as the Sandals Resort, Spice Island Beach Resort, and Six Senses Spa—to provide them with fresh produce such as lettuce, kale, arugula, zucchini, and more to feed their guests and cook in meals.
“I think they inspired me to get into agriculture on a deeper basis and on a larger scale,” Marryshow tells theGrio, reflecting on how the Sandals Foundation made a financial investment in her work. “Their guests can get the breeze from the river, go to the river soak their feet and come out and have what you call a farm-to-table experience where we harvest the crops on the farm itself, we prepare it on the farm, we have our kitchen and everything.”
From Overlooked Women to Booming Business
The “Spice Isle,” as it’s known because of traditional crops like nutmeg and cinnamon, has seen continued growth in its 58-million-dollar tourism industry, with projections that it could skyrocket to 74 million dollars by 2028.
This is promising news for Black-owned businesses like T’s EcoGarden, as well as larger local farming communities like GRENROP (Grenada Network of Rural Women Producers).
Marryshow, who is also the president of GRENROP, remembers a time when women farmers like herself were overlooked and underappreciated in the business.
“In 1990, at that time, women power started,” Marryshow recalls. “Women started to cry out that they are the one that really doing farming. And the Ministry of Agriculture was only giving the men the assistance and the men was getting the recognition.”
But that changed after a survey across the Caribbean was completed to get the real story.
“After that survey, it was recognized that the women are the ones that’s really doing the farming—they are the ones that do the planting and the weeding and the harvesting and the marketing and so and the men more do the land preparation,” Marryshow explains. “From that survey IICA (Inter-American Institute for Cooperation on Agriculture) was asked to organize the women in the rural communities in the various Caribbean countries to form a group.”
That’s when Marryshow’s local chapter of rural women producers came together and supported each other’s work. They saw success, and the demand eventually became so high, they expanded to welcome men and youth who had an interest in agriculture.
A Future of Expansion
Now with their successful efforts in fruits and vegetables, Marryshow has expanded her capacity to explore new kinds of business.
Tomorrow, Marryshow will see the grand opening of her new Coconut Processing Plant and Farmers Chill Room. She says the plant will produce coconut flour, coconut flakes, virgin coconut oil, coconut milk, and coconut oil.
“The one that we really cook with, the brown one that we put on the fire is the better one for cooking,” she explains. “The virgin one is more for the cosmetic industry and for the individual to use on the skin so that they can stay young and looking healthy and keep life going until God ready,” she says with a chuckle.
It’s that vibrant spirit and deep knowledge of the land and its produce that makes Marryshow such a respected chef, agricultural leader, and entrepreneur on the island.
Marryshow encourages anyone who hears her message of healthy eating to take things one step at a time.
“You have a container, you put it on your veranda and you start planting. Maybe start with your herbs because we all use herbs on a daily basis to cook. Then you could get into growing your little lettuce and your little kale and your a little pork choy and so on,” she advises.
For Marryshow, it’s those small steps that can grow a much larger and more intentional movement of change—one that uplifts the very people who have put their blood, sweat, and tears into the very soil we enjoy the fruits of:
“The government should put a lot of emphasis on the farmers because we keep the nation going. We help maintain the doctors, the lawyers, the teachers, and everything… We are the most important people in the country.”
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