Our Mission
A healthy community where everyone has access to quality, nutritious, healthy food can be achieved through a synergistic relationship between stores and the communities they serve. Corner stores/community markets can serve as an important conduit for communities to get healthy products, provide information that promotes health and well-being, and for facilitating community empowerment.
What do we do?
We dismantle the barriers that corner store owners face when acquiring healthy products for their customers.
Establish alternative food infrastructure
We establish the food supply-chain infrastructure that small immigrant businesses need to access economies of scale.
Invest in communities of color
We partner with Resident Leaders to disseminate financial support to residents for food purchases at nearby corner stores
Produce research on local food systems
We synthesize the stories of success and failure across the local and regional food supply chain, especially from the perspective of immigrant business owners. More research coming soon.
Our History
Saba started as a community organizing effort by Arab-American and Muslim corner store owners in Oakland. We advocated for an equitable use of Oakland’s soda tax revenues during the city’s 2019 budget cycle.
Since Oakland’s 120 corner stores operate in neighborhoods with the lowest access to healthy foods, corner store owners offered to transition their stores into health food stores, if the City invests its soda tax revenues into dismantling the barriers they face in the healthy foods supply chain.
We won an initial allocation of $200k, which was the seed that helped us grow into the organization we are today.
Saba’s 2020 Celebration
120 Corner Stores in Oakland participated in our advocacy
Our Team
Lina Ghanem
Director and Founder
Rae Peres
Office Manager
Jiyeon Choi
Warehouse Lead/Produce Buyer
Laura Lackey
Grants Coordinator
Anita Ledesma
People & HR Director
Haven Bourque
Communications Director
Our Board
Francis Calpotura
Executive Director, In-Advance
Nina Ichikawa
Executive Director, Berkeley Food Institute
Deaa Ahmad
Owner, Lee’s Stores
Andre Isler
Manager, Isler’s Liquor
