New York City’s Mayor Zohran Mamdani has appointed plant-based Siddhartha Sanchez as executive director of the Mayor’s Office of Food Policy. Sanchez will be tasked with reshaping the city’s food system to increase access to healthy, affordable plant‑based food, especially in low‑income communities of colour where nutritious whole foods remain scarce.
Sanchez brings decades of experience in community advocacy, food policy, and environmental work, including his role at the Bronx River Alliance, a nonprofit dedicated to conserving and restoring the Bronx River corridor. There, he helped pilot the first edible food forest at Concrete Plant Park, converting a former industrial site into a source of native berries and vegetables for residents, and earlier, he founded a catering company specialising in plant-based Dominican cuisine.
Although it has been reported that Sanchez is a lifelong vegan, this has not been confirmed by him, and it may just be that he eats a plant-based diet, and perhaps he was a vegetarian since childhood (the media often erroneously label vegetarians as vegan, and all the recent reports about him being vegan seem to come from the same source).
The appointment fits within Mamdani’s broader plan to reform New York City’s food landscape, which includes a proposal for five city‑owned grocery shops, with the first expected to open in the Bronx in 2027. It also responds to the reality that food prices in New York City are about 18% higher than the US average, making access to healthy plant‑based food even more difficult for many residents.
Zohran Mamdani’s administration’s food policy agenda appears to recognise that shifting towards plant‑based options can be aligned with affordability, health, and social justice.
Sanchez will be building on reforms advanced under former mayor Eric Adams, whose administration expanded access to healthy plant‑based foods in schools, hospitals, and other city agencies. In 2022, New York City public schools launched Vegan Fridays, now known as Plant‑Powered Fridays, offering free plant‑based meals to around 930,000 students, and in 2025, the city’s Food Standards were updated to emphasise whole‑food plant‑based options and remove processed meat from 11 agencies.
Expressing his motivations for the role, Siddhartha Sanchez said, “I am deeply grateful for the opportunity to serve the people of New York City — the city I grew up in and have dedicated my career to… Food security is inseparable from racial and economic justice, and for too many New Yorkers — especially in low-income communities of colour — access to healthy, affordable food remains out of reach.”
