Good Food is Everybody's Business
In spite of the rapid growth of an alternative food system – local and sustainable food production, farmers’ markets, the public’s rising food consciousness – we become more dependent everyday on industrial agriculture whose representatives insist that it is the only way to feed a hungry world. In the face of such assertions, we must ask if our dependence on such a system threatens to supplant individual self-reliance.
The average age of American farmers is now over 57 and farmers aged 65 and older are the fastest growing group of farm operators, according to the USDA. The number of farms owned or operated by farmers under the age of 30 continues to shrink. Where are new farmers going to come from? Minnesota Food Association’s Big River Training Program farmers come from Somalia, Burma, Cambodia, Mexico; from around the world.
A real local food revolution must feed people healthy, local food year round to be sustainable. At the Benton Harbor Fruit Market, Market Master Lee LaVanway has helped the Mendel Center at Lake Michigan College make a commitment to serve local fruits and vegetables year round include winter. “Food for All Seasons” tells the story of this pioneering development.
Tucked away under the snows of the Arctic Circle is the Svalbard Global Seed Vault. Sometimes called the doomsday vault, it’s nothing less than a backup of the world’s biological diversity in a horticultural world fast becoming homogenous in the wake of a flood of genetically identical GMOs. For Cary Fowler, a self-described Tennessee farm boy, this vault is the fulfillment of a long fight against shortsighted governments, big business and potential disaster.
Seattle City Council person, Sally Clark, talks about people having more creative choices in terms of how they grow their own food or how they’re buying food grown locally.
We thought this video was so special that we wanted to share it with our readers. Liza de Guia, at Food Curated, recorded Phil Karlin, founder and commercial fisherman behind PE & DD Seafood in Riverhead, Long Island, NY, talking about his a small, family-owned commercial fishing operation.
Marion Nestle, Ruth Reichl, and David Kessler discuss the politics of food and healthcare, frame the political/policy problems as well as the physiological factors, then propose and discuss solutions that could win favor from both parties.
If you’ve been in a restaurant kitchen, you’ve seen how much food, water and energy can be wasted there. Chef Arthur Potts-Dawson shares his very personal vision for drastically reducing restaurant, and supermarket, waste — creating recycling, composting, sustainable engines for good (and good food).
