April McGreger, Louisville, KY

“Eating should not be a political act.  Eating well should be a right.” -Erika Allen of Growing Power 

I went to Southern SAWG to learn about building community food systems. The concept of community food systems are very similar to and sometimes used interchangeably with “local” food systems. By including the word “community,” however,  emphasis  is placed on the relationships between all components of the food system, such as production (farmers), processing (value-adders), distribution (direct-markets, stores or wholesalers), and consumption (the people)  The goal of a communtiy food system is to integrate those components in a way to enhance the environmental, economic, nutritional and social health of the community -  one relationship at a time, you might say - and to hold sustainability as its long term goal.

The folks at Growing Power are veterans at building community food systems.  They work to inspire and empower communities in Milwalkee, Chicago, the MS Delta, New Orleans, and more to create sustainable food systems in which healthy, high-quality, safe, and affordable food is available to all.   It seems their sucess is due primarily to their ability to first and foremost listen to the community.  Their motto is,  ”Those with the problems own the solutions.”   This simple change in approach can mean all the difference.  Sitting in these workshops I couldn’t help thinking, if only Bill and Melinda Gates could have made it to a Growing Power workshop, perhaps we wouldn’t have to watch the failure of another Green Revolution. 

This entry was posted on Tuesday, January 30th, 2007 at 11:14 pm and is filed under Slow Experiences. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.