Food and Agriculture

Students Launch Campaign For Fresher Food, More Options, Better Pay

April 2, 2022 Rory Linnane, Milwaukee Journal Sentinel. Create! Education, Food and Agriculture, Worker Rights and Jobs, Youth Activism

Calling attention to the lack of fresh food in their lunches at Milwaukee Public Schools, student leaders have launched a "school lunch justice" campaign outside the district's central offices. The students are part of Youth Empowered in the Struggle (YES), the multiracial youth arm of Voces de La Frontera, an advocacy organization for the rights of immigrants and workers. "Our lunches are cooked in a central location and distributed to the schools to be reheated, resulting in undercooked food and of substandard quality," said YES leader Katherine Villanueva, a senior at Milwaukee School of Languages. "This is not acceptable." Villanueva said YES surveyed more than 1,000 MPS students and found that the quality of school lunch was the "most pressing issue" with the school environment.

What Does A Just Food Future Look Like?

March 21, 2022 Elena Seeley, Food Tank. Create! Agroecology, Environment, Finance and the Economy, Food and Agriculture

During a recent event at SXSW organized by Food Tank, Huston-Tillotson University, Oatly, and others, food system scholars and activists discussed the intersection of food, culture, and economics. Cortlin Harrison, a barista at the first unionized Starbucks in Buffalo, New York and a member of Starbucks Workers United highlighted some of the deep inequities perpetuated by food corporations. “We were seeing partners who can’t afford their rent, partners struggling with food insecurity,” Harrison says. “Meanwhile we’re seeing the corporate elite make billions of dollars in profit,” Panelists also pointed to many challenges on the farm. Sue Beckwith, Executive Director of the Texas Center for Local Food notes, “Black farmers and ranchers are losing heritage land to predatory developers every single day.”

Schools Will Stop Serving Free Lunch To All Students

March 17, 2022 Marlene B. Schwartz, The Conversation. Create! Congress, Education, Food Access, Food and Agriculture, School Lunch

In March 2020, nearly all U.S. K-12 school buildings closed due to the COVID-19 pandemic. The U.S. Department of Agriculture, which administers the federal government’s National School Lunch Program, quickly granted waivers to increase program flexibility and accommodate the challenges of the pandemic. These waivers, which have been renewed several times, were critically important for school food service programs as the programs abruptly shifted away from serving meals in cafeterias and designed new distribution models to continue to feed students. Many school meal staff across the country created grab-and-go meals that families could pick up, which was particularly important in the spring of 2020 and the following school year.

Stories From The Movement: Transition Toronto

March 12, 2022 Rob Hopkins, Resilience. Create! Canada, Environment, Food and Agriculture, Transition Town

The principle in Transition of focusing your energy on what you are passionate about is beautifully captured in the work of Transition Toronto in Canada. While COVID meant that some of their key projects, such as their annual EcoFair, which they co-present with the Green Neighbours Network, had to go virtual, two key projects, TreeMobile and Food Up Front really came into their own. TreeMobile (pronounced in the same way as ‘Batmobile’) is described by the group thus: “TreeMobile delivers and plants food-bearing trees, shrubs, and other perennials to improve local food security, reduce food miles, reforest urban communities, and create delicious food”. The idea is simple but effective. In the winter, Virginie Gysel, landscaper and the founder of the TreeMobile project, contacts tree nurseries, reserves trees and shrubs (edible species only) which will do well in the local climate.

How Grocery Co-Ops Across New England Thrived Despite The Pandemic

March 11, 2022 Paige Wolf, Grassroots Economic Organizing. Create! Community organizing, Cooperatives, Food and Agriculture, New England

Though a global pandemic and ease of technology has sent millions of grocery shoppers online to order from Instacart and Amazon, the most grassroots and socially connected form of grocery shopping has been surprisingly untouched. In fact, grocery co-ops have grown during the pandemic, with overall sales increasing 10% during 2020, a year full of supply and social disruptions.

USDA Offers $1 Billion To Help Farmers And Ranchers Fight Climate Change

February 9, 2022 Cristen Hemingway James, EcoWatch. Create! Carbon sequestration, Farmers, Food and Agriculture, USDA

The U.S. Department of Agriculture (USDA) will invest $1 billion in projects that encourage farmers, ranchers and owners of forested land to employ practices that help mitigate the effects of climate change by lowering greenhouse gas emissions or catching and storing carbon, USDA Secretary Tom Vilsack told Reuters on Monday. The new program is called the Partnerships for Climate-Smart Commodities. President Biden has committed to cutting agricultural emissions in half by 2030 and has asked farmers to lead the way, as U.S. agriculture is responsible for more than 10 percent of the country’s greenhouse gas emissions, according to U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) estimates, CNBC reported.

Water For All

January 30, 2022 Kendall Dix, People's Policy Project. Create! Food and Agriculture, Human Rights, Public Good, Water

By some estimates, more than two million people in the United States do not have running water and sanitation in their homes. Water utilities shut off water access to about one out of every twenty people, or close to fifteen million people, every year for nonpayment. Unsurprisingly, this affects racial minorities more than others. This barbaric practice has likely killed tens of thousands of people during the COVID-19 pandemic. Given how wealthy the United States is, it doesn’t have to be this way. And throughout the pandemic, we’ve caught some brief glimpses of alternatives. Though the federal government declined to pass a national moratorium on water shutoffs, some states and cities passed laws to prevent utilities from shutting off water to people during the pandemic.

After Sale, Valley Proteins Workers Continue Fight For Workplace Justice

January 18, 2022 Lewis Kendall, Facing South. Organize! Food and Agriculture, Labor Unions, Virginia, Worker Rights and Jobs

Valley Proteins, the Virginia-based rendering company at the center of an ongoing union organizing effort and a large class action lawsuit over alleged wage theft, has been sold. On Dec. 28, sustainable food processing multinational Darling Ingredients, headquartered in Texas, announced it was acquiring the privately owned Valley Proteins in a $1.1 billion deal. But current and former Valley Proteins employees are fighting to ensure that the sale doesn't provide cover for a company they say has long fostered a toxic and abusive work environment that has led to exploitative, unsafe conditions across its plants — a point driven home by the deaths of two workers over the summer.

15,000 Pounds Of Powdered Milk Delivered To Cuba

January 16, 2022 Medea Benjamin, People's Forum. Resist! Cuba, Economic Blockade, Food and Agriculture, Sanctions

On January 15, 2022, the organizations Puentes de Amor, The People’s Forum and CODEPINK are sending a cargo plane loaded with 15,000 pounds of powdered milk from Miami to Cuba. Representatives of the organizations are traveling to Cuba with the shipment. The aid will be received by the Martin Luther King Center in Havana. It will be distributed to pediatric hospitals in Havana. Since the pandemic and the disruption of food supplies it has caused, there has been a shortage of powdered milk in Cuba, which is normally given out by the state—for free—to children, pregnant women, the elderly and people with medical needs. Due to the reluctance of U.S. companies and banks to deal with Cuba for fear of running afoul of U.S. sanctions, Cuba buys imported milk—at an inflated cost—from places as far as New Zealand and Uruguay.

Is A Program To Foster Sustainable Farming Leaving Out Small-Scale Growers Of Color?

January 7, 2022 Anne Marshall-Chalmers, Inside Climate News. Educate! Environment, Farming, Finance and the Economy, Food and Agriculture

Even when there are funds available, the soils program can be difficult for farmers who grow many crops, as well as immigrant farmers who may not speak English fluently, to access or make use of. It’s also hard for lower-income growers who lease their land year to year to successfully complete an application, because the program requires a three-year commitment for all who participate. And HSP takes a largely prescriptive approach—requiring that one practice be applied to the same plot of land for the entire time. But smaller operations tend to grow a diverse range of crops that require intricate rotation and the ability to swap out crops due to weather, water availability and other factors.

Fifteen Things Biodiversity Protectors Are Watching Out For In 2022

January 2, 2022 Mary Hoff, Truthout. Educate! Biodiversity, climate crisis, Environment, Food and Agriculture

It’s no secret that the diversity of life around us is plummeting fast. In 2020 alone, scientists declared more than 100 species to be extinct. And that’s bad news not only for the creatures themselves, but for those of us (that would be all of us) who rely on them for food, to produce oxygen, to hold soil in place, to cleanse water, to beautify our world and so much more. According to the World Economic Forum, nature plays a key role in generating more than half of global GDP. So, what can we do to reduce future harm? One big thing is to identify emerging threats and opportunities to protect biodiversity and proactively shape policies and actions to prevent harm early on.

Not Everyone Is Feasting

November 30, 2021 Sasha Abramsky, Truthout. Educate! COVID-19, Food and Agriculture, Food Insecurity, Pandemic

As the COVID pandemic upended the economy in the spring and summer of 2020, tens of millions of Americans lost their jobs and became ever more vulnerable to hunger. In consequence, the country’s network of food banks saw a sudden spike in usage. Just prior to, and at the start of the pandemic, food banks distributed 1.1 billion pounds of food in the first quarter of 2020. By the fall of that year, they were handing out 1.7 billion pounds. Since then, that dizzying increase has leveled off or fallen somewhat in many places, but that doesn’t mean the country’s no longer suffering an epidemic of food insecurity. To the contrary: Large food banks around the country are still reporting far higher levels of need — and of food distribution to attempt to meet that need — than was the case prior to COVID.

These Tortilla Workers Walked Out And Won A Day Off Work

November 30, 2021 Jeff Schuhrke, In These Times. Resist! Food and Agriculture, Walkout, Worker Rights and Jobs, Workplace Safety

Chicago — Food production workers at El Milagro, one of Chicago’s most popular tortilla companies, join with community allies for a Day of the Dead vigil Nov. 2, 2021, in honor of five coworkers who died after contracting Covid-19 on the job. With candles and sugar skulls outside the company’s flagship taqueria in the Little Village neighborhood on the city’s Southwest Side, workers and supporters spoke about their ongoing standoff with management — and their demands for justice on the job. “We’re here to remember our coworkers, friends and loved ones who have passed on from Covid-19,” Guillermo Romero said at the vigil. “We’ll never forget them. But we continue in this fight, for ourselves, for our dignity and to get respect.” Romero has worked at the company for 16 years.

Indian Farmers Defend The Rights Of Farmers Everywhere

November 25, 2021 Vijay Prashad, People's Dispatch. Resist! Corporatization, Farmers, Food and Agriculture, India

On November 19, 2021, India’s prime minister Narendra Modi said, “[W]e have decided to repeal all three agricultural laws.” The prime minister was referring to the three agriculture laws that were rushed through the parliament in 2020. During his speech to announce the rollback, Modi told the farmers that they “should return to [their] homes, fields and to [their] families. Let’s make a fresh start.” At no point did Modi admit that his government had passed laws that would negatively impact the farmers, who have spent a year protesting the laws thrust upon them.

On Contact: Struggle Against Industrial Agriculture

November 21, 2021 Chris Hedges, RT. Uncategorized Big Ag, Chris Hedges, Farming, Food and Agriculture

The San Joaquin Valley in California is the most agriculturally productive farmland in the United States, but it is also plagued by high levels of poverty and water pollution, as well as the serious health risks that come with constant exposure to pesticides. These huge corporate farms in California, established over the last century, became the model for modern agrobusiness designed to exploit a transient labor force, bankrupt, and seize small family farms, exhaust the soil, and drain the aquifers and reservoirs. These agrobusinesses use their economic might to buy elected officials, deform the court system to legalize their assault on the land, and silence criticism in academia and the press.

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