Comments MichaelDimock has made
better know the peeps
I had to smile when I read this critique. Many of the leaders involved in slow food are on the ground working as farmers, chefs, and nonprofit advocates. The declaration referred to was not even initiated by slow food, but by an allied organization. On Slow Food Nation was magnificent in many ways, but overshot its mandate posted 1 year, 2 months ago 17 Responses
Nice to see the dialog grow
I am very happy to see so many folks commenting on Tom's blog (and so many other blogs) and the meaning of Slow Food Nation. The comments reflect the amazing diversity in the spectrum of perceptions that shape our world. They underscore the complexity we must engage in order to comprehend and discern the path to effective action.
As former chairman of Slow Food USA, and a co-leader of the Russian River chapter, I can only say that at last the organization worked very hard to move out of its comfort zone. It is imperfect. It is very white, middle class, and its competencies are limited. But given the constant criticism that it is elitist, Slow Food risked much and acted boldly. It did not let fear of judgement from foes and allies stop it from pursing its mission.
So now Slow Food will learn, or not, be better or not, make progress or not. I am an optimist. I think Slow Food will become better at what it does. It may or may not become less white in the short to medium term and maybe as Brahm Ahmadi points out that is less important than the new alliances it builds. I am hopeful that it will follow his advise and become a better ally to groups working in the inner city and with farmworkers.
I hope it does not lose its contact with the middle class. In fact, I hope it grows to include millions of middle class Americans. Because if it does, the food system will change. The middle class represents the bulk of the nation's buying power. If people really began to use good, clean and fair as their criteria for purchasing food, the supply side would change in response very quickly.
Slow Food is made up of people and we all know that all people are imperfect. So, let's not expect too much too soon, but let's keep the faith and hope for the best. I, for one, will keep up the pressure on my fellow Slow Food members and the current leadership. I know others will do the same inside and outside the organization. But in the end, we should appreciate, or at least recognize, that a new and potentially powerful ally has emerged to help the good food movement grow its influence on the nation. Has any other group garnered so much media for good food in such a short span of time? I don't think so.On Slow Food Nation was magnificent in many ways, but overshot its mandate posted 1 year, 2 months ago 17 Responses
root causes and principle #1
Jason is right, a blog is not the right place to do deep analysis, but unfortunately it seems more of us are spending more time on the blogs than in the stacks of our nation's great libraries. But that is another topic.
I am actually not prone to debate, which is rooted in the concept of verbal combat. I prefer dialog that allows all sides to uncover deeper understanding of the question at hand. In that spirit, I'd like to continue exploring with Jason some of the topics arising from our initial exchange.
The 12 principles are in fact an attempt to get the nation to focus on solving the root causes of health, social and environmental problems caused by food and agriculture in America. If Congress were to apply the 12 principles to USDA and FDA programs and investments, and if communities were to apply them to local food ordinances and related activities, the nation's food system would look very different.
The document and its principles rest on the important assumption that "mental models", or our beliefs about the world, shape perceptions and actions. The first principle is an attempt to remind us all that healthy food and agriculture are required for any healthy civilization.
Most Americans hardly think about food and agriculture in a meaningful way anymore. If we were to all remember the importance of these related topics, policy would improve in this country. It is interesting to note that between 1900 and 1920, nearly 2 dozen major, groundbreaking bills were introduced and passed in the Congress related to assisting farmers, ranchers and rural communities. Now, we are lucky if the topic is discussed once in Congress during the five years between farm bills. We have lost focus on the fundamental need for healthy food and agriculture as the basis of national health.
The lack of focus is understandable given the apparent success of American agriculture. We have lots of cheap food so people perceive there is no problem, nothing to think or worry about. Unfortunately, the lack of concern hides that our food and agriculture are making us fat and ill in all areas of the country and poorer in rural communities. Humans and animals suffer unjustifiably. The water is dirtier and top soil less abundant. We can do better.
Jason's focus on the word "prosperous" in his comments on principle #1 is revealing. The principle actually says much more: Healthy food and agriculture "forms the foundation of secure and prosperous societies, healthy communities, and healthy people." The reduction of focus to "prosperity" reflects a bias toward economic analysis and reveals a fundamental cause of world problems: reductionist economic and scientific thinking. Most of us do not see the whole system and the interlinking dynamics that shape our lives.
The first principle is based on the logic that the healthier the food and agriculture, the healthier the environment surrounding the civilization and the healthier the people within it. Even if a nation is forced to import its food, that imported food should be healthy. In addition, the nation growing the food for them had better do it in a way that does not degrade its ability to keep producing and exporting or the importing nation will eventually suffer the consequences. It is all connected.
Export oriented agriculture is ubiquitous, but it is based on cheap oil and mass subsidies to producers that keep export prices low. Former Mexican corn farmers cross our border to work our fields because US corn production has destroyed their domestic market. Most economists would see that as a good thing. I see it as a problem with vast social, ecological, and health consequences that are at least if not more important than the economic "benefit."
The logic of market capitalism would say that the US is a more efficient corn producer. But it says that because the current measuring tool is rigged, it is insufficient. It does not account for the externalized impacts of that "efficiency". Let's factor in the financial impacts of atrazine, anhydrous ammonia, and nitrogen fertilizer on water and health in the midwest or the fisheries and tourism centers impacted by the dead zone in the Gulf of Mexico. Let's factor in the impacts of air pollution and climate change from carbon-based fuel used in tractors, combines, trucks, and irrigation pumps. Let's factor in the loss of top soil due to the massive perennial monoculture that is corn and soybeans in a region that evolved a perennial polyculture that was the great plains. Let's factor in the cost of border patrols and the DEA's war on drug smuggling that have emerged in sync with rising poverty in rural Mexico. If those costs we added to the price of US corn, I doubt it would be less expensive than corn grown in smaller plots with more hand labor in Mexico.
I think we need to think much more holistically when we consider whether healthy food and agriculture does or does not "form the foundation of secure and prosperous societies, healthy communities, and healthy people."
Michael Dimock visit www.rocnetwork.org visit www.fooddeclaration.org
On The 12 (annotated) principles for a healthy food and agriculture system posted 1 year, 2 months ago 7 Responses12 Principles
I appreciate Jason's focus on the 12 principles found within the Declaration for Healthy Food and Agriculture, but I am a bit disappointed by his shallow review. If he was to visit the site http://www.fooddeclaration.org, or contact anyone involved, he would learn that the document is a final draft. The document's framers, writers, and original endorsers are inviting anyone to comment for the next 90 days. It must be improved.
Jason comments on each principle, but I will focus on only two to highlight my critique of his critique. First, regards the first principle: to say that many regions are prosperous without agriculture or food playing a central role is simply absurd. It like saying cities have no connection to agriculture. Cities exist because of agriculture. Every human life in every point on earth is based on food and most every on agriculture. Without food and agriculture, we are all dead within a matter of weeks. Japan has some of the most protectionist agriculture policy in the world because it understands the need for food security. The northeast US is home to some of the most innovative efforts in the nation to rebuild local food systems. Singapore is very vulnerable because it cannot feed itself. Jason's oversight reflects the reason why this statement is the first principle in the document. The average citizen, even the most educated among us, has lost touch with reality around food and agriculture.
Second, regards principle #8. Most agricultural economists today would recognize that the current food system in based on industrial thinking: specialization, efficiency, mechanization, and economies of scale. The industrial model or framework has worked very well at producing calories at low cost because it externalizes impacts on workers, the environment and human health and because it is heavily subsidized directly through farm bill payments and indirectly through subsidies to the oil industry. Principle #8 points out that food and agriculture actually emerge from biological processes that must be understood, respected, and fostered in order to achieve a sustainable system. Human efforts to create agricultural factories are, according to the Millennium Assessment and many other important scientific studies, a primary cause of ecological destruction. The soil is not a factory. Animals and humans are not machines. All are living things that require flows of resources and energy at the macro and micro level that are too often impeded by treating farms like factories. Erosion of top soil, drying uf of water supplies, desertification, the increasing pest pressures on farms, cancer rates among farmers and farmworkers are proof we have messed up too many natural systems. We have to use a biological framework to rethink the ways we produce food. Wes Jackson and Allan Savory, and many others around the world have done great work in this arena.
The 12 principles are food for thought to those just entering the arena of food systems. They are lessons learned by those who have worked for decades on the problems, and the 12 principles can always be improved. Please help us to do that by visiting http://www.fooddeclaration.org.
Michael Dimock visit www.rocnetwork.org visit www.fooddeclaration.org
On The 12 (annotated) principles for a healthy food and agriculture system posted 1 year, 2 months ago 7 ResponsesChangemakers Day at Slow Food Nation
I appreciate Tom's balanced critique of Slow Food Nation. I want to clarify the realities around Changemakers Day and why it was "weirdly" an invitation only event. Roots of Change was the the sponsor of Changemakers Day. We are a California based and California focused organization with the mission of creating a sustainable food system in the state by the year 2030. We support a broad network of organizations working in the good food movement. Brahm Ahmadi from The People's Grocery and Anya Fernald of Slow Food Nation were both members of the first group of ROC Fellows. Over 200 California food system leaders have been working collaboratively on a strategy for transforming the state's food system. It is known as California's Campaign for a New Mainstream in Food, Farms and Fisheries (Please check it out:
http://www.rocfund.org/campaign/campaign/campaign-strateg ...).Changemakers could only involve 670 people due to venue and budget constraints. We needed people connected to the Campaign to be involved in the day. We knew more people would want to come than could be accommodated. Thus, ROC -- not Slow Food Nation -- made the decision that it would be by invitation in order to ensure that a critical mass of CA-based actors would be able to participate. We did include nearly 200 non-Californians to support healthy cross-pollination. We did provide travel stipends to limited income people and small nonprofits that wanted to travel from afar to attend. Thus, in my view, it was not weird, it was a rationale decision given constraints. But, however you may view it, please forgive the imperfections this first time out, we did the best we could. On Slow Food Nation was magnificent in many ways, but overshot its mandate posted 1 year, 2 months ago 17 Responses