|
The
California Food and Justice Coalition
CFJC
Home | Newsletters | Issues/Policy
| Events | Press
Room | Publications |
Join Today!
Taking
Back the Food System:
Organizing for Food Justice in California
Read
Notes from the Summit
- View Summit Program
(in pdf format)
Summary
Report
On June 10 and 11th more than 230 community food security advocates
joined at USC in Los Angeles for the 2nd California Community
Food Security Summit, Taking Back the Food System: Organizing
for Food Justice in California. The summit, co-hosted by
the California Food and Justice Coalition (CFJC) and the national
Community Food Security Coalition (CFSC), brought together activists,
farmers, organizers and community leaders from across the state
to find common ground on issues related to nutrition, public
health and sustainable agriculture.
The first summit in Oakland in 2002 was highlighted by the formation
of the California Food and Justice Coalition, and in
the two years since, the CFJC has begun organizing to bring
attention to the community food security crisis in the Golden
State. While Californians have seen many victories in protecting
our rights to healthy, safe and affordable food, millions continue
to suffer from hunger, obesity and diabetes. Meanwhile, the
number of small farms, which often grow the healthiest foods,
continue to decline. Members of the CFJC work together to develop
policies and programs that empower local food systems across
California.
The summit featured a mix of keynote, plenary, and breakout
sessions meant to inform and inspire participants and illustrate
connections between community needs, state level policy change
and the global food justice movement. As with the first summit,
a primary focus of this event was to engage people from across
the state, working in all sectors related to food security,
in developing and carrying out CFJC's issue oriented policy
and informational campaigns. Here is a summary of attendees
evaluations of the summit:
- 88%
of evaluations received rated the summit excellent to good.
- Most
useful parts of the summit included the Thursday afternoon
breakout sessions, the Friday morning organizing committee
meetings and networking opportunities.
- Almost
all who responded said the Summit increased their understanding
of Community Food Security.
- Keynotes,
roundtables and concurrent sessions rated on average as excellent
to good. Half found Anuradha Mittal's keynote address to be
excellent.
- Two
thirds rated the Policy Matters panel as excellent or good
and many commented that the panel spurred an important dialogue
among the membership.
- The
organizing committee meetings were all rated in the excellent
to good categories and people felt that they where focused
on issues that interested them.
- The
majority of people responded that the Summit increased their
interest and commitment to work on statewide community food
security issues.
Day One
Day one began with a look at the worldwide movement for fair trade
and food sovereignty with an inspirational keynote (listen)
by Anuradha Mittal, founder and executive director of the Oakland
Institute. The day continued with a roundtable focused on
tying together the multiple food justice movements in California
that led into an afternoon of concurrent breakout sessions where
community leaders presented practices and programs that are creating
change across the state. The day closed with a celebration of
local food and talent at the Mercado La Paloma, co-hosted by the
Los Angeles Food Justice Network and Blacksmith Records.
Day Two
Day two opened with an address by Deputy Secretary Valerie Brown
of the California Department of Food and Agriculture. A roundtable
on state level food policy issues followed and was closed with
a passionate debate between CFJC members over the role of policy
in creating community food security. After learning about and
discussing policy issues that impact California's food system,
attendees participated in Coalition organizing committee meetings
where they worked together to strategize action plans for implementing
CFJC's policy platform (read committee notes).
The day closed with a tour of urban farming sites in and around
downtown Los Angeles, including the LA
Regional Area Food Bank Community Garden on 41st and Alameda,
the "Urban Oasis," at Crenshaw High School, and the "Milpa" garden
at Normandie Avenue Elementary School.
Coalition Organizing Committee Meetings
Coalition Organizing Committees (now referred to as Membership
Action Teams (MATs)) met on Friday morning to develop goals and
action plans around CFJC's policy priority areas. Three of the
MATs were formed to correspond with issue areas within the CFJC
policy platform (view platform
in pdf format), which was developed based on members input
at the first CFS Summit in 2002. These three were: Forming a Statewide
Food Policy Council, Ensuring Access to Healthy Foods, and Farm
to School (read about committees). The fourth
MAT, Land Access for Food Production, was brought to the Coalition
by the membership and in coordination with the Reparations and
Land Reform concurrent breakout session began identifying a constituency
within CFJC on these issues.
For most, the organizing committee meetings were an opportunity
to review CFJC's recommendations in these areas and to get up
to speed on what actions or organizing activities the CFJC steering
committee has been involved in during the last two years. Participants
also discussed strategies for implementing the CFJC policy recommendations
and campaign activities that would empower grassroots advocates,
strengthen local food systems, and build support for policies
and programs that promote community food security at the state
level. Summit participants were encouraged to join a committee
that they were interested in continuing to work with after the
Summit. At each of the meetings no fewer then 20 participants
signed up to continue to be involved with the Member Action Teams,
and many volunteered to do specific follow up activities.
Next Steps
The most significant outcome of the summit is the formation of
CFJC's Membership Action Teams (MATs), initiated by the Coalition
Organizing Committee meetings that took place on Friday morning
at the Summit. The four current MATs are: Farm to School, Forming
a Statewide Food Policy Council in California, Ensuring Access
to Healthy Food and Access to Land for Food Production. These
Action Teams will be the mechanism by which CFJC members participate
in developing and carrying out the Coalition's policy and education
campaigns. Each of the MATs will meet in August 2004 to continue
the planning they began at the Summit, and to develop campaigns
for implementing CFJC's policy platform and empowering local food
systems in California. For more information on the Membership
Action Teams contact Heather Fenney at heather@foodsecurity.org
or 310-822-5410. You must be a member of the CFJC to participate
in a MAT - sign the pledge and join today!
Notes from Concurrent Breakout Sessions (in pdf format)
Coalition Organizing Committee Notes (in pdf format)
Forming a State Food
Policy Council in California
Ensuring Access
to Healthy Foods
Farm to School
Land Access for Food Production
Notes from Pleneries and Keynotes
(in pdf format)
Keynote Address, The new face of agriculture: Linking justice
with sustainability by: Anuradha Mittal, Founder & Executive Director,
Oakland Institute (listen
to MP3 - this 20MB file takes a few minutes to download and
works best with a highspeed connection.)
Policy Matters Panel
Thank you all the Summit Funders and Co-sponsors
Funders:
The Columbia
Foundation
The California Wellness
Foundation
California
Nutrition Network *, with funding support from the National
Food Stamp Program, USDA
Center for
Ecoliteracy
Risk Management
Agency, USDA
Co-sponsors:
California
Hunger Action Coalition
California
Nutrition Network*
California Sustainable
Agriculture Working Group
Center
for Food and Justice, UEPI, Occidental College*
Community Alliance
with Family Farmers
Community
Services Unlimited, Inc.*
Esparanza Community Housing Corporation
Foundation
for Global Community*
Friends of the Certified Farmers' Market
Gold Coast Growers' Collaborative
Los Angeles Food Justice Network*
Prevention
Institute
School of Policy, Planning and Development, USC
Strategic
Alliance for Health Food and Activity Environments*
Sustainable Economic
Enterprises of Los Angeles*
*Participated on the summit planning committee
CFJC Home | Newsletters | Issues/Policy
| Events | Press
Room | Publications |
Join Today!
|
