Michael Pollan's key note address at the 2009 Georgia Organics Conferene and Trade Show.

“Obama did not run on a platform of reforming food and agriculture, yet, I would argue he will have to tackle this issue sooner or later. Why? Unless he does, it will be impossible to make any progress on three of the issues he did run on: Energy independence. Climate change. The healthcare crisis. Why? Because the way we’re feeding ourselves is at the heart of all three problems.”

For people who say the organic food and farming story has been told, or that the label has lost credibility, Harvesting Justice has a crucial reminder. Pointing to the spate of articles on organic and sustainable food coming out of the NYT, including one titled Is a Food Revolution Now in Season, blogger Barb Howe writes:

[T]he "food revolution" appears to have even the support of the first family who, with the help of children from a local elementary school, recently planted a new organic vegetable garden on White House grounds. Incorporating bees for pollination and ladybugs for pest control, the 1,100 square foot garden will produce over 55 varieties of seasonal vegetables for White House residents, staff and guests.

Besides being healthier and better for the earth than conventional chemically-produced produce, the new White House garden carries some valuable lessons for the next generation: participating in the planting, nuturing and harvesting of crops helps children understand where food comes from and the important role that agricultural workers play in getting produce from the farm to our plates.

This is the part of the organic story that has not been told. And it's crucial to tell it, because farm work is tough work, and, heck, if we're going to talk about food revolutions, U.S. farm workers have been pushing for a real change in how food gets to our plates since the early-1960's, addressing pesticide poisoning among farmworkers and better working conditions for the people who harvest our food. 

Indeed, US farmworkers have actually been telling a different part of the organic story for some time. It's just that many in the organic industry have not wanted to listen. Or carry that story forward. 

Read more...

Judging by Alice Waters' interview on 60 Minutes this past Sunday, the downturn in the economy has not impacted her restaurant Chez Panisse at all.  Apparently San Franciscans are still going for the roughly hundred dollar meals of grilled local squab in salmis sauce with squab liver toast and bittersweet chocolate souffle.

Because Waters is sticking to her guns. It's slow food or die at Chez Panisse. And who could argue with her core belief that eating foods without poisons on them is a right, not a privilege? Not El Dragón. And local food isn't just a lefty, Berkely cliche -- after all,  isn't it an old school Republican value to have a web of small businesses (local food systems)  networking across the country? And, for years, major hospitals have been begging Americans to eat more, fresh, green veggies in order to staunch the obesity and diabetes epidemics in this country.

The problem is that Waters doesn't explain why people think sustainable food is expensive and why it seems elitist. Without doing that, the whole argument for local/sustainable/organic foods, the whole movement, stops in its tracks like a shopper with sticker shock -- and Waters opens herself  to being called elitist. Which fellow gatekeeper Leslie Stahl does. Repeatedly.

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"The OFPA [Organic Foods and Production Action] was passed under the first Bush administration in 1990, and came into full implementation under George W. Bush. But organics isn't solely a Republican issue. We have to branch out!"

-Jim Riddle,
Former Chair of the USDA's
National Organic Standards Board

Organic Farming Conference, 2005 

Kathleen Merrigan, Director of the Agriculture, Food and Environment Program at Tufts, has been appointed Deputy USDA Secretary.Pop the champagne, kids, because this one's a win for the organic movement and sustainable farming. Read more...