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Fair Food: Stories from a Movement Changing the World

September 5, 2015 by Food Sovereignty

Reviewed by Jennifer Richards
We all need stories and narratives to help us make sense of the world. Fair Food is a collection of the personal stories of regular people who live out the change they want to see in the world around them. It is the primer for anyone wanting to jump into Australia’s Fair Food movement. Edited by AFSA’s National Coordinator, Nick Rose, it operates as the handbook to the food sovereignty movement in this country.

It outlines how the seed of an idea, if watered by imagination, hard work and lots of long conversations over lunch, can grow into a movement for social change.

At a glance it outlines both the players who have brought the food sovereignty movement to the place it is now and their collective and individual achievements.

After enthusiastic forewords by chef Guy Grossi and concerned eater/Rugby player David Pocock, Rose allows each individual to tell their own story in their own words. It is the breadth of experience in these pages that is inspiring. Farmers, academics, home-makers, eaters, policy-makers and permaculturalists fill these pages with their own variations on a common theme: A realization that there is something desperately wrong with the food system then a determination to forge a path to change it in their own way.

The stories document both the hardship and hope involved in the little steps that make up the larger movement. Inaugural AFSA president Michael Croft gives an account of stepping from his farm straight into the dizzying world of international food politics. Tammi Jonas charts her journey from a Twinkie-munching kid through politico-vegetarianism to her place as farmer, ‘activist omnivore’ and current AFSA president. Kristen Larson tells her story of becoming so disillusioned with the slow pace of change she broke out and started building open-source software resources to serve the greater goal of change. Carol Richards gives her perspective as an academic; Fran Murrell speaks as a GM campaigner; Cat Green is a radical homemaker passionate about her role in her community. Social entrepreneur Robert Pekin, permaculture expert Angelo Eliades and farmer Charles Massey are the other voices in this fair food chorale, the whole of which is greater than the sum of its parts.

In his introduction Nick Rose makes the point that for many of these players food-activism is the place they choose to concentrate their efforts because it is an area where so many social inequities are present.

What they really want is wide-spread social change into a fairer, more equitable world.

While I love the optimism associated with this ideal, I couldn’t help but wonder whether the revolutionary aspect of this might limit the wider appeal of these stories. Do I have to, I wondered, follow Cat Green’s amazing example and roll my own oats and produce my own honey to be effective in bringing about change? Would that idea appeal to enough of the vast numbers of people who would need to change from mindless consumers to active food citizens to have a real impact on the system? Is there a middle ground I can emulate or does such compromise just reinforce the injustices of the system? Green certainly believes that it is impossible to be ethical in an unethical system and the majority of other writers have come to that conclusion too.

Fair Food demonstrates the impact that individuals can have when they are seen as part of the wider push for change. If you are looking for your path in food activism in this country or if you need a snapshot of the Australian Food Sovereignty movement, this book will provide both insight and inspiration.

Fair Food: Stories from the Movement Changing the World is published by University of Queensland Press. Available now.

Jennifer Richards writes about sustainable food, ethical eating and supermarket-free shopping at Beyondthetrolley.com

Winter ‘Woodstock’ heralds revolution in Australian agriculture

August 6, 2015 by Food Sovereignty

Revolution was in the air last weekend at a remarkable gathering that ABC Gardening host Costa Georgiadis has coined ‘the Woodstock of Australian agriculture’.

The first Deep Winter Agrarian Gathering, held in the central highlands of Victoria, was attended by 150 farmers, connectors, communicators, educators and eaters collectively striving for a fair food system that operates in the best interests of producers and consumers.

To achieve their goal of developing truly integrated agroecological farming systems, they pledged to share resources and work together to support each other in diversifying their farms.

“The need to build a food system that includes true cost of farming – the social, ecological and regenerative costs of farming – has never been greater” said Robert Pekin, founder of Brisbane-based food enterprise, Food Connect.

The multiple dimensions of food production, distribution and connection addressed at the Gathering included the increasing incidence of ‘food fraud’ committed by some restaurants and providores.

Many farmers gave examples of their produce being named on menus of restaurants they were not currently supplying.

“Our efforts to maintain high welfare animal husbandry systems are being coopted by unscrupulous chefs or, in some cases, their suppliers” said Michele Lally of Savannah Lamb and Australian Food Sovereignty Alliance (AFSA) National Committee member.

“Accordingly, consumers who are aiming to make ethical choices and support the growth of the regenerative farming movement are also being duped.”

Producers called for solidarity in fighting fraudulent claims, and the burden of disabling regulations.

Food safety regulation, topical of late in Victoria where complaints by small producers and butchers have triggered a review of Victorian meat regulator PrimeSafe, was flagged as a major impediment to growing local food economies and rural communities.

Victorian producers face specific challenges as all other states and territories possess integrated food safety authorities.

“PrimeSafe has lost sight of its mission to support innovation in the industry. From all appearances, it only knows how to regulate Big Food, and is totally bewildered by the emerging fair food movement. It labeled small, transparent producers’ systems ‘novel supply chains’ in a recent consultation exercise” said Tammi Jonas, free-range pig farmer, butcher and President of the Australian Food Sovereignty Alliance (AFSA).

“A regulator that thinks it is ‘novel’ to sell food directly to people and allegedly more risky than long, industrial supply chains has lost sight of where the real risks to food safety are,” said Jonas.

Poultry farmers also expressed concerns over the narrow options available to them in processing their products. Many indicated their willingness to work with government authorities to build acceptance of safe, on-farm micro abattoirs such as that at Southampton Homestead in Western Australia.

Labour on farms was identified as another critical issue that concerns not only affordable wages and fair conditions but the need to ‘grow the next generation of growers’ in rapidly ageing rural communities, where the average age of the Australian farmer is 52.

The Gathering highlighted the role of connectors or ‘ethical middleman’ throughout the food system such as Open Food Network, Food Connect, co-operatives and farmers’ markets.

These innovative, community-building ventures were celebrated as promising alternatives to the systemic disconnection embodied by the duopoly of Coles & Woolworths (‘Colesworth’) which dominates 80 per cent of the grocery retail market in Australia.

In facing the challenges of developing a fairer food system those who attended the inaugural Deep Winter Agrarian Gathering demonstrated a spirit of optimism, engendered by the deeply practical work they do every day to connect people to fair food in their communities.

Paulette Whitney of Provenance Growers in Tasmania summed it up this way. “I’ve come home with knowledge, ideas and inspiration, and best of all with some incredible, true new friends, but most of all I’ve come home with a fire in my belly to fight the paradigm that says efficiency is dollars per acre, when for me it’s health, happiness, and good land stewardship that is true efficiency. ”

Contact: Tammi Jonas, AFSA President 0422 429 362

‪Tweet: #‎winteragrarian ‬‬‬‬‬‪#‎deepwinter2015‬‬‬‬‬

The story of Fair Food — coming to a bookstore near you!

July 23, 2015 by Alana Mann

IN VERY EXCITING NEWS, University of Queensland Press will be publishing in September Australia’s first anthology of the Fair Food movement, which in important respects is also a history of AFSA. The book’s synopsis follows – stay tuned for launch events and updates over the next few months!

Australia’s food system is more than just broken: it’s killing us. Now is the time to act, to make a difference – to change the world.

The groundbreaking Fair Food tells the new story of food – how food and farming in Australia are dramatically transforming at the grassroots towards reconnection, towards healing – of the land, of each other. It offers a compelling and coherent vision of how our future can be so much better than our present and our past, and how each of us can act to hasten the process of change.

Told through the experiences of several of the leading figures in Australia’s Fair Food movement, this book tells stories of personal change, courage, innovation and food activism, from local food hubs and backyard food-forests, to the GE-free movement, urban agriculture, radical homemaking and regenerative agriculture.

In a time of bullying corporations, supermarket monopolies and environmental degradation, Fair Food offers compelling and inspiring stories of personal transformation from everyday people, showing us that we, too, can be powerful agents of change in this time of need.

Edited by Fair Food pioneer Nick Rose, and with forewords by David Pocock and Guy Grossi, the book includes contributions from:

Michael Croft
Angelo Eliades
Cat Green
Tammi Jonas
Kirsten Larsen
Charles Massy
Fran Murrell
Robert Pekin
Carol Richards
Emma-Kate Rose.

[button_link url=”https://www.penguin.com.au/products/9780702253669/fair-food” target=”_blank” style=”” title=”” class=”” id=”” onclick=””]Visit book weblisting[/button_link]

AFSA joins university students in the Fair Food Challenge

July 3, 2015 by Alana Mann

By Sophie Lamond, co-leader of the Youth Food Movement, Melbourne

Fair food matters. This audience, if anyone, knows the importance of the mission to educate people about what fair food means and why it is crucial for our future. One of our biggest challenges is to communicate this message beyond our immediate community. It is vital that we spread the word far and wide and turn these conversations into action.

This is the basis of the newly launched Fair Food Challenge. Supported by AFSA, the Challenge is asking Australian higher education institutions to implement sustainable food policies that support and encourage local, sustainable, ethical and fair procurement. We are calling for a commitment to 20 per cent fair and sustainable food procurement by 2020.

The Fair Food Challenge is inspired by the Real Food Challenge (RFC), a grassroots movement that begun in 2007 in the United States. The RFC bought together student activists, national food movement leaders and higher education sustainability experts to agitate for real food on university campuses. In the intervening eight years the American organization has become a national movement that has persuaded dozens of tertiary institutions to adopt food policies. Major victories have included the integration of the Real Food Challenge into the sustainability policies of multi-campus systems such as state university system of California. In total the challenge has succeeded in redirecting over $60 million of institutional money to purchasing local, fair, sustainable and ethical food.

It is a daunting aspiration, but an important one. If we can successfully bring this challenge to Australian universities we can do so much to further the cause of fair food in this country. Not only can we provide substantial direct economic support for fair food producers, but we can open up a massive platform for advocacy and education. University students are away from home and on their own for the first time, and the behaviours they adopt at this time will influence the rest of their lives. To encourage young people to ask critical questions about where their food comes from and to demand more from their food system sets up a new generation of consumers willing to venture outside the strictures of duopoly shopping and fast food.

Students have a right to food. Research that we’ve undertaken shows that Australian university students are overwhelmed with the task of trying to feed themselves good food while surviving on low wages and sensitive time pressures. Recent reports have outlined that students are lining up for meals from charity because they can’t afford anything else. University food outlets are expensive and often lacking in healthy options. Part of the challenge will be to encourage the provision of healthy, fresh and affordable food on campuses.

We face a unique set of hurdles in the Australian iteration of this challenge; although we may think of America has the epitome of the free-market it still has a much more centralised model of food procurement than anything we know in Australia. Our childhoods were free of school lunch programs and our university experience is not defined by dining halls. Food on our campuses is a dispersed affair – which means we will need some creative and engaged thinking to bring about change in our system. But difficult is not impossible, we will work with student unions, clubs and societies, university administration and students to create knowledge networks that can contribute to the formulation of sustainable food policies.

We won’t be able to do this alone, this is a challenge that will benefit from collaboration and engagement from a wide variety of stakeholders. Join Us. Sign up for updates at fairfoodchallenge.com. Spread the word, if you or anyone you know are interested in fair food and are involved with any Australian tertiary institution we’d love to hear from you.

A gross infringement of food sovereignty and basic rights

April 26, 2015 by Food Sovereignty

Media release 26 April 2015

The Western Australian Government’s proposed closure of remote Aboriginal communities

The Australian Food Sovereignty Alliance (AFSA), supported by the Public Health Association of Australia (PHAA), express our strongest opposition to the forced removal of Aboriginal peoples from their communities, as proposed by the Western Australian government.

Such a removal would infringe fundamental human rights, and further diminish the food sovereignty of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander peoples.

Government in breach of obligations

ABS data released this week indicates that more than one in five Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander people live in a household which had run out of food and was unable to buy more, a rate of food insecurity six times higher than the rest of the Australian population. AFSA supports the combined call by the Public Health Association of Australia, Red Cross and Dietitians Association of Australia for increased resourcing of nutrition and food supply strategies to respond to this crisis.

This appalling rate of food insecurity shows that our Federal and state governments are in breach of their obligations to ensure that all Australians, and especially the most disadvantaged, enjoy the fundamental human right to adequate and culturally appropriate food, guaranteed by Article 10 of the United Nations Covenant on Economic, Social and Cultural Rights. Australia is a signatory to that Covenant and has ratified it. The UN Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples outlines a range of rights of indigenous peoples which would be contravened by the forced removal of Aboriginal peoples from their communities and lands.

We believe it is a fundamental and ongoing act of reconciliation, respect and celebration of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander peoples and their culture that as a nation we support their right to remain on their traditional lands. This is where they are able to maintain the crucial relationships to the land, animals, plants, and ancestral and spiritual beings.

We acknowledge also that language, culture, spirituality, health and wellbeing and nutritional and medicinal knowledge are inextricably linked to peoples’ traditional lands and are strengthened, deepened and replenished by being on their traditional lands.

In Western Australia, dispossession continues

The history of colonisation of Australia demonstrates that when Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander peoples are removed from their traditional lands there is a loss of skills and knowledge of the nutritional, medicinal and spiritual properties of traditional foods and the language to describe them. These processes of removal constitute a form of cultural genocide. It is unacceptable for this to happen yet again.

In the historical frame of the last 230 years, the current proposal by the WA government to remove basic services and infrastructure support from some remote Aboriginal communities is, whatever the rhetorical and ‘pragmatic’ justifications, yet another dispossession of both people, and the country to which they belong and owe the duty of custodianship.

With rapidly declining soil health and water availability in Australia, the living bank of sustainable land management knowledge held by Aboriginal people who have been able to maintain their language, culture and connection to country is an irreplaceable resource, not just to the people themselves, but to the whole nation. The impacts on Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander peoples’ lives that have occurred through colonisation mean that remaining knowledge and skills are vulnerable to loss. Closing remote Aboriginal communities would all but guarantee that loss.

Should the Western Australian government proceed with the closure of remote communities it would set a disturbing precedent for the denial by governments of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islanders rights across Australia to remain on their traditional lands. Such action would also have broader implications for infrastructure in rural and remote areas of Australia particularly regarding critical issues such as road maintenance and health services which are shared by all.

A better way forward

What is required of our governments are responses to Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander peoples human rights which are driven not by governments but by Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander people themselves.

AFSA calls on the Western Australian government to confirm that no remote Aboriginal communities will be stripped of essential service and infrastructure supports.

The reoccurring failures of governments to adequately and consistently respect and uphold Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander peoples’ rights to food sovereignty and food security is reflected in the lack of national, coordinated policy, funding and practice regarding food sovereignty and food security.

We call on governments at all levels to come together as a matter of urgency to develop in collaboration with Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander organisations and communities, health and community sector peak bodies and other key stakeholders, a policy framework, funding commitments and national action plan for food sovereignty and food security.

………..

About the Australian Food Sovereignty Alliance and food sovereignty

The Australian Food Sovereignty Alliance (AFSA) is working towards a fair, diverse and democratic food system for the benefit of all Australians. We are a civic organisation of Australian producers, communities, organisations and individuals committed to upholding the rights of peoples to food sovereignty.

Food sovereignty asserts the right of peoples to nourishing and culturally appropriate food produced and distributed in ecologically sound and ethical ways and their right to collectively determine their own food and agriculture systems.

The degree to which peoples experience food sovereignty has a direct bearing on their food security. Food security exists when all people, at all times, have physical, social and economic access to sufficient, safe and nutritious food which meets their dietary needs and food preferences for an active and healthy life. The greater peoples’ food sovereignty, the greater the level of control they have over their food choices and the sources of their food.

Contact:

Clare Richards, National Committee member for North Australia, Australian Food Sovereignty Alliance:

Mobile: 0409 944 136
Email: clare@clareskitchen.com

Michael Moore, CEO, Public Health Association of Australia:

Mobile: 0417 249 731

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