Did you miss out on the Community Food Fund grant? Let’s know

June 1, 2014 by

ONE OF OUR THEMES FOR FAIR FOOD WEEK this year will be — Supporting your local community fair food projects and groups — organise a fundraiser for a group that missed out on the Community Food Fund grants or other food project or group you’d like to support.

In February, the Federal Government axed the $1.5 mn Community Food Fund that was part of the National Food Plan.

364 groups around Australia applied for grants under this fund.

If you are from one of those groups, or you know of someone who applied, please let us know.

We want to profile and support you as part of Fair Food Week 2014.

[button_link url="mailto:admin@afsa.org.au" target="" style="" title="" class="" id="" onclick=""]Email and let us know if you missed out on the Community Food Fund grants[/button_link]

[message_box type="note" icon="yes" ]

Theme 2: Support your local community fair food projects and groups

Organise a fundraiser for a group that missed out on the Community Food Grants or other food project or group you’d like to support

Where government fails, communities can succeed.

That’s the potential Fair Food Week 2014 offers event organisers across the country. Fair Food Week celebrates community self-help food initiatives such as:

food co-operatives
community supported agriculture
food rescue
farmers’ markets and the rest.

Fair Food Week 2014 is the opportunity to raise funds for community food initiatives denied promised funding when the federal government cancelled the Community Food Grants scheme.

[/message_box]

AFSA’s electoral scorecard — only the Greens pass the fair food test

August 21, 2013 by Nick Rose

The government and the Coalition fail badly with 24.25% and 8% respectively

The Australian Food Sovereignty Alliance (AFSA) today released the results of its Fair Food Electoral Scorecard which rates Australia’s three major parties according to the values, principles and proposals for a fair food system set out in the Peoples' Food Plan.

In June this year AFSA sent a survey to the parties, seeking to gauge the extent of their commitment to a fair, sustainable and democratic food system across eight main indicators:

[bullet_list i class="icon-plus-sign" indent="20px" style="" color="#98CC66"]

transitioning to sustainable and viable farming systems
optimising the health and well-being of all Australians
prioritising food and farming in planning frameworks
tackling food insecurity and food injustice
tackling corporate concentration and creating a more diverse food retail ecosystem
supporting fairness for small-scale farmers abroad, especially women
promoting fairer trading systems
promoting inclusive and participatory governance frameworks for food and agriculture.

[/bullet_list]

Our findings are summarised below. Note that the Coalition has not yet released a detailed food and agriculture policy — should it do so prior to the election, we will update these results.

[button_link url="https://afsa.org.au/wp-content/uploads/2013/08/mr_ASFA-electoral-scorecard-22-8-131.pdf" target="blank" style="dark" title="" i class="icon-download-alt" id="" onclick=""] Download AFSA Electoral Scorecard press release — 21.8.13 (pdf 889KB) [/button_link]

[button_link url="https://afsa.org.au/wp-content/uploads/2013/08/Fair-Food-Survey-AFSA-15.8.13-Consolidated.pdf" target="blank" style="dark" title="" i class="icon-download-alt" id="" onclick=""] Download AFSA's consolidated survey — 21.8.13 (pdf document) [/button_link]

Media coverage: AFSA response to the National Food Plan

May 24, 2013 by Food Sovereignty

Media coverage of AFSA's comment on the National Food Plan in the Age and the West Australian

Food plan forgets small growers: alliance

The West Australian and Age newspapers, via AAP, cover AFSA's statement issued on 24 May 2013 on the release of the National Food Plan White Paper.

AFSA spokesman Dr Nick Rose said there wasn't much in the plan for small-to-medium scale food businesses, which employ most Australians in the food sector.

[quote author="Nick Rose" image="https://afsa.org.au/wp-content/uploads/2013/05/afsa_129x129.png" w="" h="" image_align=""]We are looking for a National Food Plan that is fair to Australia's food consumers as well as to family and small-to-medium scale farmers and food processing businesses and their workers", he said in statement on Friday.[/quote]

AFSA said ensuring the health and wellbeing of consumers and Australia's environmental resources should have been top of the agenda for any economically viable and nutritious food system.

[quote author="" image="https://afsa.org.au/wp-content/uploads/2013/05/afsa_129x129.png" w="" h="" image_align=""]Dr Rose said it was positive to see the government finally recognise the role of the community food sector, but the $1.5 million in grants was at best a "token gesture". AFSA has encouraged the government to look again at the allocated funds, and consider including the informal and community sector into Australia's national food system.[/quote]

[button_link url="http://au.news.yahoo.com/thewest/a/-/national/17317201/food-plan-forgets-small-growers-alliance/" class="icon-globe" target="blank" background="#98CC66" style="" title="" class="" id="" onclick=""]Read West Australian article—Food Plan forgets small grower: alliance[/button_link]

[button_link url="http://news.theage.com.au/breaking-news-national/food-plan-forgets-small-growers-alliance-20130524-2k6ox.html" target="blank" background="#98CC66" style="" title="" class="" id="" onclick=""]Read Age article—Food Plan forgets small grower: alliance[/button_link]

The National Food Plan: Does it support health, sustainability and fairness?

May 24, 2013 by Food Sovereignty

On Saturday 25th May the Australian Federal Government will finally launch its long-awaited National Food Plan.

The Australian Food Sovereignty Alliance, along with organisations and businesses representing hundreds of thousands of Australians, are deeply concerned that this Plan is taking the country in the opposition direction to that demanded by the principles of fairness, health and well-being, genuine sustainability and true resilience in what will be challenging years and decades ahead.

[quote author="Dr Nick Rose" image="https://afsa.org.au/wp-content/uploads/2012/11/Nick-Rose_logo.jpg" w="" h="" image_align=""]"We are looking for a National Food Plan that is fair to Australia's food consumers as well as to family and small-to-medium scale farmers and food processing businesses and their workers", said Australian Food Sovereignty Alliance (AFSA) spokesman, Dr Nick Rose.

The health and well-being of all Australians, the future of our fresh water supply of which agriculture consumes around 65-70 percent, the soils that are the foundation of a secure food future, and the ecosystems that supply services that support national food production are the real resources of an economically viable and health-promoting food system. These qualities underwrite the viability of our farmers and regional centres, and their enhancement should have top priority in a National Food Plan that truly addresses our food future in the best interests of all Australians.[/quote]

[button_link url="https://afsa.org.au/wp-content/uploads/2013/05/AFSA-Press-Release-24th-May-2013-NFP-release.pdf" target="blank" icon="icon-download-alt" background="#98CC66" style="" title="" class="" id="" onclick=""]Download AFSA media release — National Food Plan of 24 May 2013[/button_link]

The AFSA will offer further comment in the coming days, when we have had a chance to examine some of the detail of the National Food Plan.

Food Sovereignty: A social movement for a fair food system

May 15, 2013 by Food Sovereignty

In the April-May 2013 issue of Arena Magazine, AFSA National Co-ordinator Nick Rose discusses the importance of food sovereignty and the People's Food Plan process for Australia.

[quote author="" image="https://afsa.org.au/wp-content/uploads/2013/05/Food_Sovereignty_banner1.jpg" w="125" h="125" image_align=""]AFSA’s research shows that most Australians want something different to a food system controlled by two giant supermarkets and a handful of other less visible mega-corporations such as Cargill and Archer Daniels Midlands. National opinion surveys carried out by the Australia Institute over the past year have found the following:

[bullet_list icon="" indent="10px" style=""]

75 per cent of Australians believe levels of supermarket concentration are excessive
86 per cent say supporting our farmers to grow more, and 62 per cent say ‘protecting our best farmland from mining interests and suburban sprawl’, should be in the top two measures for guaranteeing our food security (only 5 per cent say ‘import more basic foods’)
Over 90 per cent say it is ‘very’ or ‘quite’ important to them that we have a thriving farming
sector and small-to-medium sized food businesses
85 per cent want ‘support for local and regional food systems’ to be in the top two priorities of a National Food Plan.