april: challenges in common
In the past month, I have visited with campus leaders from University of Michigan, Michigan State University, Eastern Michigan University, Kalamazoo College, Loyola University Chicago, Western State University in Colorado, Colorado College, and University of Denver, not to mention the campuses I regularly connect with in Minnesota --- St. Catherine's, Macalester, Carleton, St. Olaf, and the University of Minnesota in the Twin Cities, Morris, and Duluth.
Needless to say, it has been a busy month, and it's pretty remarkable to sit here and reflect on campus/community food system experiences from mountains to valleys to Great Lakes to mega-cities. What strikes me most, however, are the similar challenges that unite all of these communities when it comes to creating a more healthy, equitable, and sustainable food system.
1. Systems
Producers in Western Minnesota and Southern Michigan need liability coverage and food safety certifications that are financially accessible. Ranchers in Western Colorado need meat processing and packing facilities to even exist in the state. Vegetable growers in Eastern Colorado need access to non-privatized water. Growers around the Twin Cities and Chicagoland metro areas need distribution infrastructure -- warehouses, trucks, refrigeration, storage. Really, all-of-the-above people need all-of-the-above overlapping and interlocking systems -- natural and technological -- to be understood and scaled for community-based food and agriculture businesses. The opportunities for research, non-profit projects, and entrepreneurship in the food system are astounding.
Before any of this can be understood, let alone accessed, there needs to be real understanding about how current systems operate. I heard this need echoed from healthy hospital advocates in Southern Michigan to campus dining services management in Western Colorado. A couple weeks ago marked an exciting development for many of the students I work with -- Sodexo, one of the largest food service providers in the United States, finalized a transparency agreement with the Real Food Challenge that will allow students at any of their campuses to do food purchasing assessments and really find out where their food is coming from, to then be able to work with the dining services and campus leaders to shift purchasing dollars to community-based, fair, humane, ecologically sound food products. This is an enormous moved towards greater food chain transparency nationwide.
3. Leadership from the frontlines
The folks being most impacted by our inequitable, unhealthy, unsustainable food system are not the people in the majority of leadership positions in food system work. Whether its people of color, low-income folks, women, or young people, all of us in this work need to continue to put the efforts of the most impacted communities at the forefront, have the real conversations and make the real decisions to make space for this leadership in all sorts of real ways. (More on this in future reflections)
The other day, one of my colleagues commented, "we organize so that people allow themselves to feel." This comment really resonated with me. In my work with young people, I am sometimes astounded, and certainly saddened, by how little people allow themselves to dream. I think this is a troublesome result of our limiting, disempowering educational system. People are truly not given the space or opportunity to imagine, let alone fully realize, their potential -- individually and especially in communities. I am so grateful to spend time connecting with young people in a way that gives them permission to unlock their full capacity, and imagination, and potential for enormous beauty, and action, and change.
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