The week's readings and discussion, specifically regarding the transformation from traditional local family farms to the profit driven agricultural system brought to mind a discussion I attended held by the Waterloo Region Food System Roundtable, entitled "How Much Should We Pay for Food?" There were five panelists from differing backgrounds speaking about food cost and accessibility to local, fresh food. What stood out for me was the accessibility (or lack of) to local, fresh food. We've discussed in class that the unfortunate reality of low-income families is that they often do not have the resources to access local, fresh food and are uneducation about food. One panelist Laura Callum, a Community Nutrition Worker, spoke of a program that serves a demographic consisting of mostly women and new Canadians. The program teaches food preparation skills, how to buy quality food as opposed to convenience food, informs about buying local, and encourages the rituals of preparing and eating food as community. This program is important as it is not only imparting wisdom about food and the process of cooking but about the importance of buying local and eating well. This encourages supporting local farms and farmers as opposed to putting profit into the agriculture system that produces food in unhealthy, unethical environments. I think it is important to start this movement at a local level and raise awareness, impart wisdom in the community about the realities of the food we consume and the effects it has on humans and our environment.
For anyone interested, I have posted a link that takes you to the Waterloo Region Food System Roundtable website and allows you to look at a forum that discusses this event in further detail. http://www.wrfoodsystem.ca/index.php?p=forum/view_thread&thread_id=10127
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I think that is a very good idea! I wonder why it is aimed at a specific population however as those seem like lessons we could all use! Unfortunately though, we could have all the knowledge in the world on this topic, it's the resources, particularly money, that's the key to making this knowledge practical. I would be eating every environment-friendly product out there if it was within my financial limits. Not to strike down this program or anything. Like I said, it can be very useful, I just believe the real problem lies in the prices.
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