The word “community” may mean different things to different people. Are you working toward building a stronger local or regional food community, with and for specific self-identified groups? For example, if you’re organizing around farmers, what does that mean to you? Is that every farmer within a certain geographical range? Or only those farmers who practice a certain method? Are they immigrant farmers, beginning farmers, established farmers, and/or people who grow their own food for their own use? Whom do you truly include in your community, and how are you going to do that? There are no right answers here. These are your paths to choose. In order to make real transformative change, however, it is critical to understand for whom you’re building, how you are organizing, and if they (in this case, farmers) are all in. Otherwise it’s easy to fall prey to favoritism, cliques, discrimination, elitism, and self-interest.
Build with wisdom. Build your program, policy, law, or infrastructure to respect all people, all members of your community, the environment, and food.
Good processes will strengthen your work (see Ask What Is Working). Build on a foundation of strength, respect, and transparency (see Wholesome Wave’s organizational values; Implement a Conflict-of-Interest Policy; A Donor Bill of Rights; and Learn from Those Who Came Before You). Creating transparency about what we envision our work to be early on in the development of a project, program, business, or nonprofit will help establish a vital baseline: consensus of definition(s) and hence the articulation of vision, mission, goals, and objectives from which priorities can be determined. Whether that work involves a farmers’ market, a permit program for produce cart vendors, or a local humane slaughterhouse, you will have a much better chance at being understood, functional, strategic, and sustainable when your project is built from the ground up with wisdom and respect.
Words matter. The language we use matters when we talk about people, food, communities, stories, barriers, issues, and solutions. Grantors often want their potential grantees to identify what’s broken and then to outline how to fix it. But when you focus on what’s wrong or broken, people get defensive. People shut down. They stop talking, then pull up their bridges.
So what if, as potential grantees and activists, we asked instead: What is working well, and how can we do more of it? What do we love about where we live, what we eat, what we grow, what we teach, who is in our community, and what resources we have? You feel a shift, don’t you? Immediately the energy moves toward the positive. And once it does, we’ll do more of what we’re doing right, and with inclusion.
I wish I’d been aware of this process, called appreciative inquiry (AI), when I first starting working as a food activist in a nonprofit. I see in retrospect that this kind of approach (developed by David L. Cooperrider and Diana Whitney and outlined in their book Appreciative Inquiry: A Positive Revolution in Change) would’ve fundamentally shifted our mission statement, visioning, planning, and execution. I think it would have been easier and more inviting for more eaters to get involved. We would’ve looked at our community in different ways. Also, as a taxpayer who is actively seeking change in our food systems, I see how some nonprofits remain stuck in self-fulfilling prophecies because their existence is based on what’s broken; that is, when a nonprofit is awarded grants or donations from the government or philanthropists to fix what’s broken in a food system, there’s an inherent contradiction. If they fixed the problem, they’d also make themselves obsolete, lose their funding, and close their doors. Success would (and should) mean they run themselves out of business. Most don’t want to do that.
My goals are to have us really look at the language we use, then shift dialogue and energy away from finger-pointing, defensiveness, and divisiveness. Away from self-righteous indignation, judgment, knowing better, and the savior complex — all of which are exhausting and unproductive. Instead, let's find out what’s right. What’s good. People know. Just ask them. Start with appreciation.
At the Institute for Agriculture and Trade Policy (IATP) Food + Justice = Democracy Conference, held in September 2012 in Minneapolis, good food activists from a variety of nonprofits, from the Rural Coalition to Slow Food, came up with a draft of six principles of food justice. As we work to build a more just and equitable food system, these ideas will help us be both clear and broad-thinking in our aims.
These principles are in draft form, because “food justice” is a phrase that’s open to interpretation, reflecting time, place, and culture. You’ll see reflected in the different styles for each of these six principles the voices and concerns of the activists who gathered in each committee. Use these principles as a starting point to discuss the issues and solutions you want to pursue. Use them as building blocks to include everyone. Use them as pillars in whatever you build because good food is not just for a few, but for everyone. Good, healthy, fresh food is a right.
Good, healthy food and community well-being are basic human rights. Food justice is the right of communities everywhere to produce, process, distribute, access, and eat good food regardless of race, class, gender, ethnicity, citizenship, ability, religion, or community. Food sovereignty is the right of people to define their own food, agriculture, livestock, and fisheries systems. This means recognizing people’s rights. Community food security is the condition in which all people at all times have access to fresh, healthy, affordable, and culturally appropriate food, outside emergency food situations. Consider the following:
Recognize people’s rights:
The emergency food system perpetuates food insecurity and health disparities. It is sustained by the corporate food industry. Reforming that system means:
In a fair, just, and sustainable food system:
Because the majority of food chain workers are immigrants and people of color; and because structural racism and inequality in the food system means these communities are disproportionately targeted and impacted; and because of corporate consolidation and the need to bring sustainable food supply chains to scale:
We commit to building a food system that shifts the dominant narrative in a manner that prioritizes the rights of food chain workers, including the right to organize a path to legalization for undocumented workers and a living wage for all workers, farmers, and fisherfolk.
A just food and water system works to reverse climate change by becoming agro-ecologically independent of fossil fuels while adapting to climate change in ways that address its inequities. A just food and water system is predicated on public policy processes in which communities make free and informed decisions to protect and affirm the interdependent web of life.
— Excerpted with permission from the Institute for Agriculture and Trade Policy (IATP), Draft Principles of Food Justice (iatp.org/documents/draft-principles-of-food-justice#sthash.ou5MUf6h.dpuf)
Where I live, there are some bucolic farms with fields of corn and grand old trees that grace their borders. Sheep and cows graze on green pastures. When I see land like this, I envision a scenario of a peaceable kingdom: fertile lands producing good food for all; equanimity, access, balance, and respect between people, animals, land, and cultivation. But as my friend the author Alice Randall pointed out, we all see things through the lens of our personal histories. My great-great-grandparents were German immigrants who moved to the Midwest, bought land, then worked the land they owned. My relationship to the landscape that I’ve inherited is different from that of some of my African-American friends and colleagues like Alice. I think it’s safe to say that most of their ancestors did not own the land they worked. When Alice looks at those same cornfields, grand old trees, and pastures, she may not envision a peaceable kingdom but rather one of terror, violence, and oppression.
These landscapes endure. They outlast generations, yet they do not reveal their history easily. We must therefore tread gently. When Alice’s lens and my own lens come together, we can acknowledge our different scenarios and see a more true history of our country’s agriculture, in spite of the pain it may cause.
It is up to all of us to collectively learn with keen eyes, open ears, and compassionate hearts. When it comes to people, places, and history, ignorance is no longer acceptable as we work onward in feeding our communities.
“History, despite its wrenching pain, cannot be unlived, but if faced with courage, need not be lived again.”
— Maya Angelou
The draft principles developed out of the Food + Justice = Democracy conference of the Institute for Agriculture and Trade Policy (IATP) remind us that making an effort to understand the history of the food system we are part of is an important action. Here are some places to look for your local food history.
The best defense is a good offense, or so the saying goes. Here, it’s totally applicable. As an eater, a business owner, a farmer, or a producer — whether you buy food at the grocery store or buy in bulk from a wholesaler for your restaurant, hotel, or cafeteria — what you buy makes a difference in campaigning for agricultural workers’ rights.
Rule of thumb: buy from local and regional farms and producers first, from people and businesses that treat their workers well, pay them respectable wages, and have them work in safe environments. If that’s not possible (for foods that don’t grow in the United States, such as coffee, chocolate, and bananas), GRACE Communications Foundation’s website Sustainable Table (sustainabletable .org) suggests you look for certified products with labels from Fair Trade USA, the Rainforest Alliance, or United Farm Workers. These certification programs ensure that farmworkers are treated fairly, work in safe environments, and are paid a decent-to-fair wage.
The Rainforest Alliance’s website (rainforest-alliance.org) has a “Find Certified Products” locator. Just fill in your country and state, then select the types of products you want to find, and it will search its database of Rainforest Alliance Certified™ products. If you’re a business and want to source Rainforest Alliance Certified forest products (wood, paper), or food, drinks, and other farm products, you can explore the options under the “Engage Your Business” tab on the home page.
The Coalition of Immokalee Workers (CIW), based in Immokalee, Florida, has initiated an innovative, highly successful farmworkers’ rights campaign and a powerful partnership between farmworkers, Florida tomato growers, and buyers called the Fair Food Program (FFP). Participating buyers pay an extra “penny per pound” premium for their tomatoes, and the growers pass that on as a bonus to workers. The CIW says that between January 2011 and May 2014, over $14 million in premiums was paid.
When Walmart signed on to the FFP in January 2014, it agreed to “work over time to expand the Fair Food Program to other crops beyond tomatoes in its produce supply chain.” This agreement has great implications for farmworkers on other large-scale agricultural enterprises that grow crops such as onions, peppers, broccoli, fruits, and nuts.
The FFP is overseen by an independent nonprofit organization called the Fair Food Standards Council (FFSC). According to the CIW, the six main elements of the FFP, which the United Nations Working Group on Business and Human Rights pointed out “could serve as a model elsewhere,” are as follows:
As consumers, we can ratchet up our conscious buying power. Follow and join the CIW to expand the implementation of the FFP. To date, Wendy’s and Publix have yet to sign on.
— Excerpted with permission from the Coalition of Immokalee Workers, Fair Food Program (ciw-online.org/fair-food-program)
There are three cups of coffee between me, Carlos Marentes, and my son, Elijah. The dinner in the cafeteria this afternoon is cigar-thin burritos — flour tortillas, refried beans, some meat and cheese. Carlos decides to tell us a story.
“I go to my friend’s house to visit,” he begins. “We are in his kitchen. He wants to give me something to eat. So my friend washes an apple. Taking care to clean it, he then hands it to me. A red, juicy apple.
“‘Thank you,’ I say. And then, ‘Why did you wash the apple before giving it to me?’
“‘So it is good enough for you to eat,’ my friend answers. ‘To clean it of the chemicals, the pesticides. You never know who touched it or where it has been. You know why, Carlos. A child would, too.’
“‘Thank you,’ I say again, accepting his answer and the piece of fruit.”
As Carlos leans in closer, he continues this story while workers shuffle in and out, picking up a burrito or three for dinner from the cafeteria ladies, respectfully greeting Carlos and us as they do. “But then I asked my friend another question, and now I am going to ask you the same thing.” He gazes at Elijah and me across the table that separates us, his eyes dry and clear with birthright, indignation, and wisdom. His words are careful, insistent, barely above a whisper.
“What do you do to care for food like that apple? Just wash it? Food is sacred, isn’t it? A right. What do you do for the farmers and the farmworkers who planted, grew, and harvested it? The land, air, and water it needs to grow. The people — like these people — and the children like their children.” Carlos looks to Elijah. “Children like you.
“Who should be able to eat good food like that beautiful, fresh apple? Who gets to eat that food? You see,” he says, tapping the table emphatically, “washing the apple was about him, my friend. Nothing else. Nothing.” He shakes his head. “What about everything else? What about everyone else?”
Carlos Marentes is a practical man. He saw a need in his community and did something about it. As he tells it, he was handing pamphlets out to some farmworkers on a cold El Paso night before they boarded the buses that would take them to the fields. He wanted to talk to the men about organizing around labor issues.
One fellow told him yes, that would be good, to one day be organized. But what would be really nice was a cup of hot coffee and a warm place to sleep so that he didn’t have to sleep on cardboard on the sidewalk. So Carlos and his wife, Alicia, led the way to building Centro de los Trabajadores Agrícolas Fronterizos (Border Farmworker Center) on the U.S.–Mexico border, directly across the street from the border control station and the bridge between our two countries. It took the leaders and founders of Sin Fronteras Organizing Project about 10 years to complete the center, together with the city of El Paso, and today it stands — an 8,000-square-foot building.
There is dignity and respect in this place where farmworkers can get that cup of coffee and a burrito made from scratch by the warmhearted cafeteria ladies. It’s a place where people can get their mail and leave their things. There are English and art classes for both children and adults, and a food garden is in the works.
Now Carlos can do what he originally set out to do, which is to help workers organize. Carlos is a very practical man.
If we’re going to be building more resilient, equitable, and just comm-unity food systems and working for wholesome food for people — in the myriad ways we can do that — the organizations we build should not only be run ethically and transparently but also provide safe working environments and fair living wages to their staff members. Otherwise, quite frankly, how can you look your community and your board in the eye? Organizations are echoes of the people who work in them, their missions, and what they do. If they’re not built on strong, healthy foundations, how does it all square up? Who and what are we, really? Consider Wholesome Wave’s organizational values. What are yours?
Wholesome Wave (wholesomewave.org) is a Connecticut-based nonprofit headed up by the James Beard Award–winning chef Michel Nischan. Developed out of a commitment to food justice, Wholesome Wave’s goals revolve around increasing access and affordability to fresh, healthy, local foods, in both rural and urban areas. Wholesome Wave’s benchmark initiative, the Double Value Coupon Program, doubles the value of SNAP benefits when used at the farmers’ market to buy fresh foods. A similar program involves providing individuals affected with a diet-related disease with a prescription for fruits and vegetables at the local market. Their programming has extended to 25 states and the District of Columbia, and they are tirelessly working at the policy level to improve food security for families across the United States. See Wholesome Wave’s organizational values.
The local food movement has given birth to many nonprofit offspring. And many of us who are involved don’t have previous experience in nonprofit organizations. Or perhaps because we have the proclivity to be rabble-rousers, any history with processes such as Robert’s Rules of Order might have left a bad taste. Or as a worst-case scenario, some of us have experienced how destructive and damaging a dysfunctional organization can be.
Building strong foundations in your organizations will help them function better, treat people more fairly, and flourish over time. Nonprofits take a lot of time and work; they should be run not only like a business with a bottom line but also like an ethical, transparent, and respectful one at that. If you want to rebuild our food systems into something that’s fair, just, and equitable, pay your people a fair, living wage; ensure medical coverage; and offer maternity/paternity leave. Try to reflect your mission and values in every way. (See Noli’s essay on Stewardship.)
Small communities are rife with potential conflicts of interest. It may seem as though the same people are always raising their hands to help out, to be on boards. So it’s even more important to be proactive and transparent to ensure your organization has a conflict-of-interest policy and that you check in on it at least once a year, with staff and board members, and more frequently as needed with changes in leadership. Like luggage in overhead bins on an airplane, things may have shifted while in flight. Here’s some advice on the topic from the National Council of Nonprofits.
A policy governing conflicts of interests is perhaps the most important policy a nonprofit board can adopt. To have the most impact, the policy should be in writing and the board (and staff) should review the policy regularly. Often people are unaware that their activities are in conflict with the best interests of the nonprofit, so a goal for many organizations is to simply raise awareness and cultivate a “culture of candor.” It is helpful to take time at a board meeting annually to discuss the types of situations that could result in a conflict between the best interests of the nonprofit — and the self-interest of a staff member or board member.
A conflict-of-interest policy should (a) require those with a conflict (or who think they may have a conflict) to disclose the conflict/potential conflict, and (b) prohibit interested board members from voting on any matter that gives rise to a conflict between their personal interests and the nonprofit’s interests. Beyond those two basics, it is helpful for each nonprofit to determine how conflicts at the board and staff level will be managed. Keep in mind that the revised [IRS informational tax form] 990 asks not only about whether the nonprofit has a written conflict-of-interest policy, but also about the process that a nonprofit uses to manage conflicts as well as how the nonprofit determines whether board members have a conflict of interest.
— Excerpted with permission from the National Council of Nonprofits website (councilofnonprofits.org)
PHILANTHROPY is based on voluntary action for the common good. It is a tradition of giving and sharing that is primary to the quality of life. To ensure that philanthropy merits the respect and trust of the general public, and that donors and prospective donors can have full confidence in the not-for-profit organizations and causes they are asked to support, we declare that all donors have these rights:
I. To be informed of the organization’s mission, of the way the organization intends to use donated resources, and of its capacity to use donations effectively for their intended purposes.
II. To be informed of the identity of those serving on the organization’s governing board, and to expect the board to exercise prudent judgment in its stewardship responsibilities.
III. To have access to the organization’s most recent financial statements.
IV. To be assured their gifts will be used for the purposes for which they were given.
V.To receive appropriate acknowledg-ment and recognition.
VI. To be assured that information about their donations is handled with respect and with confidentiality to the extent provided by law.
VII. To expect that all relationships with individuals representing organizations of interest to the donor will be professional in nature.
VIII. To be informed whether those seeking donations are volunteers, employees of the organization, or hired solicitors.
IX. To have the opportunity for their names to be deleted from mailing lists that an organization may intend to share.
X. To feel free to ask questions when making a donation and to receive prompt, truthful, and forthright answers.
— Excerpted with permission from the Association of Fundraising Professionals (AFP) and others, 2013
“Donors get pitched a lot,” reads the website of the Center for High Impact Philanthropy, which operates out of the School of Social Policy & Practice at the University of Pennsylvania. To help “clarify” the “complicated space” of food-related funding, the center has developed its Food Funder Compass, which “identifies the four primary social impact areas where donors seek change: Health & Hunger; Environment; Vibrant Communities; and Rights & Equity.” For anyone who is able to donate money to help build a stronger food community, the center offers a document that lays out a rationale for donor investment; one case example to illustrate how philanthropic funds can produce change; and additional promising approaches, as well as examples of organizations implementing those approaches.
— Excerpted with permission from the Center for High Impact Philanthropy, School of Social Policy & Practice, University of Pennsylvania (impact.upenn.edu)
Gridlocked federal government is generally not a reliable source of funds, especially funds that might lead the way to help create access to healthy foods. It’s often up to states, towns, cities, and grassroots organizations. There is a bottom-up aspect to this revolution. But we need a top-down as well.
It’s critically important to your organization’s good reputation and function that you ask for and use money ethically and transparently. Beware of mission creep — either moving too quickly, without checking in, or taking on too much — which can lead to using money in ways donors didn’t intend. Here’s a summary of good advice from the Association of Fundraising Professionals (AFP).
— Excerpted with permission from “Solicitation and Use of Philanthropic Funds,’’ Association of Fundraising Professionals
There are many great organizations out there. Look to fund programs that are happy and striving to work their way out of existence and into “planned obsolescence” as Noli Taylor of Island Grown Schools puts it, because they’ve been so successful at addressing the issues that the problems have all been solved. Obviously this is a highly idealized version of an organization, but use the gist of it. Fund the programs and the people that work.
As it’s said that most of an iceberg is underwater, dive below the surface and do research before you fund a seemingly new program. Make sure that it’s not redundant. That would be a shame and a waste of your money. In my opinion, solid programs and organizations build upon preexisting work in innovative ways, and they are transparent about it. That said, if it is seed money a new program needs to get on its feet, make sure the leadership is strong, the broader community necessity is great (and replication is avoided), community demand and support already exist, and the newbie has a solid plan.
There’s an excellent resource for donors who are specifically interested in sustainable agriculture called the Sustainable Agriculture & Food Systems Funders (safsf.org), and for donors interested in the public health sector, check out the Health & Environmental Funders Network (hefn.org).
This advice goes for nonprofits doing the asking, too. Take the time to do your homework before you ask for funding. Are there other organizations that have done, or are doing, what you’re proposing? Research like-minded nonprofits, even if they’re out of your geographical zone, to find out whether useful information, strategies, tools, surveys, or data already exist. Usually, organizations are open to sharing the information they’ve developed. (This book is chock-full of such generosities.) Most times, organizations will only ask for credit where credit is due. Your research should help you ask appropriately for funds to finance true and real needs.
Patti Smith, the godmother of punk, once said, “Build a good name. Keep your name clean. Don’t make compromises. . . . Be concerned about doing good work. Protect your work and if you build a good name, eventually that name will be its own currency.”
This advice is as useful for nonprofits as it is for artists. You represent your organization when you’re out to dinner, at the ballpark, on a bus. And the people who surround you, and whom you hire, are part of the team. Keep your good name.
She was insistent in her pitch. Instead of responding to our assistant editor’s polite “Now’s not a good time,” the young public relations agent kept pushing, insistent on pitching her story. Our magazine, Edible Vineyard, was on deadline to go to press. I said I would get back to her the next week. But for whatever reason, she e-mailed me directly anyway. Something to the effect of: Had I ever heard of Island Grown Schools? They’re serving organic school lunches — they’re your community’s farm to school program. A perfect match for Edible Vineyard. So many stories to tell.
She was pitching the program I helped launch. She hadn’t done her homework. Edible Vineyard had already run numerous stories about school food and Island Grown Schools (IGS). We had also donated significant ad space to promote the program, including the coveted back cover.
I felt damn surly about that pitch, so beyond letting that PR rep know that without doing her homework she was doing harm to IGS, I also let the IGS coordinators know that their PR agent was stepping in it big-time by insulting one of their benefactors.
So be sure that anyone who might be speaking on behalf of your organization in any context knows the facts and history. And remember: gifts in kind, such as advertising, computers, graphic design, and lawyers’ fees, are all donations and should be treated as such.
According to the U.S. Department of Agriculture (USDA), a food hub is “a centrally located facility with a business management structure facilitating the aggregation, storage, processing, distribution, and/or marketing of locally/regionally produced food products.”
As much as that definition is official, there remains debate and discussion about the term, and the attempt to define such a dynamic system. Krysten Aguilar, of the Dona Ana County Food Policy Council and La Semilla Food Center in Anthony, New Mexico, explained further:
A food hub is not simply a facility but a business model that is designed to aid farmers with support and infrastructure. The types of existing food hubs across the country vary greatly, as they should. The key words to consider are “local” and “regional”; there is great diversity across this country in climate, growing seasons, city and town size, and demographic makeup. By considering an area’s particular assets and challenges, a food system can be created that effectively serves members of the community, both the suppliers and the buyers.
“Value chains are supply chains that begin on the farm and end at the consumer’s table, and which promote values of health, fairness, and sustainability.”
— Anthony Flaccavento of the Appalachian Sustainable Development
The University of Vermont (uvm.edu) recently launched its low-residency “Food Hub Management Certificate Program,” the first of its kind in the country, available to anyone interested in a career in food systems
La Semilla Food Center is a nonprofit in Anthony, New Mexico, a town in the Paso del Norte region near El Paso, Texas. In order to develop a stronger food system, the center’s members started by asking the community questions. Local youths took questionnaires out into the neighborhoods, and that sent a powerful, inclusive message about the future: young people care. La Semilla has generously shared its questionnaire, reprinted here, and you can adapt it to fit the needs of your own community. To build a healthy food hub, first ask your community questions.
Build good relationships with regulators as you build your community’s food system. For example, host a food safety workshop on your farm or with your farm-based education organization.
The scale at which to operate a value chain is critically important if it is to be financially viable for all parties: buyers; producers; and processors, aggregators, and distributors. Local conditions of markets, farmers, and facilities will all play roles in determining at what scale a value chain should operate in a specific area. Asking the following questions will aid you in discovering the appropriate scale of a local and regional value chain to fit your area:
— Excerpted with permission from Creating a Regional Food Hub: Assessments and Recommendations for Dona Ana County, prepared by Krysten Aguilar with La Semilla Food Center. The section about assessing value chains is based on the work of Appalachian Sustainable Development. (This is one nifty example of how doing your research like La Semilla did, and giving credit where credit’s due, benefits all involved. Thanks, Appalachian Sustainable Development and La Semilla!)
The original mission of Island Grown Initiative (IGI), the nonprofit that grew out of that first Potluck with a Purpose in 2005, was to support farmers on the 100-square-mile island of Martha’s Vineyard, off the coast of southern Massachusetts. Before the group even had a name, it had determined one actionable goal by the end of that dinner: to draw a map. It was a project that had a beginning, a middle, and an end. We enlisted the skills of a local graphic designer, and the Martha’s Vineyard Commission supported the map with its geographic information system (GIS) services. Getting the farms’ data up-to-date required a lot of phone calls, e-mails, and face-to-face meetings to explain what we were trying to do and why.
A farm map serves multiple functions: First, it increases awareness of the local farming scene and encourages consumers to buy direct from the source. Second, it is a useful resource for zoning agriculture bylaws and right-to-farm designations in municipalities. And finally, it serves as the basis for redrawing wholesale food distribution routes to supermarkets, restaurants, food banks, and institutions such as schools and hospitals.
For an island that has a reputation of being all beaches and famous people on vacation, Martha’s Vineyard has more than 25 diversified family farms. Farmers are raising meat animals, poultry, and shellfish. They are producing fruits, vegetables, fungi, raw and pasteurized milk, cheese and yogurt, wool, and sea salt. Because we’re surrounded by water, we included shellfish aquaculture farms on our map.
With no middleman in the mix, farmers would make more money. The map included a listing of what, in general, the farmers sold and how it was for sale — whether through their own farm stands, at farmers’ markets, or by appointment only. This worked. Anecdotal evidence offered by our local Cronig’s Market, a supporter of the farm map and the Island Grown Initiative, suggested that Cronig’s actually lost thousands of dollars in sales the first year the map was out, because people were buying direct from the farmers.
We decided to make the map free and available to the public at farm stands, feed stores, and supermarkets. It was a very persuasive promotional piece. After it was printed, some folks from the map’s working group wanted to do more. The map set us on our path. It proved that there were energetic allies and local resources. It also made us proud of our place and the farmers in it. People, we the eaters, were ready to do something about supporting a healthier community food system as opposed to feeling paralyzed by the problems.
In order to get our map drawn, we went to our community development agency, the Martha’s Vineyard Commission, to enlist the help of their geographic information systems (GIS) specialist. I’m no expert in drawing maps, but I can say that GIS is a powerhouse. It allows maps to be drawn in layers by building up data, and data is what you want to make informed decisions.
Let’s say you are in a town or city looking to build an urban agriculture project or a new farmers’ market — you’ll want information about zoning, roads, types of existing businesses, public office buildings, schools, and public bus routes. Or let’s say you’re a nonprofit looking to connect land to farmers — with the aid of GIS you can see what’s in conservation already, who owns it, and even what soil types there are. It’s possible to scale, to layer, to peel away those layers, and to make really cool, very helpful, dynamic maps. Unlike a paper map, a GIS map allows you to select what you want to see; you can add and subtract according to the types of data it is built with.
Check with your city or county government to see whether they have a GIS specialist or share one with another town. The international company Esri (esri.com), headquartered in Redlands, California, is a major supplier of GIS software.
Consider this: You’re in a neighborhood association and you want to map vacant lots, or maybe open rooftops, for potential community gardens. You’re going to need to find out who owns them. Maybe you’ll want data about where food is already available in the area, such as restaurants, fast-food joints, corner stores, community centers, schools, farmers’ markets, and supermarkets, to help in determining what the need is and whether people are really going to want to grow their own food.
Additional useful data for your map may be how close the gardens are to transportation routes and/or parking lots so community members can get to them. If you’re considering the gardens as potentially commercial enterprises, maybe you want to map existing processors, aggregators, and distributors to determine the conventional supply chain or value chain. Information is power. GIS is very powerful.
There are any number of online mapmaking tools. At BatchGeo (batchgeo.com), you can copy and paste your addresses (directly from a spreadsheet if you have one) and create a coded, dimensional map. If you’re looking for distribution information (say you’re a co-op, a farm, a CSA, or a new farmers’ market), you could collect physical addresses of grocers, farmers’ markets, corner stores, restaurants, food banks, public schools, hospitals, and public transportation stations to see how accessible food outlets are in whatever geographical area you determine.
Check out the blog Mapgiving (mapgiving.blogspot.com), which describes itself as “a meeting space for non-profits and cartographers.” Or simply go to Google Maps (maps.google.com). Or do your own search: “Best online mapmaking tools.”
My own big sister, Ann Bliss, was the founding chair of the Cobblestone Farmers Markets in Winston-Salem, North Carolina. She also worked as an attorney and as a judicial officer in the Wisconsin court system before moving to North Carolina. She has provided the following advice for farmers’ market organizers. Also see The Farmers Market Coalition, where she gives more specific advice to growers and vendors who participate in farmers’ markets.
It’s as critical a part of your infrastructure as signboards, washing stations, and portable toilets. This means building relationships with folks at city hall, county government, community and school groups, businesses, and other markets.
Vendor qualifications, attendance, advertising (as in product labeling), and standards of conduct for all market participants should be addressed. Create an internal process for review and revision, and rewrite the rules as needed. Give every vendor a copy, and keep a copy on-site during market hours. Enforce them, gently but firmly.
For the public, that means continuity: market days, hours, and location are reliable, and every market offers a safe, enjoyable, high-quality environment. For growers, funders, and supporters, credibility is an earned reputation for an ongoing commitment to compliance and accountability. Have a budget, and keep accurate, detailed financial records for every item of income and expense associated with market operations, including in-kind contributions from volunteers.
The evil twin of genuine enthusiasm, mission creep results in taking on too many projects, saying yes every time someone starts a sentence with “Let’s . . . ,” and forgetting that other people’s time and energy are not infinitely expendable or available on demand.
Watch out, too, for the belief that great ideals and a good cause excuse bad behavior and wrongful acts. This devil lurks in each and every detail of your market operations. One wink, and the hours and hours you’ve invested in networking and building credibility will go up in smoke.
Don't fail to distinguish between community outreach and education and advertising. Both are important. Neither can fully substitute for the other. Community outreach and education is labor intensive and builds market participation over time. Advertising tends to be expensive and can fade quickly, but it is critical to shopper attendance and market “brand” recognition.
Be clear about whether your organization is a qualified tax-exempt entity.
Don't ignore the demands of sound business practice as defined by the contemporary American legal and regulatory environment. This means permits, insurance, taxes (sales tax, too), health and sanitation compliance, and security, to name just a few. Be wary of the common adage, “It’s easier to get forgiveness than to get permission.”
The Massachusetts Department of Transportation has begun a Farmers’ Market Program in which farmers are invited to use free space at all 18 of the service plazas on Massachusetts highways. Eleven of those plazas are on the Mass Pike, the big highway that crosses Massachusetts from east to west, connecting with I-90 in New York. Drivers can shop at farmers’ markets right across from the plazas’ donut shops and fast-food joints. If you want to start a farmers’ market at a rest stop in your state, start by enquiring at the department of transportation.
The mission of the Farmers Market Coalition (farmersmarketcoalition.org) is to “to strengthen farmers markets for the benefit of farmers, consumers, and communities.” The coalition runs an electronic mailing list (a.k.a. a Listserv), provides a list of resources, offers information about the Farmers Market Promotion Program (FMPP), holds webinars, and hosts events. Find these good guys! Here is what they are working to do, their priorities in their own words:
— List excerpted from Farmers Market Coalition (farmersmarketcoalition.org)
Law and food share an inextricable relationship. There are multiple laws and regulations affecting every bite we take, every seed we plant, every piece of meat we grill, and every pint of ice cream that’s shipped. The kind of laws I’m talking about in this book were not handed down at Mount Sinai. So they can be examined, rewritten, and implemented to reflect the scalability — from industrial agribusinesses to small growers and producers, from international food systems to local food systems — and the reforms that must be made to support greater access to healthy food for everyone. It’s very possible that your town, village, or city doesn’t have the permits or regulations that encourage small business owners to open up shop and start selling healthy whole foods, whether out of trucks, parking lots, or farms. But you can change that and much, much more once you have the right guides, tools, and information to give you support.
For farmers at a market.
Mobile food vendors can travel deep into the neighborhoods most in need of fresh produce, and unlike supermarkets, they don’t require large capital investments to start operations. Mobile vendors can also adjust their inventory quickly to fit the unique cultural demands of the community. Establishing a permit program for these vendors may also have economic benefits, providing local entrepreneurs with small business opportunities and contributing to neighborhood economic development by revitalizing the street scene. In some places, produce cart vending might even be an avenue to promote agritourism by highlighting the unique offerings of the local agriculture to attract outside consumers.
The National Policy & Legal Analysis Network to Prevent Childhood Obesity's (NPLAN) model ordinance creates a streamlined permit program for “produce cart vendors,” retailers who sell only fresh, uncut fruits and vegetables from a mobile cart, much like a produce stand on wheels. The ordinance sets forth the requirements for vendors, the rules for vending, and a range of incentives a local government may provide to encourage vendors to sell in neighborhoods that lack other sources of fresh produce. Giving vendors priority consideration when applying for a permit, discount rates on permit fees, access to small business loans with low interest rates, and small business counseling and technical assistance are some of the incentives suggested in the model ordinance.
In most communities, state law regulates the health and sanitation requirements for most types of food sales, including mobile food vending. But in many states, the retail food code regulations exempt the sale of whole fresh produce from produce stands.
NPLAN designed its Model Produce Cart Ordinance (available for download at nplan.org) to take advantage of this exemption, by limiting sales to whole fresh produce so that communities in those states simply need to implement the local ordinance. Because state law varies, it is important for individual communities to review their state retail food code before enacting the model ordinance to determine whether and how state law regulates whole fresh produce vending. By establishing a streamlined permit program for produce cart vendors, communities can make it easier for residents to buy fresh fruits and vegetables for their families. NPLAN’s Model Produce Cart Ordinance is a simple, cost-effective way for local government to make fresh produce — and the corresponding benefits of a healthy diet—more accessible.
— Reprinted with permission from ChangeLab Solutions, changelabsolutions.org
Farm Hack (farmhack.net) is an “open source community for resilient agriculture.” Calling itself a “farmer-driven” organization, Farm Hack focuses on improving farm tools. Its success is made by its members, who come together in person and online to design and build farming equipment that is affordable, adaptable, and easy to fix. They’re talking cover-crop rollers, laydown weeders, multi-dibblers (rolling tools for marking seedbeds), oat and grain dehullers, and even things like record-keeping and profitability analysis tools. Farm Hack is all about innovation, community-driven design, and mutual aid.
Food + Tech Connect (foodtechconnect.com) is a media and research company building “a network for innovators transforming the business of food.” See its website for news about all manner of food and technology topics, such as crowdfunding for food start-ups, ways to meet other innovators from across the food supply chain, the latest infographics, marketing, and more.
It all went terribly wrong that gray autumn afternoon. The lack of planning, the late start. The woodman’s ax, the piercing screams of the pig, blood pooling on hard, merciless ground. The men chased the frightened, injured animal and delivered inept blows until it finally succumbed to a painful death.
Despite my best efforts to know my food and look dinner in the eye — I’d helped feed and care for that pig — in its end, I turned my back, covered my ears, and squeezed shut my eyes. With bile and adrenaline on my tongue, it was all too late, too much, and all too little. To fight or fly — my body shook in the in-betweens. This slaughter was all wrong, and it couldn’t be stopped or undone.
Years later I still wonder: What was I thinking? Does “connecting” to my food equate the necessity to bloody my hands and take part in an animal’s slaughter and butchering? Though I had no business doing what I’d taken on — I was no farmer then and am still not one now — I’d set out for the experience of raising and slaughtering an animal to feed my family. In retrospect it was complete foolishness. Yet it’s an intention that I see too many backyard growers devise today, in the name of local food. I had neither the knowledge nor the skills to take on that complex relationship and the responsibilities between human, animal, and meat. Especially the specific skills of slaughter — safely, humanely.
That night, I came home in the dark, mute, dirty, and smelling of death. The shower couldn’t have been hot enough, the scrub brush not wire enough, the soap not lye enough.
What I thought I'd chosen was a conscientious path, the result of soul-searching and seeking beyond the plastic-wrapped boneless, skinless cuts of protein from factory farms, on sale cheap for my budget and my convenience. I had wanted to be actively engaged: to work, to see, then to do.
That tainted pork sat in our freezer for what felt like years. With pain and fear frozen in its every cell — to eat it or to feed it to others would’ve been the antithesis of sustenance, for it was toxic. I couldn’t do it. I finally gave my freezer-burned transgressions a burial in an unmarked grave, deep enough so that even the raccoons or my dog could not dig it up.
Quitting meat would’ve seemed to be a normal, highly justified reaction to that night, but I didn’t. I am not a vegetarian; my body needs animal protein, still. So I stand today, back in the kitchen. Ready to do something of worth to help ensure that no one, no animal, goes through what we did that sad night. Indelibly I remain a conspirator, witness, and perpetrator. Pig blood figuratively stains my feet, hands, and eyes; my memory; and now my actions. To take that memory and to do something with it is all I can do to honor that poor, innocent, pitiable animal and the meals it never became.
If animals are going to be raised for our sustenance, humane slaughter is a mandate. I’ve been sickened to come across videos online supposedly championing local food and small, diversified family farms yet showing sadistic behavior toward animals. Abuse is abuse whether it happens on a bucolic farm or in a corporate, industrial-sized slaughter and processing plant. If you see examples of such abuse, don’t turn a blind eye. Instead, act by speaking out. And most important, do not purchase or be served meat from inhumane slaughters even if the farm is “local” or the animal was “sustainably raised.” Inhumane slaughter is totally unacceptable and preventable. You can find people who care enough to slaughter meat animals properly. Check out the following resources.
The Animal Welfare Institute (awionline.org), a nonprofit organization founded in 1951, began its Animal Welfare Approved (AWA) standards program (animal welfareapproved.org) in 2006. The program establishes basic standards for how animals should be treated. I wonder how many local or small-scale slaughters of local four-legged livestock like sheep, pigs, goats, or cows wouldn’t meet basic AWA standards. Here is a list of prohibited actions, which AWA considers cruelty to animals:
Customers, look to buy meat from sources with AWA certification. Folks raising livestock, check out the institute’s resources for helping you raise and slaughter animals humanely.
Maybe you’ve seen meat labeled with the Global Animal Partnership’s 5-Step Animal Welfare Rating Standards (globalanimalpartnership.org/the-5-step-program). The supermarket chain Whole Foods Market has adopted this ranking system, which shows consumers a range from step 1, which prohibits crates and cages, to step 5+, which says that the entire life of the animal was spent on an integrated farm.
These days in Temple Grandin’s career, she is more on the road with her work about autism than she is discussing humane livestock handling systems. Nevertheless, her website (www.grandin.com) is an important resource for people concerned with animal welfare: the width and breadth of Grandin’s expertise and her generosity in sharing observations are unparalleled. Check out her guidelines for audits of slaughter plants, building plans, and critical control points (CCPs) of humane slaughter, and much more.
Somebody’s got to do it. It’s a noble and connected thing to slaughter your own animals for your own consumption. But the acts of slaughtering and processing are not for everyone. What if you put your focus and energy into building a humane slaughterhouse for many, as opposed to humanely slaughtering for one? I have yet to slaughter a chicken, though I helped build and support our community’s mobile poultry slaughterhouse.
The lack of access to small-scale, size-appropriate humane slaughterhouses is a barrier to small family farmers who might otherwise raise chicken and turkeys, or even diversify their enterprise with four-legged livestock: pigs, sheep, goats, and cattle. “Mobile slaughter is crucial” to building local and regional food systems, U.S. Secretary of Agriculture Tom Vilsack said in a Bloomberg News interview in July 2014. Mobile slaughterhouses for poultry and four-legged animals are making an impact in communities they serve. But as with any enterprise, the building and implementing of any slaughter option will only be as good as the people who run it and the careful plans they’ve made before purchasing equipment or drawing up a building plan.
On Martha’s Vineyard, we started a poultry-slaughtering program and built a mobile poultry-processing trailer because the investment was relatively small, for both our nonprofit and for the farmers. (See my book The Mobile Poultry Slaughterhouse: Building a Humane Chicken Processing Unit to Strengthen Your Local Food System.) If we couldn’t come through, we hadn’t wasted a farmer’s longer investment in raising pigs or cattle, for example. Chickens are gateway livestock in many small farming enterprises, and the number of backyard growers is on the rise. Both commercial and noncommercial growers are potential customers for a mobile poultry-processing trailer. Regulations are different in each state, but poultry exemptions do exist, which means you should be able to turn a gray area into an opportunity. To learn about your state’s regulations, go to the Niche Meat Processor Assistance Network’s website (nichemeatprocessing.org).
Here’s what Martha’s Vineyard farmer Jefferson Munroe, of The GOOD Farm, has to say about running a mobile poultry-processing trailer (MPPT):
“It’s the little details that are vital. Little things make big things happen.”
— John Wooden, basketball player and coach
What if counties took up the challenge of facing down zoning barriers to slaughterhouses so that small family farms finally had access to infrastructure without the cost and stress of transporting live animals great distances? The answer: Farmers in the region would most likely begin to raise more livestock and, consequently, produce healthier, higher-quality meat.
In September 2013, Whatcom County in Washington State voted (narrowly) to allow slaughterhouses of less than 7,000 square feet with just a building permit and the proper permits for waste handling and right to water. Larger slaughterhouses (up to 20,000 square feet) would still have to face a public hearing.
I have a mentor who has been doing agriculture policy work in Washington, D.C., for decades. Now in her early 60s, she’s weary of the many and constant challenges in food policy today: having to do more with less money; struggling with the insider political nature of the grant processes; seeing industry, corporate, political, and status quo interests held above farmers’ interests. She’s especially tired of a history and culture of chauvinism and racism, both overt and implied. These days, as we finish up one of our conversations, she always ends with, “You should be doing this work. They listen to people like you, and they’re tired of me.” That’s about my “white American privilege” as opposed to her brown immigrant status.
But her plea also speaks to how urgently we need help in this regard. Are you interested in the details and struggles of such work? Or do you know someone who might be? Here are some good places to start to look at what advocacy work is being done now, and where you might find comrades.
According to its website, The Rural Coalition/Coalición Rural (ruralco.org) links over 90 grassroots member organizations “to serve as a critical advocacy voice of African-American, American-Indian, Asian-American, Euro-American, Latino, and women farmers, ranchers, farmworkers, and rural communities throughout the U.S.”
The National Sustainable Agriculture Coalition (NSAC) is, according to its website (sustainableagriculture.net), an “alliance of grassroots organizations that advocates for federal policy reform to advance the sustainability of agriculture, food systems, natural resources, and rural communities.” Check out its lists of board members and supporting organizations to learn who’s who in your region and what they are doing.
If you can speak, read, or write in more than one language, consider becoming an interpreter for a food-based organization. As an interpreter, you can reach out to community members, immigrants, and the press. Blain Snipstal, a farmer and agroecology organizer, is one of the Rural Coalition’s (see opposite page) representatives to La Via Campesina (www.viacampesina.org) and its North American region. He tweeted, “Without translators there can be no revolution!”
The Regional Environmental Council in Worcester, Massachusetts (recworcester.org), prints brochures for its community farmers’ market and schedules for its mobile farmers’ market in 11 (at last count) different languages, from Albanian to Arabic. The schedules are distributed at family health centers; Special Supplemental Nutrition Program for Women, Infants, and Children (WIC) offices; and low-income and elderly housing units.
I want to close this chapter with some words of wisdom from Don Ralston and Marty Strange, the founders of the Center for Rural Affairs (cfra.org), a nonprofit that started in 1973 and remains based in the town of Lyons, Nebraska (population 851). The center is grounded in a sense of place and committed to the rural. Their work includes developing advocates (see Speak), affordable health care for farmers, federal policy review and action items, and small business support.
In his August 2014 New York Times op-ed, “Don’t Let Your Children Become Farmers,” Bren Smith wrote that “it’s time for farmers to shape our own agenda.”
We need to fight for loan forgiveness for college grads who pursue agriculture; programs to turn farmers from tenants into landowners; guaranteed affordable health care; and shifting subsidies from factory farms to family farms. We need to take the lead in shaping a new food economy by building our own production hubs and distribution systems. And we need to support workers up and down the supply chain who are fighting for better wages so that their families can afford to buy the food we grow.
“None of these demands will be met,” Smith concluded, “until we start our own organizations — as in generations past — and shape a vision of a new food economy that ensures that growing good food also means making a good living.”
The Center for Rural Affairs is one of those organizations that closes the gap of “generations past” because not only are they doing the work of supporting farmers, but they have been doing it for over 30 years and they are still standing strong. Here, then, are some of their lessons learned, from all those years of fighting the good fight.
Shine the light on others. Share the spotlight and recognize those whose shoulders upon which we all stand.
— Excerpted with permission from Don Ralston and Marty Strange, “The Center for Rural Affairs in the First 20 Years: A Short Memoir, Mostly More or Less True”