Food Security

In summer 2006 Judy Alexander embarked on an experiment to see how much food she could grow, and how many neighbors could benefit, from the garden around her house. Check out her homegrown rainwater collection and irrigation system -- watering her 60+ edible crops. Meet the bees, the chickens and the worms. And catch her joy in producing so much food for so little effort. Episode 87. Now with transcript.

This episode highlights the dialogue that a regional food security conference can help inspire, and emphasizes the wealth of knowledge and talent that may be hidden in the recesses of North American communities. Host Jon Steinman also visits with a Conscientious Cook in Saskatoon, Canada - Daniel Walker.

What happens when a city of 80,000 without a farmers' market hosts a trial market in this new age of increasing awareness of local food?

Jay Martin of Provident Organic Farm in Maryland talks to GPM volunteer Brian Magee about the nuts and bolts of practically implemented community supported agriculture (CSA). Martin also consults for LESSON, Lower Eastern Shore Sustainable/Organic Network.

If you were told, that organic farmers are giving up growing organic crops, would you be concerned? The Saskatchewan Organic Directorate has since 2002 been seeking compensation for the damages caused by the property owned by American-based Monsanto and Germany's Bayer.

Recorded at a regional food security conference in Nelson, BC, we hear from two keynote speakers and two elected officials on the current energy supply and demand balance, the imminent need to redefine local governance, mass migration, and a suggestion from one politician "to begin looking to political representation as a means to help politics stay out of the way of the interests of people!

In November 2007, Deconstructing Dinner attended one of the first regional food security conferences ever held in Canada. With a population of less than 10,000 people, the City of Nelson, British Columbia, hosted over 250 people for the first evening of keynote speakers. With an equally impressive 170 in attendance on the second day of keynote speakers and workshops, the conference acts as an example for other communities wishing to begin organizing themselves to take greater control over the food available to them.

Our global food system faces a crisis of unprecedented scope. This crisis, which threatens to imperil the lives of hundreds of millions and possibly billions of human beings, consists of four simultaneously colliding dilemmas, all arising from our relatively recent pattern of dependence on depleting fossil fuels.

The Heritage Food Service Co-operative is looking to reclaim greater control over the regional food system on Vancouver Island. Once producing 85% of the food consumed on the Island, Vancouver Island now only produces less than 10% of the food consumed! This new co-operative will challenge the common supply chain model whereby farmers most often receive the short end of the stick, and replace it with what is known as a value chain.

In Nelson, British Columbia, 150 residents pledged to commit to eating more locally throughout the month of August. We speak to seven of those who pledged and hear how they managed such an undertaking, what they learned from the experience, and whether or not they gave up!