Mr. Bowen Goes to Capitol Hill

On Thursday April 25th, EAT South’s Mark Bowen was one of four farmers and food advocates that were invited to speak on Capitol Hill in Washington, DC to be a part of a panel on “Policies that Promote Healthy Food and Healthy Economies”.  The panel was sponsored by the Congressional Tri-Caucus (Asian, Hispanic, and Black Caucuses) as a part of a new partnership between four food advocacy organizations that collectively call themselves the Food and Agriculture Policy Collaborative, which consists of the Food Research and Action Center (FRAC), Fair Food Network, Policy Link, and the National Sustainable Agriculture Coalition (NSAC).  Each organization chose a single farmer or food advocate to be a part of the panel.  Mr. Bowen was sponsored by NSAC.

Each of the panel participants discussed different topics concerning food policy issues.  Though the panelist’s topics may have been different, all topics discussed were intertwined.  In other words, all issues addressed by the panelists depend on one another to ensure success and a better food system.   Mr. Bowen covered stranded farm bill programs - programs currently unfunded as a result of the extension of the farm bill.  The two stranded programs that Mr. Bowen focused on were the Farmer’s Market Promotion Program and the Beginning Farmer Rancher Development Program.  Both programs that Mr. Bowen spoke to are programs that have benefited Alabamians.  EAT South received a Farmers Market Promotion Program grant through the USDA to build infrastructure at the Downtown farm, which annually serves thousands of children and adults in Montgomery and throughout Alabama.  The Beginning Farmer and Rancher Development Program funded the Alabama Sustainable Agriculture Network (or ASAN, which EAT South’s Executive Director Edwin Marty sits on the board of) to create the capacity for local farmers to gain access to local markets and to receive the training they need to become good farmers.

Speaking on the Hill is an important component in creating a food system that EAT South strives to implement.  The speakers on this panel are ultimately most effective on a local level.  When local food programs and policies are supported by their community and by local and state government, federal laws begin to change.  The change begins here in Montgomery, in Alabama, and throughout the south. 

To learn more about the panel discussion and to read the testimony Mark Bowen gave on the Hill, visit http://sustainableagriculture.net/blog/alabama-farmer-on-healthy-food/.

EAT South at Southern SAWG, January 28th, 2013

Last week the entire EAT South staff got to travel to Little Rock, Arkansas for the Southern Sustainable Agriculture Working Group’s annual conference (www.ssawg.org).  This conference is an amazing gathering of farmers, food system advocates, students, policy makers, and ‘eaters.’  I started the conference with a tour of two wonderful school gardens in the Little Rock area.  The first was at Cloverdale Elementary School and was part of a state-wide initiative called The Delta Garden Study.  This collaborative research-based project is an initiative to study the impact of school gardens on childhood obesity through the development of garden-based curriculum and the development of school gardens.  I had some great conversations with their staff about ways to replicate some of their work here in Alabama.  We are working on a project called A Garden in Every School/ A School in Every Garden that could benefit tremendously from their years of work. 

I also attended a number of workshops on food policy and community organizing, walking away with some really good ideas on how to increase the impact of the groups working on food policy here in Alabama – such as the River Region Food Policy Council and the Alabama State Food Policy Council.  Perhaps the best lesson learned is how critically important it is to design a project that includes substantial opportunities for the people that will impacted by the work of the project to participate in the design and goals of the project.  I heard a wonderful story about an organization that was given a vacant lot in the midst of a low-income community.  Instead of objectively assessing the problems in the community and developing a project to address the perceived problems, this organization decided to move very slowly and thoughtfully.  They simply started mowing the grass on the property and continued to mow the grass for four years while developing a strong relationship with the community.  Eventually, the community collectively decided that a garden would be the best possible use of the property and the organization was able to assist in its development.  The community felt full ‘ownership’ of the project because the goals of the project addressed their actual concerns and needs – not the ‘perceived’ needs. 

Besides lots of learning, the EAT South staff had time to share stories over good food and drink with other urban farmers across the south.  We look forward to strengthening these relationships over the coming years so that Montgomery can one day be the model others look to for local food system success stories.