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It’s another dark day for all of us in the Good Food Movement. Today it was announced that Campbell’s will buy Pacific Food, producer of organic and natural soups and broths, plant-based milks, and more. Last week, Hain Celestial snapped up Better Bean Company. More buy-ups and consolidations. More money, more power games. 
The Snoqualmie Valley Farmers Cooperative, this week made their first delivery of organic produce to 21 Acres Food Hub to be distributed to 100 low-income, home-bound seniors in Seattle. 
Getting our food from the farm to the consumer – the “supply chain” – is certainly not as simple as it was the past. Once upon a time, the consumer, his/her family, and the local community WERE the growers and a supply chain didn’t exist. Transportation from the field and barn to the kitchen was a matter of feet or yards, not miles. What once was a simple connection with one or two stops along the way, has become a spaghetti-like tangle of connections, links, and cross-links to get fresh fruits and vegetables to your plate. 
Spend a little time in the presence of a local food advocate and you’ll hear a string of acronyms beginning with CS: Community Supported Agriculture (CSA), Community Supported Bakery (CSB), Community Supported Restaurant (CSR), Community Supported Winery (CSW), Community Supported Fishery (CSF). What is all this community support about and what do these programs really mean? 
We’re all busy people, and we can easily be overwhelmed by the bewildering array of products on the supermarket shelves. According to the FMI (Food Marketing Institute), the average supermarket today carries nearly 39,000 items. How those products make it to the shelf is something that most of us don’t know. Why is this product available and not another one? Who determines what it is that you get to buy? |
 
Book of the MonthStand Together or Starve Alone: Unity and Chaos in the U.S. Food Movement
 “The Food Movement” is a pretty big concept – it can incorporate anything and everything from farming and food production to distribution, marketing, and retail sales. Then toss in farmers markets, food co-ops, and CSAs (Community Supported Agriculture) and it’s a topic that is hard to get your mind around.
In Stand Together or Starve Alone, Mark Winne uses the term “food movement” as an over-arching concept, however he rounds it up into a more straightforward description: “Food Security.” Read on... A Video You Don't Want to Miss!As a member of the Blackfeet Nation, Mariah Gladstone, IndigiKitchen, shares the importance of an Indigenous-based diet. 
Gladstone poses the question of whether a nation can truly be soverign if they are unable to provide for themselves. Something we should all ask ourselves as we move farther from being able to do so. LEARN MORE ABOUT HOW YOUR FOOD GETS TO YOUR PLATE
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