Localizing the food system

What can happen when a group of women who are concerned about the quality of the food that people in their community eat decide to do something about it? They become part of a local food movement focused on educating consumers on making healthy food choices that will improve the health of families, communities, and our ecosystem. In the northwest counties of California, they formed a small 501(c)(3) nonprofit organization that supports the development of a sustainable food system with broad community collaboration. Local NGOs, educators, health workers, schools, hospitals, farmers, and even local policymakers come together, thanks to the efforts of Locally Delicious, Inc. (visit www.locally-delicious.org for more information). For over eight years, this organization has been raising awareness of the integrated importance of combining local sustainably grown food, healthy diets, protecting local ecosystems, and strengthening local economies.

Locally Delicious is a very small and modest effort at food system change. Yet in a short period of time, they have published books of healthy recipes from food grown on local farms and how to help parents make better meals for their children. Proceeds from the sale of their publications, along with a local fund-raising campaign, have allowed them to support small efforts at “re-localizing” food systems in their region. They serve as networking agents for sustainable food system community development efforts and are involved in multiple policy-making councils and networks. They hold community meetings, host various food related events, and serve as educators about food system change. Their hope is that their books and work will inspire people elsewhere to do the same within their own communities.

The encouraging thing about Locally Delicious is that it is made up of community members who really represent the folks who eat the food grown locally, rather than the farmers who grow it. As eaters, they are acutely aware of the important role they play in promoting food system change. By forging close links between farmers and eaters, they are facilitating change at what I call Level 4 in the transformation process (Gliessman 2016). When local communities realize that they can play a big part in the development of alternatives to the commodified, monopolized, and industrialized food system so dominant today, real change can begin to happen.

Locally Delicious is a very small part of what is happening in communities around this country and many other parts of the world. The people who eat want to know who grows their food, how it is grown, and why it is important to once again be in direct relationship with the source of their food. This local food movement is spreading out laterally, and as it does so, a foundation for greater change is being put in place.

I look forward to seeing examples in the pages of our journal of how the local food movement is using agroecology to foster food system transformation.