Food Justice in West Oakland

http://gristmill.grist.org/story/2008/5/7/13125/01135

Grist.org posted an interesting video (Click on photo or link above) about an environmental justice—or, as they say, “food justice”—group in West Oakland called People’s Grocery. The group seeks “creative solutions to the health, environmental and economic challenges our community faces every day,” focusing on organic agriculture as a means of reclaiming food culture and reconnecting to community and place. The People’s Grocery is a place-based movement, “building an independent food system and a local economy grounded in community partnerships and a local knowledge-base.” The group provides fresh, organic foods to residents, education about local and organic agriculture, as well as community development programs.

I recently read Vandana Shiva’s Stolen Harvest for another course, and since I have been thinking a lot about food, culture, and place. I find the People’s Grocery particularly interesting from this perspective because it strives to combat the homogenization of food systems that alienates people from the culture and community bound up in a place. Cuisine, it seems to me, is a tangible expression of culture and place that is universal, at least in the sense that every cultural tradition has a cuisine and everyone must eat. The People’s Grocery, and they are by no means alone, recognize that by providing local, affordable, organic food to West Oakland residents, they can help empower residents to connect with one another and to the practice of place.

 People’s Grocery website : http://www.peoplesgrocery.org/mission.html