Food First!

A conversation with Eric Holt-Giménez

(April 28, 2011) “The purpose of Food First is to eliminate the injustices that cause hunger.” — Food First mission statement

Food activist, agroecologist and political economist Eric Holt-Giménez came here last week as part of HSU’s Sustainable Futures series to speak about solutions to the root causes of the global food crisis. Coauthor of the book Food Rebellions! Crisis and the Hunger for Justice, Holt-Giménez is the executive director of the Oakland-based Food First, a nonprofit think tank founded in 1975 by Frances Moore Lappé and Joseph Collins.

Food First! GRAPHIC BY BOB DORAN

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The Food First program Building Local Agrifood Systems is in its second year working to ensure that jobs in the food sector — by their count 18 percent of all jobs in America — are good jobs for fair wages. They also campaign locally and nationally to end the food crisis, to support policies that move us toward a better, more equitable food system and to provide alternatives.

As they say on their website, “Dismantling the industrial agrifoods complex at the local food system level must be accompanied by the construction of alternatives that suit the needs of small-scale producers and low-income consumers worldwide.”

In advance of his visit, we reached Holt-Giménez by phone at Food First headquarters in Oakland.

Journal: Humboldt has a flourishing, localized agricultural community. What issues is Food First focusing on that might be applicable to our area?

Eric Holt-Giménez: There is a global food crisis, and that links to local food systems. There are things we can do locally to try to change things globally. We may not feel affected locally, but there are over a billion people globally suffering from hunger. In the U.S. we have 50 million hungry people. Many of the alternative food systems that are appearing across the U.S. could actually play an important role in alleviating this crisis here in the U.S. What’s keeping that from happening is one of the focuses of Food First, and my work.

Tell us about the Oakland Food Policy Council — how Food First is affiliated, and how it’s trying to achieve its goals.

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