yearofplenty

Food Safety Modernization Act Headed for Passage - Fate of Small Farms Amendments Uncertain

I reported earlier on the fears that the Food Safety Modernization Act now before Congress could put small farmers' out of business and send a destructive ripple through the burdgeoning local food movement. Yesterday the bill passed a cloture vote in the Senate which means it will likely soon be passed and put into law. The amendments to lower the negative impact on small farmers are still up in the air, and it sounds like there is an epic battle going on right now among legislators, big food lobbyists, and locavores.

Huffington Post yesterday even went as far as to say "Locavores Hold Up Food Safety Bill in Senate." They've subsequently changed the headline to "Local Food Advocates", but yesterday it was all about those pesky, food-luddite locavores who were gumming up the works. I guess we officially have a Locavore Lobby in this country now.

Grist has been all over this so I'll turn it over to them:

Two very important amendments to the bill are currently the subject of fierce lobbying by industry. We've already extensively discussed the Tester-Hagan amendment, which would exempt small and very small farms and food processing businesses (defined as those that make under a certain amount of money, and that earn at least 50 percent of their revenue from direct-to-consumer sales like farmers markets or CSAs), from some of the bill's requirements.

It's worth noting that such direct sales of agricultural products totaled just $1.2 billion in 2007, or 0.4 percent of total agricultural sales, according to the USDA. That's the tiniest drop in the bucket, but it's growing fast every year -- sales are up 105 percent in the last decade, double the rate that overall agricultural sales have grown.

Which may explain why agribusiness groups considers such small operations enough of a threat that they're taking the legislative route to block any further growth.

If you want to get your food wonk on, go to Grist and read up on the whole interesting process. Here is a good place to start:

Will the Food Safety Modernization Act harms small farms and producers?

Grist reports that it's still not too late to call your Senator:

There's still time to tell your senators that you want them to ignore these industry lobbying groups and pass a bill that will better protect all Americans from food-borne illness and known carcinogens in their food. Call them today: Go to www.Senate.gov to find your representatives' contact information or call the Capitol Switchboard at (202) 224-3121.

Because if you've read the 20,000 words of debate that Grist has published about this bill, you hopefully agree with our panelists that the system it will create, though concerningly vague in places, will be better than the one we've got now.

How My Little Blog Out-Reported the New York Times

On Monday I wrote up a post on the much heralded New York Times article, While Warning About Fat, U.S. Pushes Cheese Sales. This kind of story is the bread and butter of the fast evolving food blogosphere, of which Year of Plenty is a very small part. A large media outlet like the Times does the original reporting and then it gets echoed throughout the blogosphere, Twitterverse, and Facebook Friend-Feed-Frenzyverse. It received so much attention that I initially wasn't going to bother linking to it, assuming that everyone had already seen it. But when I got around to actually reading the Times article, something didn't seem quite right. The article was factually correct in its reporting but cryptic in the way it described the relationship between the USDA and the Dairy Management Corporation. It hinted that the U.S. taxpayer-funded USDA was pulling the strings on the Domino's marketing campaign.

This subtle hint in the article was turned into the brash assertion all over the internet that U.S. taxpayers were not only paying for the $12 million campaign with Domino's for extra-cheesy pizzas, but that the USDA, and therefore the government, was running the ad campaign. While I highlighted in my post some smaller blogs that reported the story this way, Bill Bishop at the Daily Yonder gives a good summary of how this played out among some of the most influential people and news platforms in America:

Food writer and journalism professor Michael Pollan tweets that “our tax dollars (are) at work promoting Domino’s pizza.”

Kerry Trueman (co-founder of EatingLiberally.org) states on the liberal Huffington Post that Domino’s Pizza is selling gobs of cheese with the help of a “government handout.” 

The Atlantic says the “government wants to fatten you up with cheese.” Paul Waldman at The American Prospect writes a government agency uses “taxpayer funds” — “your tax dollars” — to promote double melt cheeseburgers.  Matt Yglesias writes a headline saying "Tax Dollars Going to Subsidize Cheesier Dominoes (sic) Pizzas," adding that this is the kind of “government spending…we could entirely do without.”

Because of previous stories I've done on the agricultural checkoff programs, these assertions didn't sound quite right. So I did something that Michael Moss, "ace New York Times Reporter" didn't do; I made a couple phone calls and actually talked to someone at Dairy Management about the program. As far as I can tell, in all the reporting that's been done on the story, I'm the only "reporter" that talked to Dairy Management to better understand their relationship to the USDA. I also talked to a representative of United Dairymen of Idaho to get a better understanding of how the checkoff system works.

Moss explained in the article why he didn't have those conversations:

The Agriculture Department declined to make top officials available for interviews for this article, and Dairy Management would not comment. In answering written questions, the department said that dairy promotion was intended to bolster farmers and rural economies, and that its oversight left Dairy Management’s board with “significant independence” in deciding how best to support those interests.

The crux of the whole story is the nature of the relationship between the USDA and Dairy Management and Moss didn't speak to anyone at either entity? He apparently got a written response to questions from the USDA. This may be a case of the USDA and Dairy Management not doing their job of accurately explaining the nature of the relationship, but I'm baffled that I could get through to them to ask probing questions and he couldn't.

So is it possible that I did a more thorough job of reporting on the relationship between the USDA, Dairy Management, and taxpayers than the New York Times?

I'm flattered that the "So Good" food blog seemed to think so. In assessing the reporting on the USDA and Dairy Management the blog says;

The most accurate breakdown of this organization’s role in this story can be found in this post on Year of Plenty, Newsflash: Dairy Industry Wants You to Eat More Dairy – What’s So Controversial About That?

I'll let you read my blog post to decide if I did a more thorough job, but I do know that because of those phone calls I didn't take the "tax-payers paying to promote cheesy pizza" bait, like so many others.

There are a couple of lessons for me in this;

1. Don't believe everything you read on the internet.

2. Don't believe everything you read in the New York Times.

3. When it comes to food politics and debates about food systems, the problem is not the demonization of food, as the Daily Yonder proposes. The problem is the demonization of people. In this case the demonization of people at the USDA and Dairy Management as evil cheese-conspirators.

If this is the problem than the solution is to talk to people and give their perspectives a genuine hearing. In other words, to be in relationship with people. In my case, when it comes to writing about food, that means being in relationship with small local farmers and large scale farmers, conventional and organic, following Grist and #agchat on Twitter. It takes all perspectives to get the story straight. Go here for a recent post on why living in an agricultural region like Spokane where I am in ongoing relationships with people involved in all aspects of the food system makes me a better food blogger.

One of the grand lessons from our year-long experiment in eating local is that relationships with people involved in bringing food to market is the key to developing just and sustainable food systems. This includes farmers, but it also includes business people. The core crisis in the food system is a break-down in the relationships between people involved with bringing food to market and those sticking the food in their mouths. Relationships breed accountability, pride, quality, health, and sustainability. A vaccuum of relationships creates paranoia, pollution, corruption, unhealth, shoddy practices, and most of the other ills in the food system. That's why I am committed to eating locally and promoting local food.

My diagnosis of the situation is more than just about good reporting and blogging. (Warning: If you don't follow my blog this is going to sound totally random.) It's actually rooted in my Christian faith and my role as pastor at a Presbyterian church. My focus on relationships arises from my understanding of Jesus' commandment to love your neighbor as yourself. In my judgement, this call to be in relationship with people is the key lens through which to see everything, including food. In my upcoming book I have a chapter dedicated to explaining this perspective. I hope it will be a helpful contribution to food debates that too often get bogged down haggling about food miles, carbon footprints, or cheesy marketing campaigns.

Korean Kimchi Crisis Serves as a Reminder of Lost Food Culture in U.S.

picture: the Walrus blog

The story of how the rising price of Napa cabbage is creating a crisis of constraints on the Korean supply of kimchi is a fascinating story in its own right. (I wasn't aiming for alliteration in that sentence but, hey, sometimes it just happens) What has really got me thinking, though, is how the Korean way of life is so connected to food and food processes, in contrast to the American way of life that is so disconnected.

Kimchi is so much a part of Korean life that the kimchi crisis warranted a response  from the government as if they were talking about the supply of gasoline or fresh water;

“There is no reason for regular folks to have to buy items integral to daily life at higher prices than international prices,” Mr. Lee said at a cabinet meeting on Tuesday, while instructing his economists to more closely monitor commodity prices that have sent the South Korean consumer price index to a 17-month high.

Notice that the essential nature of the food item is not it's nutritional content, but something deeper, more cultural, more anchored in identity and frameworks of meaning.

The article describes the Autumn family ritual of making kimchi;

The price increases have caused many middle- and lower-income homemakers to cancel the making of kimchi at home this year, a traditional rite of autumn that typically brings together mothers, daughters, aunts, grannies and neighbors. Some families can go through a couple of hundred heads of cabbage, and it’s not unusual for all the bathtubs and sinks in a house to be filled with bobbing cabbages as they are washed, soaked and brined.

The question that arises for me is; What would be the American equivalent to Korean Kimchi? What food items and rituals are so central to our way of life that they would warrant a statement from the governor? What food rituals bring together the generations in our households?

Maybe Thanksgiving turkey comes the closest, but my basic observation is that there is no equivalent. American food culture has been plowed under like a chemically enhanced, genetically modified field of corn. There is not much of an identifiable food culture. By contrast, when we went to Thailand two years ago one of the most memorable, tasty meals was the Korean food on the Korean Airlines flight. Most cultures in the world are integrally connected to food and food processes. A big part of the movement toward local food in the U.S. is an effort to recover our food culture. That's something that economists will never get.

But Korea's food culture may be facing greater challenges than a cabbage shortage;

Mrs. Roh has two daughters, both in their 30s, and she said they learned to make kimchi “by looking over my shoulder, by tasting and doing, like all Korean girls are supposed to.”

One daughter works at an Outback steakhouse, the other at an upscale department store, and they have little time to make kimchi on their own, Mrs. Roh said, lamenting the loss of another tradition to the “ppali ppali” or “hurry hurry” lifestyle of modern South Korea.

Outback steakhouse? I wonder if they serve kimchi with the steak.

Wal-Mart ramps up efforts to buy local food

Wal-Mart continues to make larger bets on going local and more sustainable as reported this morning;

In the United States, Wal-Mart will double the percentage of locally sourced produce it uses, to 9 percent, the company said. Wal-Mart defines local produce as that grown and sold in the same state. Still, the program is far less ambitious than in some other countries — in Canada, for instance, where Wal-mart expects to buy 30 percent of produce locally by the end of 2013, and, when local produce is available, increase that to 100 percent.

In emerging markets, Wal-mart has pledged to sell $1 billion of food from small and medium farmers (which it defines as farmers with fewer than 20 hectares or about 50 acres). It will also provide training for the farmers and their laborers on how to choose crops that are in demand as well as the proper application of water and pesticides.

Go here, here and here for previous posts on Walmarts efforts to go local.

Spokane Area Farm to Offer Winter CSA Meat and Vegetable Subscription

Living in a northern climate means short growing seasons and extra challenges finding local sources of food during the winter. This year Rocky Ridge Ranch, a farm small sustainable farm in Reardan, WA, is going where no other Spokane area farm has gone in helping consumers with this dilemma. They are offering a winter CSA program.

CSA's are a wonderful innovation in local food but it's likely you have no idea what a CSA is. They are basically subscriptions for a weekly supply of fresh local fruits, veggies and meats. Go here for previous posts that will help bring you up to speed and go here for a first hand account of someone's experience with a CSA. CSA's are a win-win for farmers who need steady reliable cash flow and consumers who are often too busy to hunt down local sources for food.

Rocky Ridge Ranch produces some of the areas best meat, eggs and produce so this is a great opportunity.

Here's the description they give of a typical weekly delivery;

Meat
Chicken or Roast (beef or pork or lamb.)
Beef Steak, or Pork or Lamb Chops, or Beef, or Pork Cutlets
Sausage, Bacon or Links
Ground Beef or Beef Stew Meat or Ground Pork or Ribs
Soup Bones, etc. as available
(Substitutes of comparable value may have to be made from time to time.)

Produce
Salad Mix or Spring Mix or Spinach
Salad onions or radishes
Lettuce, or Winter Greens
Beets,or Carrots or Potatoes (Stored or fresh)
Squash or Cabbage ( Brassicas we succeed with.)
Herbs (dried or Fresh.)

Go here for the full run-down.

Battle Brewing Over the "Farmers' Market" Brand In Washington State

photo: Nick Wingfield/The Wall Street Journal

I first got wind of a brewing controversy from Jack, a commenter on the blog, who heard a radio ad to the effect of - No need to go to the Farmers' Market when you can come to the Albertson's produce market. Apparently Safeway has been taking a similar approach, promoting their in-store produce experience as a farmers' market.

Yesterday I received notice from the Washington State Farmers' Market Association that they are forming a task force "to review the use of the term "farmers' market" by non-WSFMA-member groups." I didn't immediately make the connections between the Albertson's ad and the formation of the task force but then I came across this WSJ article explaining the controversey;

Farmers and their supporters have spent several decades building "farmers' market" into a brand that signifies something specific to consumers, namely, locally grown produce fresh off the farm. Now, to the dismay of farmers' market representatives, two large grocery chains in the Northwest recently began posting store banners advertising displays of tomatoes, corn and other items as farmers' markets.

In June, several Safeway Inc. stores in the Seattle area posted signs with the term "Farmers Market" above produce displays in front of their stores. When local farmers' market groups complained—the offerings included mangos, which aren't suited to Washington's climate—Safeway changed the signs to say "Outdoor Market." A Safeway spokeswoman said the chain has no plans to call its outdoor events "farmers' markets" in the future.

But then, over the Labor Day weekend, about 200 Albertsons stores in Washington, Oregon and Idaho put up their own "Farmers Market" signs next to their produce stands. The same groups complained to local Albertsons managers about the promotions, but a spokesman for the chain's owner, Supervalu Inc., said the Albertson stores may repeat them in the future if the chain deems them effective. These "farmers' supermarkets" have popped up from time to time in other regions as well.

In Washington State the rules for state association member markets are very clearly defined and enforced, so it does create a dilemma when you have a highly regulated use of the term "farmers' market" alongside a fast-and-loose use of the term, strictly for marketing purposes. I'll be interested to see how this shakes out. I think a good argument could be made that the state association, through its work, has established and nurtured the term "farmers' market" as a valuable brand in the state of Washington, and therefore they should have some authority to regulate the use of the brand.

This is yet one more example of how the rapidly growing interest in local food has large retailers scrambling to get on board. I'm not sure if they are seeing a decline in sales or if their marketing departments simply see an opportunity.

I did an interview yesterday for an upcoming show on NPR about the growing backlash against the local food movement, and I was asked about the critique by some that farmers' market and the like are nothing more than elaborate marketing schemes. My response is that there is actually something very real and substantial going on in our culture around food, and there are some that are responding by turning that into a marketing scheme. But as the flimsy marketing banners go up around town, let's not forget the substantial shifts that are taking place in the relationship between consumers, food, farmers and land. The marketplace is responding to consumer interest, but let's not then equate the marketplace's response to the thing itself.

Food Fight, Ctd - In Praise of the 10,000 Mile Diet

A recent Chicago Tribune article had one of the more thorough treatments of the debates between industrial agriculture pragmatists vs. local food idealists.I was intrigued to hear about an upcoming book;

...economist Hiroko Shimizu and University of Toronto geographer Pierre Desrochers are finishing a 2011 book, tentatively called "In Praise of the 10,000 Mile Diet," that argues locavorism is a misleading marketing fad that, among other problems, ignores the threat it poses to the current affordability of food and to the economic health of developing countries.

Food security can suffer if "you put all your eggs in one local basket and something goes wrong," Desrochers said from his Toronto office. "I also have a problem when local food activists want to promote food that is either not economical or cannot compete with foreign food in that area."

Go here for a brief article of the same name by Shimizu.

The whole Tribune article is worth a read but I should clarify one point regarding the use of food stamps at farmers' markets. The article offers that as a counterpoint to farmers market elitism but early reports are that while many markets take food stamps, few consumers are taking advantage of it. Unfortunately, this has been true at the Millwood Farmers' Market where we haven't had a lot of food stamp transactions this summer.

Go here for my response to these debates.

Food Fight: Washington Post Foodie Ezra Klein Defends Industrial Agriculture

Earlier in the week influential blogger Ezra Klein of the Washington Post wrote a short post dismissing the influence of the local food movement and heralding that "Industrial farms are the future." He wrote;

Despite the dreams of many foodies, I can't think of a major industry that went from small, decentralized production methods to large, scaled industrial production -- and then back again. Are there any examples I'm missing? Maybe so. But for now, I think of the preference for farmers markets and small producers as being mainly important in sending certain signals about production methods and branding preferences to Big Ag than in actually creating some sort of viable alternative.

In the article he references an article from the Guardian in the UK where Jay Rayner argues;

Words such as local, seasonal and organic have become a holy trinity. But these are merely lifestyle choices for the affluent middle-classes, a matter of aesthetics, and nothing to do with the real issues.

If we are to survive the coming food security storm, we will have to embrace unashamedly industrial methods of farming. We need to abandon the mythologies around agriculture...and recognise that farming really is an industry, much like car manufacturing or steel forging, one which always works better on a mass scale, but which can still be managed sustainably.

Ezra Klein is a farmers'-market-shopping, meatless-monday-eating, full-on-foodie so his little post created quite a stir. Tom Philpot at Grist offered up the highest profile retort. He mainly takes down Rayner's editorial and tisk-tisks Klein for passing it off as meaningful commentary. He writes;

Rayner's argument goes like this: a) because the U.K. relies increasingly on food imports, and b) U.K. supermarkets demand flawless, uniform fruits and vegetables, forcing farmers to "grade out" much high-quality produce, and c) U.K. consumers have come to expect dirt-cheap food, then the nation "will have to embrace unashamedly industrial methods of farming" to avoid looming famine.

Really? The same line of reasoning could more logically have led Rayner in the opposite direction: that Britain's food problems stem from a globalized industrial food system consolidated into the hands of a few powerful companies.

Yesterday, Klein offered a little bit of an apology for citing the Guardian editorial, which he admits is weak, but he sticks to his guns when it comes to the future of food being industrial;

...I'm increasingly less convinced that small and big are, in the overall scheme of things, terribly useful dividing lines for the future of agriculture. Whether one could hypothetically imagine feeding the world using decentralized production methods, I don't see much reason to believe it will happen. At the same time, small farms can be run wastefully and large farms can be run sustainably.

When I say that the food movement is sending important signals to America's agribusiness giants, I mean it -- forcing them to innovate in organics and compete with Stonyfield and think about the success of farmers markets are types of pressure that could lead to really important transformations in how they do their business. And those are transformations that might then be copied by large producers in other countries. That's why I think the most important role of the food movement is potentially changing the behavior of players like Nestle and ConAgra, and creating some large companies that demonstrate how a different ethos of food production can be brought to industrial scale.

Andrew Sullivan just pinged this dialogue so I suspect it will get a lot of play on blogs and editorial pages in the coming weeks.

This little food fight touches on so many different aspects of what I blog about here that it's a little hard for me to decide where to enter in, but let me pick one aspect of the debate and see where it leads.

Klein mentions the hypothetical question as to whether it's possible to feed the world through decentralized production methods. It's typical in these debates for defenders of industrial ag to assert that it's not possible to feed the world using organic or local methods and others reply that, actually, you can. Klein dismisses this line of argument as irrelevant. He says it's not going to happen. He asserts that we have never seen "a major industry that went from small, decentralized production methods to large, scaled industrial production -- and then back again," which is what would need to happen in the case of food. The industrial cat is out of the bag and there is no turning back. All we can hope for is mega-corporations that are responsible and responsive to consumer demands for more sustainable and local food.

He takes the the pose of the realist and on one hand I agree with him. I often say (I just said it yesterday in fact), that real substantial change in food distribution will have to come through changes to big retailers like Walmart. For an example of how this is happening with potatoes go here.

But I disagree with Klein's and Rayner's foundational assumption - that the production of food is best viewed as an "industry, much like car manufacturing or steel forging, one which always works better on a mass scale..." For one, there is mounting evidence that food production does not work better on a mass scale. It's only over the last 75 years that food has been imagined as an industry and practiced as such. We fed the world for millennia with small, local and organic agriculture. Modern industrial food practices are a very recent innovation and the long term consequences are still unknown.

There is no doubt that modern technologies have been a boon to the task of feeding people around the world, but there is something different about food than making cars or forging steel. Manufacturing cars is a product of the industrial revolution. Eating food arises out of the very nature of the created order. For all of history food amounted to more than the shallow categories of industry. Food was culture, family, provision, and for the three major religions of the world, a sign of God's grace.

In the Genesis account of creation the first words out of God’s mouth to Adam and Eve are, “You are free to eat….” Not far behind is the warning, “You must not eat…” After their disobedience, God proclaims judgment, “Cursed is the ground because of you; through painful toil you will eat of it all the days of your life. It will produce thorns and thistles for you, and you will eat the plants of the field. By the sweat of your brow you will eat your food until you return to the ground, since from it you were taken; for dust you are and to dust you will return” (Genesis 3:17-19). Even in judgment there is a grace of provision.

It's funny to me how casually we throw around the phrase "saving the world" in debates about sustainability. Isn't it so obvious that "going green" is a veiled, modern-secular way of entering into the territory of apocalypse and salvation, the ancient categories of the human quest for life and meaning and God. Food goes deep into mysterious and hallowed places of human existence. Food cannot be reduced to the limited categories of industry and it does great damage to imagine it exclusively as such.

There is one thing I agree with in the Guardian column. Rayner says that the local, seasonal and organic food movements are a matter of aesthetics, and have nothing to do with the real issues of industrial practices and pragmatics of feeding the world. He's right in pointing out that what drives the local food/sustainable food movement is, something beyond the pragmatism of calories and food miles, something more intangible. Aesthetics is a rather dismissive way of putting it. I would say that it arises out the human search for meaning and hope.

One last comment. Rayner claims that it's only the well-off middle-class who have the luxury to dismiss the reality of food as industry. In my experience it's actually the impoverished 2/3 world that understand the reality that food is more than industry. To the majority world food is culture, family and life. Most of the world gets that those are "real issues" that are relevant to conversations about food. Wealthy westerners are actually the innovators of the exclusive view of food as industry and profit margin. It is our particular single-minded lens that is foreign in the world. 

The insurgent foodies in the western world are attempting to lift up other issues that are very real, issues that touch on aspects of human life that industry can never reduce and control, and issues that impact and change industrial practices.

As I see it, the task is not to de-industrialize food, the task is to re-enchant, re-annimate, and re-new our imaginations around food, which by necessity means to re-connect with the land that supplies us with food (and perhaps the Creator of the land), and along with that to re-connect with the farmers who farm the land.

Idaho Potato Commission: Local Food Movement a Threat to Idaho Potato "Global Brand"

Picture: Mashed potatoes from last year's potato harvest featuring the natural colors of the potato flesh.

Northwest Food News has a great report on how local food advocates and the Idaho Potato Commission recently butted heads in the Idaho legislature.

A resolution was brought before the ag committee simply proposing that the Idaho legislature endorse local food. In response to this rather tame, teethless proposal Frank Muir, the CEO of the Idaho Potato Commission stood up as the lone opponent;

Well Mr. Chairman, Representatives it will probably come as somewhat of a surprise that the Idaho Potato Commission is here to testify in opposition to HCR-56 and on the surface I would be shocked too because it sounds positive, in support of the grower, in support of eating locally and the problem that we have with this is that Idaho Potatoes is not local.  Idaho Potatoes is a global brand.

He went on to explain that the growing emphasis on locally grown food led Walmart to shift gears;

The largest retailer in the country discontinued Idaho potatoes in 5 distribution centers – not 5 stores – 5 distribution centers.  Not because Idaho potatoes wasn’t selling; it was because they were now focusing on buying from the local farmers.

There are several fascinating aspects to this development. For one, stores as big as Walmart are shifting gears in the way they distribute food. I've always said that any substantial shift toward local food would take change at the large retailers and it looks like that is actually happening.

The other interesting aspect is that this shift creates dilemmas for places like Idaho that have low populations and high production of food. A big portion of the Idaho economy is built on exporting milk, potatoes and other agricultural products. When McDonald's in Seattle starts bragging about using Washington grown potatoes that's a problem for Idaho potatoes. They can't compete with that. People that have gone to great lengths to nurture "global brands" are coming to grips with a new marketplace that values local brands.

The whole story is worth a read or listen. If you're interested in local food in the Northwest, Northwest Food News is a must follow on Facebook or Twitter.

Spokane's "Sustainable September" Calendar of Events

This will be the second year for Spokane's Sustainable September series of events and activities. I think this concept was originated on the west of the state, but some leaders in Spokane, specifically the folks at Community Minded Enterprises, are takin it to the next level. Here's the description;

Sustainable September is an annual month-long series of events dedicated to promoting sustainability in the Spokane community. Sustainable September includes discussions, activities, presentations, and tours designed to build community and increase awareness so that Spokane can become more environmentally and economically resilient.

There are currently a diverse variety of environmental and community building non-profits in our area. Sustainable September’s goal is to bring many of these organizations together to build a united front in supporting the environment and health of our community.

Community-Minded Enterprises is partnering with several organizations and businesses to build a strong coalition in promoting action and education within the greater Spokane area. This year Sustainable September is building on partnerships including The Lands Council, the Community Building, LaunchPad INW, Avista, the Sierra Club, and the Northwest Eco-Building Guild.

Here are some off the food related events:

Kickoff Luncheon
September 1, noon at Masonic Temple

This event will kick-off the month long series of Sustainable September. Please join us for a talk from your chef, Jeremy at Sante Restaurant, a speech from Mayor Verner and a Keynote address by Kevin Danaher, founder of Global Exchange. Tickets available at www.brownpapertickets.com/event/123974

The Ethics of Eating Event
September 9, 5:30pm at Trezzi Farm

Guest speakers explore the ethics of eating and access to healthy food in our community. Meal will feature local ingredients. Tickets required and available at www.brownpapertickets.com/event/122812. Download SSS Ethics of Eating for this event.

Green Drinks Spokane
September 14 at The Swamp

Green Drinks monthly event, www.greendrinks.org Featured Organizations: Down to Earth, Sustainable September Cost: FREE Time: 5:30 pm

Food Summit
September 27, 1-3pm - (location to be determined)

Gathering for non-profit and other groups committed to local food and food access issues. meet and greet, and discuss current projects, goals, and challenges. Potluck lunch. RSVP to Kristi at lavenderlaver (at) hotmail (dot) com.

Wheat, Wine and Wild Salmon 4th Annual Dinner
September 29, 10-11 am at Hills Restaurant

DescriptionEach year 3 local organizations, Slow Foods Spokane River, Save Our Wild Salmon & Spokane Falls Trout Unlimited, come together in support of one single issue... supporting the longevity of wild salmon & steelhead in Salmon Nation. Many challenges face these fish, so critical to the health of the NW ecosystem, economy and culture. Extremely local and delicious meal. Tickets available now at www.brownpapaertickets.com/event/118578 Discount for early ticket purchase (before 9/22).

There are a full slate of activities. Go here for the full calendar of events.

Picture: Indian Paintbrush at Mt. Spokane taken last week.