Oklahoma Food Coop Videos

 From April 19^th – April 22^nd 2010, five delegates from the Harvest Moon Local Food Initiative (HMLFI) and one from the Farmers Market Association of Manitoba went to Oklahoma City to learn about the operations of the Oklahoma Food Co-op (OFC). The delegates had the opportunity to: 1) Tour, and collect video documentation of the operations centre 2) Participate in the OFC’s drop-off and delivery days on Wednesday April 20^th and Thursday April 21^st 3) Meet and talk to producers and volunteers on drop-off and delivery day 4) Meet and talk with several key members of the OFC including the Co-op’s founder, Bob Waldrop, the general operation manager, Kara Joy McKee, the volunteer coordinator, Megan Dosher and one of the financial administrators, Lori Lyon 5) Record interviews with Bob Waldrop, Kara Joy McKee, Lori Lyon, and producers and volunteers on delivery day.  Most importantly the group of delegates had the opportunity to see, in the context of the OFC, how important a multi-stakeholder approach, and inclusionary principles are in creating a successful local food distribution system. The key message from OFC organizers was the importance of communication, policy and governance structure including multiple stakeholders (e.g. producers, volunteers, eaters etc.) and an ability to adapt and change when necessary.

Direct Marketing Survey: Congrats to the Draw Winners and Thanks to All who Participated

Colin and Allan Making the Draw

Thanks to everyone who participated in our study about direct farm/ranch marketing in Canada and the United States. We had just under 200 respondents to our survey and interviewed about fifty farmers. We’re currently working through the results and will keep you posted as results are written up. Every person who returned a survey was entered to win a random draw for a prize. My next door neighbor and I drew three names. First prize went to Dan Cwach from South Dakota. Second prize went to Jim Tingle from British Columbia. Third prize went to Paul Fradette from Saskachewan. (more…)

Food Buying Clubs: Increasing Our Access to Local Food

You may have decided that high-quality local food has health and environmental benefits you value. You may also think that it would be interesting to get to know your farmer and see where your food comes from. This may sound great, but how do you actually go about buying local sustainable food? It sure wouldn’t make sense for you to drive two hours to a farm when a grocery store is much closer. And it doesn’t make any more sense that a farmer would make a trip to the city just to deliver you four steaks. The Harvest Moon Local Food Initiative seeks to make local food practical through the model of Food Buying Clubs. After a brainstorming session at the Harvest Moon Festival, Food Buying Clubs may just be bringing local food even closer to you! (more…)

How Wall Street Starved Millions and Got Away With It

High finance really intrigues me. Shocking, I know, because who wants to talk about financial instruments? Futures, swaps, derivatives, blah, and blah. While the nature of high finance is obscure, their effects on the real world are painstakingly real.

This fact is demonstrated when food is traded as a commodity, like any other piece of stock – when you can draw the line between how those futures and affect the real cost of our daily bread. No clearer was this fact was demonstrated than during the food crisis of 2008. (more…)

Slovenia – Big Local Food in a Small Country

Farmer's Market in Koper Slovenia

One of the greatest highlights of traveling to other countries is the opportunity to try new and different foods. This past semester I went on the Canada-European Union Peace and Conflict Resolution Exchange to Slovenia, a very small, hilly country in the former Yugoslavia.  (To give you an idea of just how small this country is, we lived a town called Koper on the east coast and were able to drive to the western border in a mere three hours!) While my studies investigated peace and justice from a political perspective, I also had the chance to take a look at food justice in this Eastern European country.

Export agriculture makes up only 2.5 percent of Slovenia’s economy, however (more…)