Does It Matter
Where Food
Comes From?

To a casual observer of the overflowing produce stands, luxury delicatessens and eateries of Manhattan, or the lavishly stocked supermarkets of the suburbs, the notion that New York City has a food system problem seems bizarre. To those who look a little deeper, the problems often seem overwhelming. Hunger in the city is widespread and increasing as evidenced by the growing numbers of hungry people turning up at soup kitchens and food pantries; stubborn urban poverty is matched by increasing rural poverty as a globalizing food system makes it even harder for the region's farmer's to make a living from the land. Those of us concerned about hunger and those of us concerned about a viable local agriculture system clearly need to have a discussion about how we can work together to solve a web of food-system problems that none of us can solve alone.

With that in mind, educators, consumer advocates, farmers, chefs and a wide range of anti-hunger, urban gardening, social justice and community groups came together over the last year, under the auspices of Just Food, to talk about the food system. From these discussions it emerged that access to high-quality, nutritious food emerged was an obvious area of common ground and a starting point for collaboration.

But as soon as we began working together, we realized that the same word - access - didn't mean the same thing to all of us. We needed to step back and ask ourselves and each other some key questions: "What is the food system we're talking about?", "What's wrong with it and how do we begin to fix it?', and finally, "What kind of access are we talking about - to what kind of food?".

We learned immediately that anti-hunger groups saw the existing U.S. food system as a bent cornucopia. Dealing daily with the problem of truly hungry people, facing increasing need and shrinking resources in an increasingly hostile policy environment, and watching "donor fatigue" compound the problem of salvaging some shreds of a safety net, these folks saw the problem as lack of access by a large and growing segment of society to the abundance of relatively cheap food the U.S. produces or imports, to the stores that sell it, or to the income and job opportunities that make purchasing that food possible.

Sustainable food system advocates, on the other hand were worried about a shocking decline in the number of farms and farmers, about growing consolidation in the "agribusiness" sector, and about an increasingly globalized food system heedlessly destroying the resources sustainable agriculture depends on: good soils, clean water, genetic diversity and human knowledge of local ecosystems, crops and climates. The underlying problem as they see it, is that most people don't have access to food produced and distributed in ways that enhance rather than destroy the land, water, farm families and communities. Indeed, many of those who grow, process and distribute the food are themselves often counted among the hungry.

Given these differing concerns, how do we begin to reconcile the immediate and overwhelming food needs of millions of low-income New Yorkers, the immediate and overwhelming survival needs of New York farmers, and the long-term needs of all New Yorkers for healthful food, clean environments and life-sustaining employment? The reconciliation begins, I believe, with a common vision of a society free of hunger and full of healthy, fulfilled people.

Hunger is part and parcel of a global economic system that is driving inequity, exploitation, waste and poverty. Where food comes from, how it's grown and by whom is important because it determines the kind of food system and economic system we are investing in for ourselves and our descendants. We can support an unsustainable, globalized food system based on high fossil fuel use, genetically engineered inputs, and mind boggling concentration of power and decision making - and continue to hope that there will be enough "left overs" to go around, if only we can provide access to them. Or, we can begin, as hundred of groups around the city and the region are doing, to develop component parts of regional food systems that will increase access to good food, good jobs and control over the regional economy and environment.

Kathy Lawrence is the Executive Director of Just Food, the NYC Sustainable Food System Alliance.