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Brooklyn Food Conference: Local Action for Global Change
Grassroots Communities Organize For A Healthy, Environmentally Sustainable, and Socially Just Food System
May 2, 2009
PS 321 & John Jay High School in Park Slope
* Free and Open to the Public
Co-sponsored by Brooklyn’s Bounty (BB), Caribbean Women’s Health Association (CWHA), and the Park Slope Food Coop (PSFC) this one-day, Brooklyn-wide conference will educate Brooklynites about what we at the grass roots can do to address our broken global food system.
- Why do we have food shortages and skyrocketing prices?
- How are high rates of obesity and diabetes related to cheap prices for corn, sugar, and other subsidized commodities produced by agribusiness and added to our food by big food manufacturers?
- We’ll learn how the food system impacts social justice, human health, and environmental sustainability.
- We’ll also discover local, regional, national, and international organizations working to change the system by providing healthy, environmentally sustainable food and protecting those who produce it.
Featured Speakers
Events include:
- Major speakers and workshops for teens and adults, addressing issues including: effects of our food system on health, the environment, and labor; improving the nutritional content of school lunches; urban agriculture; farmers’ markets; community gardens; and food coops.
- Workshop presenters will come from Brooklyn community organizations. Neighborhood-based sessions will promote future organizing projects all over the borough.
- Information tables, food demos, and healthy food provided by local restaurants
- Learning activities for kids organized by Brooklyn parents and teachers
- Teen programs developed by teens
- A dinner and dance honoring local farmers and key Brooklyn Food activists to end the evening
Our goals are to:
- Expand community participation and develop networks within and across neighborhoods, expanding Brooklyn’s Bounty into a broad-based Food Coalition
- Educate the larger Brooklyn community on food as a critical issue for both present and future
- Strengthen existing organizations working on food issues
- Create greater awareness and unity on these issues, and educate and activate elected officials
We invite you to help us gather partners, participants, and funders. We expect up to 1,000 participants from every Brooklyn neighborhood and 150 partner community organizations. info@brooklynfoodconference.org; 917-693-3155. www.brooklynfoodconference.org
