Care About Your Food? Then Show Up in Salem!

In the last two years, we've all learned the value of just showing up. Two years ago, not showing up to vote cast this country into the nightmare we are living through right now. And showing up to a rally for women's rights demonstrated to the world the power and importance of women's voices. In the mid-term elections just last fall, sending postcards to complete strangers urging them to vote, and exercising our own franchise changed the balance of power on a national level.

Showing up, and learning the power of collectively putting our bodies where our beliefs are, has meant that from local school boards to state legislatures to the halls of Congress, our representatives are now more…well…representative of everyone in our communities.

Part of putting our energy into making change together also means getting involved in issues we care about, and I'd highly recommend that if you care about where your food comes from and about the small family farmers who work every day to produce the food we put on our tables, then you should make every effort to get yourself and your families to Salem on Wednesday, March 27. Not only will you get to meet many of those family farmers and show them you've got their backs, you'll have an opportunity to participate in the democratic process by meeting with your representatives in the legislature and tell them how important good, clean food is to your family.

If you're wondering what the heck the legislature has to do with your food, just take a glance at the issues before the current session: a moratorium on the factory farm mega-dairies that are spewing unregulated toxic emissions into the state's air and groundwater; a ban on aerieal spraying of toxic pesticides; bills that will support beginning farmers and encourage retiring farmers to keep their farms in food production rather than selling them for development; and a ban on the use of bee-killing neonicotinoid pesticides that are at least partially to blame for the collapse of pollinators. And those are just a few of the dozens of bills under consideration.

If you've never set foot in the Oregon's Capitol building, it's high time you did. And what better reason than to support the farmers whose labor we all depend on multiple times a day? Get more info and sign up here, and you can sign up to join a carpool to the event from Bend, Grants Pass, Amity, Portland, Monmouth, Corvallis, Springfield and other communities around the state. You even get lunch in the deal!

All you have to do is show up.

Food News: Farm Bill Reboot; Edible Portland Expires Under Cloud

Today Oregon Congressman Earl Blumenauer is hosting a broad range of experts and stakeholders for a forum titled “A Call for Reform: Fix the Farm Bill,” that focuses on the need to create a more visionary, equitable and cost-effective farm bill. The forum features Michael Pollan (top photo, center), author of The Omnivore’s Dilemma, who is delivering the keynote, followed by a panel discussion with a group of policy experts to discuss their ideas for the reform that he's calling The Food and Farm Act.

In an interview about his re-envisioned farm bill on the website Civil Eats, the congressman said that "we continue to pay too much to the wrong people to grow the wrong food in the wrong places" and that he's working to reform subsidies to support innovation and small-to-midsize farmers rather than large corporate agribusinesses.

As he told Good Stuff NW in an interview earlier this year, he's building a coalition of consumers, farmers and non-profits to provide "support for protecting the environment, water quality, habitat [and] things that help the farmer and have broader social and economic benefit. The big issue is that all the attention and subsidy is skewed toward things that don’t need it, and shortchanges things that do, upon which we’re heavily reliant."

One unique element of his efforts is a comic book, "The Fight for Food: Why You Deserve a Better Farm Bill," that explains why the Farm Bill matters to people who care about their food and talks about how they can get involved.

Read my interview with Rep. Blumenauer, part of "The Future of Our Food" series. Photo courtesy Rep. Earl Blumenauer's office.

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Sad news came today that Alex Corcoran, owner and publisher of Edible Portland magazine, has announced that the magazine will cease publication after the current November/December issue.

Corcoran bought the magazine last year after Ecotrust, which had owned the publication since its inception in 2006, decided to cease publication after the Spring 2015 issue and put it up for sale. At the time that Corcoran bought it, Eric Thorkilsen, then-CEO of Edible Media, said, "Alex has a great track record of success managing Edible publications, starting with Edible Rhody [Edible Rhode Island] and continuing with Edible Seattle. His capacity to immerse himself in the local food community—forming solid relationships with small businesses and attracting a devoted readership—suggests a great future for Edible Portland."

The first edition under Corcoran's leadership was the September, 2016, issue. Corcoran initially posted an ad for the sale of the magazine, but because of contractual disagreements with Ecotrust, he has pulled the ad.

In an e-mail to Good Stuff NW, Carolyn Holland, VP of Engagement at Ecotrust, said that Corcoran "does not have the rights to sell the magazine. He has been in breach of his contract with Ecotrust since 2015 when he signed on to assume the license. While we were working with him to give him time to get it on track, now that he has decided to fold, the rights to magazine will revert to [Ecotrust]."

Mr. Corcoran declined a request to comment for this post.

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UPDATE: I received the following update today (11/28) from Carolyn Holland at Ecotrust:

"Free Range Media, publisher of Edible Portland, is ceasing publication of the award-winning magazine at the end of 2017. According to a previous agreement, Edible Portland will return to its original owner and publisher, Ecotrust, which originally launched the magazine in 2006 as one of the first Edibles in the nation. Ecotrust will work with the national media organization Edible Communities, licensor of more than 90 Edible magazines across the United States and Canada, to find a new home for the magazine. Edible Portland boasts a devoted readership of more than 75,000 and has a solid base of both advertisers and contributors. Ecotrust is committed to supporting a smooth transition in ownership. If you are interested in becoming the publisher of Edible Portland, please contact Carolyn Holland, Ecotrust’s VP of Engagement, at 503.467.0754."

Read my recent article for Edible Portland, "Big Milk: Big Issues for Local Communities."

Correction: An earlier version of this post mistakenly stated that Edible Seattle was for sale. It is not. Corcoran is inviting a new publisher to start an Edible magazine in the South Sound area.

The Future of Our Food: Rep. Earl Blumenauer on Putting Your Money Where Your Mouth Is

This series interviews farmers, food activists, politicians and policy wonks to try to get a handle on the seismic shift in our local food landscape due to the change of administrations in Washington.

Congressman Earl Blumenauer, a lifelong resident of Portland, Oregon, has devoted his entire career to public service. While a student at Lewis and Clark College, he spearheaded the effort to lower the voting age both in Oregon and at the national level. He ran for office and was elected to the Oregon Legislature in 1972, then in 1978 he was elected to the Multnomah County Commission. He ran for the Portland City Council in 1986, where his innovative accomplishments in transportation, planning and environmental programs helped Portland earn an international reputation as one of America’s most livable cities. After his election to Congress in 1996, Mr. Blumenauer became the chief spokesperson for Livable Communities: places where people are safe, healthy and economically secure. He also served on the Transportation and Infrastructure Committee, where he was a strong advocate for federal policies that address transportation alternatives, provide housing choices, support sustainable economies and improve the environment. He is currently a member of the Ways and Means Committee and the subcommittees on Health, Social Security and Trade. Every holiday season he makes a multitude—this year it was well over 200—of fruitcakes for friends and colleagues, saying this tradition, for him, is an exercise in connection, creation, and fellowship.

What are the critical issues affecting agriculture and our food system a) here in the Northwest and b) in the country as a whole?

The main problem we have is a massive system of agriculture support and fragmented policy that does not serve the broader interests for agriculture and nutrition. Oregon and Washington are particularly disadvantaged because it is skewed toward large industrial agriculture and processed food.

Oregon has a very diverse agricultural base, and it’s not dependent on large subsidies for major commodities like corn, rice, cotton, wheat, soy. We have some wheat, but in the rest of the country, the support flows to those major commodities. We have an agricultural base that, they’re called specialty crops, but it’s basically food and nursery, and our wine industry. These people don’t want federal subsidies [but] they would like support for innovation. They would like support for protecting the environment, water quality, habitat, things that help the farmer and have broader social and economic benefit. The big issue is that all the attention and subsidy is skewed toward things that don’t need it, and shortchanges things that do, upon which we’re heavily reliant.

I could take the next half hour and talk about how this administration’s devastating, cruel and inhumane policies on immigration threaten our wine industry, threaten our orchards, threaten the nursery industry, but I think the big issue for me is the mismatch between federal programs and priorities and the needs of most farmers and ranchers, especially in the Pacific Northwest.

Putting on your best prognosticating hat, what are the issues you think are going to be at the top of the list of the new administration, and how do you think they will address them?

It’s a big question mark. There has not been any sort of thoughtful, rational position paper that has emanated from either the Trump campaign or the Trump administration. When he convened some people early on, they weren’t exactly on the cutting edge of innovation and reform. But we truly don’t know. Mick Mulvaney, who’s the OMB (Office of Management and Budget) director, who’s been in charge of the slash-and-burn program, like the defunding of public broadcasting—Mick is not a fan of some of the wasteful agricultural subsidies. And who knows how that plays out?

In the Northwest, our farmers and ranchers are disadvantaged because we don’t have an effective program of crop insurance. It is so distorted and heavily subsidized that, in some cases, some commodity growers can plant crops they know will fail because they make so much from failure that it’s worth their while. At the same time, [for] people in the nursery industry [and] in the wine industry, there is no meaningful crop insurance for most of Oregon agriculture. [The system] doesn’t work for them. [Organic and sustainable farming] is another one of those areas where there ought to be some support from conservative forces. I don’t know where the administration is going to come down, but I’m working on a version of the Farm Bill that would make more sense for Oregon, and there are many conservative groups that are working with us to try and reform things like crop insurance. [Conservatives are involved in the issue] because no good is served by wasting money and not helping people who need it. So that’s something that I’ve found that they’re open to reforming to make it work better and, of course, save money. We all ought to be concerned about that.

What do we as citizens need to be paying attention to? What are the best sources for information on the issues?

The best source of information for us are the people who are in the field who are working on it now. Oregon has, as you know, a number of leaders in sustainable agriculture and national efforts for nurseries, for wine. They are quite innovative in organic. I think the best source for us all is to spend a little time with people who are trying to do it right. They’ve got some great observations. I’ve learned a lot from them and I think the more that we can connect to Oregon’s farmers and ranchers [who share] our values the better off we’re going to be.

In your opinion, what’s the most effective action citizens can take in the short term? In the long term?

I think the most effective action that citizens can take is to invest their time and money in the type of food that they think is worthy of it. Voting with your dollars to support farmers’ markets and value-added agriculture and being willing to spend a few pennies more to make sure that people who are taking a risk to do the right thing, that are being trailblazers, that are spending extra time and effort, that they’re supported. I think that if all of us voted to support the producers, the restaurants, the food products that mirror our values, that is in the short term is the single most important thing we can do. Help them be financially successful, show that there’s a market, and get used to enjoying the fruits of their hard work.

In the long term, I hope people will work with me to think through what a farm bill would look like just for Oregon. We’ve traveled the state for the last couple of years interacting with thousands of people, and we’ve got some pretty good recommendations that are being developed that we’re advancing. Those are the sorts of things that we want to get into the discussion of the next Farm Bill that I hope will be enacted.

We should [also] have a farm and food policy for Oregon. We should start by renaming the Department of Agriculture, like Jerry Brown did in California, the Department of Food and Agriculture. We ought to make sure that Oregonians who are in Congress are going to fight for provisions that are going to make a difference for us.

What organizations most need our support?

What I’m hoping that each Oregonian will do is to raise the need for sound food and farm policy with all the organizations that are impacted by food and farm policy. The people who are fighting hunger, like the Oregon Food Bank.

I had a meeting recently with probably two dozen environmental organizations that were sharing with me what their priorities were. We went all the way around the room and I heard from them and they are things that I care about, and I said none of you have mentioned the Farm Bill. Does anything in the Farm Bill affect your environmental priorities? People thought for a second, then they went around the room and everybody, every one of those organizations had a stake in the Farm Bill. People who care about conservation programs. People who care about water quality. People who care about wildlife. People who care about toxics. I mean, we went all the way around the room and everybody acknowledged that they had a stake.

There’s a move afoot back here in Washington, DC, to blow up the Affordable Care Act. I’ve been having dozens of meetings with people in the health sectors, we talk about their concerns and we compare notes and stuff, but in every one of those meetings, I ask, "What is your position on the Farm Bill?" And they think about it for a moment and [say] we have the food and farm policies that subsidizes a diet that literally makes us sick. It’s too expensive, especially for lower income people, seniors, to be able to have healthy food, and there are some subsidy programs we need more of. We don’t do a good enough job teaching children about where their food comes from, how to prepare it.

The Farm Bill has a tremendous impact on education. Everything from having healthy food in our schools to our prisons, to ecomomic development for small and beginning farmers. The average age of a farmer in the United States is pushing 60. It’s hard for young people to break into the market. The organizations that support family farms, the organizations that deal with economic development. Every organization that cares about the health and well-being of our people, our economy, and our environment should be involved with [the Farm Bill] and I think citizens ought to push on all the organizations that they have contact with to make sure they’re doing their part for a food and farm policy that works.

[As to the impression of most people that the Farm Bill is huge and intimidatingly complex], that’s a deliberate strategy. It’s complex and convoluted, and that way a small group of people can control the dialog and virtually nobody fully understands the Farm Bill.

This is an edited transcript of an interview I conducted with Congressman Blumenauer on Mar. 17, 2017.

Read the other posts in this series.

The Future of Our Food: Oregon Senator Jeff Merkley on GMOs, Climate Change and Citizen Action

This series interviews farmers, food activists, politicians and policy wonks to try to get a handle on the seismic shift in our local food landscape due to the change of administrations in Washington.

Elected to represent Oregon in the United States Senate in 2008, Jeff Merkley replaced conservative Republican Senator Gordon Smith in a hard-fought battle for the state's junior seat. The son of a millwright, he was born in the timber town of Myrtle Creek, Oregon, and was the first in his family to attend college, graduating with an undergraduate degree in International Relations from Stanford and a graduate degree in Public Policy at Princeton's Woodrow Wilson School of Public and International Affairs. After college Merkley worked as a national security analyst at the Pentagon and at the Congressional Budget Office, then returned to Oregon in 1991 to take a position as the executive director of Portland Habitat for Humanity. His work to provide housing for Oregonians led him to consider running for office, and he was elected to the Oregon House of Representatives in 1998, eventually becoming Speaker of the House. In his life outside of politics, he enjoys hiking and recently completed an IronMan event with his daughter. Impressive!

What are the critical issues affecting agriculture and our food system a) here in the Northwest and b) in the country as a whole?

Genetically modified organisms (GMO) labeling and climate change.

GMO labeling gives consumers easy access to the information they need to make informed food purchasing decisions. There are Federal requirements for disclosing whether fish is farm-raised or wild-caught, or whether juice is from concentrate or fresh squeezed; the same should be true for genetically modified ingredients. After all, 64 other countries—including China—allow their consumers to know whether products contain GMOs.

I have been deeply immersed in this issue, and last year introduced the Biotechnology Food Labeling Uniformity Act, which would deliver a 50-state solution instead of a potentially complicated patchwork of GMO labeling laws. Major food companies like Campbell’s, General Mills, and Mars have listened to the nine out of 10 American who agree that GMOs should be labeled, and have taken steps to voluntarily disclose this information on their products. These companies are demonstrating that it is possible to give consumers the information they want without raising costs at the grocery store.

As a ranking member on the Agriculture and Rural Development Appropriations subcommittee, I’ve been advocating for consumers, and organic and small farms; traditional “big” crops like corn and soybeans are already well represented by lobbyists. I will continue to advocate for Oregon’s specific agricultural needs and consumers’ right to know what’s in their food.

The devastating effects of climate change are already being felt by food systems here in Oregon—baby oysters are dying as the ocean becomes more acidic; wildfire season is longer and more intense; prolonged drought is crippling farms and ranches. And yet we have a president who believes climate change is a hoax, and an Environmental Protection Agency chief who doesn’t think humans have contributed to global warming.

Since we can’t count on the current administration to act on climate, in the coming months I’ll introduce a “100-by-50” bill to achieve 100 percent clean and renewable energy by 2050. The would provide a roadmap to clean the electric grid, electrify transportation, and promote investments in new technologies to end the use of polluting fossil fuels.

The “100-by-50” framework is something every group or organization can sign onto: Commit to operating on 100 percent clean and renewable energy by 2050, and develop a framework for how you’ll get there incrementally. Every garden club, cooking class, and family can contribute to reducing carbon emissions and curbing the effects of climate change on our food systems.

What do we as citizens need to be paying attention to? What are the best sources for information on the issues?

There is a constant barrage of misinformation coming from the current administration. I suggest you identify a favorite traditional news source—one whose information is vetted and verified—to stay informed. Find an issue that you’re passionate about and get involved.

In your opinion, what’s the most effective action citizens can take in the short term? In the long term?

The grassroots uprising by ordinary Americans has had a real effect on Congress. As we go forward, the impact of citizen action is directly proportional to the amount of individual effort it takes. If you sign a petition or send a form e-mail, you’ll help spread the message. By making a phone call or writing a personal e-mail, your message will be a little louder. The biggest impact is showing up—to town halls, to rallies, to demonstrations. Seeing hundreds or thousands or hundreds of thousands of people coalesce around an issue effectively sends a message.

Read the other posts in this series.

The Future of Our Food: Supporting Family Farmers in Oregon

This series interviews farmers, food activists, politicians and policy wonks to try to get a handle on the seismic shift in our local food landscape due to the change of administrations in Washington.

Ivan Maluski owns and operates Shimanek Bridge Farm with his wife, Kendra Kimbirauskas, in rural Linn County where his focus is on producing high quality pasture while rotationally grazing pigs, poultry, goats and cattle. With nearly twenty years of experience working on natural resource policy issues at the state and federal levels, he has served as the Policy Director for Friends of Family Farmers (FoFF) since 2012. He works to accomplish FoFF's legislative and policy priorities at the State Capitol in Salem, representing small and mid-sized farmers and ranchers. He can often be found testifying at the Oregon Board of Agriculture, the Legislature and in other venues. He also makes a terrific cheese from the milk from his herd of LaMancha goats.

What are the critical issues affecting agriculture and our food system a) here in the Northwest and b) in the country as a whole?

In the Northwest, one of the most critical issues facing our food system is rapidly rising farmland prices that is making access to land for beginning farmers increasingly difficult. The average age of Oregon farmers is now at 60 years old and a significant portion of Oregon's farmland base is likely to change hands in the next decade or two. Increasingly, Oregon farmland is being bought by out-of-state real estate investment firms and larger agricultural production firms, which is driving prices beyond the reach of family-scale and newer farmers. This trend could lead to vastly less family ownership of farmland in Oregon in the future, fewer smaller and mid-sized independent farms, and less resiliency in local and regional food production systems.

In the country as a whole, rising market consolidation and corporate mergers are a major threat to family farm ownership and consumer choice, as our food system increasingly falls into the hands of a smaller number of large corporations. A generation ago, America's food and farm economy was dominated by family-scale operations. Now, just handful of companies control most meat production and a major share of dairy production in the U.S. The world's largest seed and input companies also in the process of merging, which reduces marketplace competition, which will likely raise prices for farmers while reducing options for seeds and other inputs. This will ultimately translate into higher prices for consumers as well.

Putting on your best prognosticating hat, what are the issues you think are going to be at the top of the list of the new administration, and how do you think they will address them?

I think the new administration is going to be heavily focused on repealing regulations that they view as obstacles to large, industrial agricultural firms doing business how they see fit. To the extent EPA rules, for example, currently work to keep manure from large factory farms, or fertilizer runoff, out of waterways, these rules will be under attack by the Trump administration and the current leadership in Congress. Expect both administrative and Congressional action to repeal as many regulations as possible over the next two years, with the primary beneficiary in agriculture being bigger operations with the most significant pollution issues. I think we can also expect that, despite historical bipartisan support for the Farm Bill, the 2018 Farm Bill debate will likely be colored by efforts by the Trump administration to slash spending. If they are successful, I would expect there to be cuts to important farm conservation programs, organic research, local food system programs, programs aimed at helping beginning and socially disadvantaged farmers, and the nutrition programs like SNAP (Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program, formerly known as food stamps) that make up a big part of the Farm Bill.

What do we as citizens need to be paying attention to? What are the best sources for information on the issues?

Pay attention to how the Trump administration deals with pending mergers between companies like Monsanto and Bayer, and Syngenta and Chem China. Before being inaugurated, Trump met with the CEOs of Monsanto and Bayer at Trump tower and seemed to endorse the merger, which would have devastating impacts on many American farmers. Additionally, the Trump administration has put on hold long-overdue Farmer Fair Practices rules to level the playing field for family-scale livestock producers and increase transparency in the marketplace to address unfair practices that large meatpacking companies sometimes engage in to control prices. The fate of large agribusiness mergers and the Farmer Fair Practices rules will be an early, major test of the Trump administration on whether they will stand with family farmers, or large agribusiness companies when those interests diverge. While some of the most prominent groups in the agribusiness sector support mega-mergers and oppose the Farmer Fair Practices rules, groups that support independent and sustainable producers are also speaking up. Sign up for alerts and newsletters from groups like the National Farmers Union and the National Sustainable Agriculture Coalition to stay on top of national policy.

In your opinion, what’s the most effective action citizens can take in the short term? In the long term?

In the short term, concerned citizens may need to look at getting more involved at the local and state level to advance good food and farm policies. For at least the next two years, the federal government has been taken over by corporate ag interests that will likely take policy backwards. This must be opposed, but it is also an opportunity for state and local governments to enact or strengthen policies that promote local and regional food systems and sustainable agriculture. State and local governments will need to lead the way if the federal government is going backward.

What organizations most need our support?

Friends of Family Farmers and the National Sustainable Agriculture Coalition.

Read more in the Future of Our Food series.

The Future of Our Food: Building Infrastructure for a Regional Food System

This series interviews farmers, food activists, politicians and policy wonks to try to get a handle on the seismic shift in our local food landscape due to the change of administrations in Washington.

As Vice President of Food & Farms at Ecotrust, Amanda Oborne leads a team seeking to revolutionize and regionalize our food system. By harnessing the purchasing power of schools and institutions, empowering local farmers and ranchers, and developing infrastructure to connect the two, Ecotrust is helping build a resilient regional food economy that nourishes communities and renews the resources on which we depend. Recently named one of the "Most Creative People in Business" by Fast Company magazine, Amanda has a master’s degree from Northwestern University, and spent 15 years in private enterprise before joining Ecotrust in 2010. She has recently been featured in the Stanford Social Innovation Review, Fast Company and Civil Eats, and appeared at the Food Tank 2016 National Summit and the New York Times Live: Future of Food.

What are the critical issues affecting agriculture and our food system a) here in the Northwest and b) in the country as a whole?

Our biggest challenges are shared—our health, economy, environment and culture are intertwined with our food and how we produce and disseminate it. I believe the system we rely on for our food is fundamentally flawed. Our biology makes us highly susceptible to food that is bad for us, and our "always-on" culture keeps us running and distracted—all of which makes it extremely profitable, given the economic structure in which we operate, for corporations to exploit those realities for significant profit but to the collective detriment of our health and humanity.

It is inhumane, in my mind, to propagate a food system that solves for financial profit over human health and wellbeing. People from all walks of life—farmers and ranchers in rural communities, school children, hospital patients, service industry and agricultural workers, people disadvantaged by institutional racism, people living in poverty and even privileged city dwellers like you and me, suffer to varying degrees from a food system that prioritizes profit and efficiency over nutrition, access and resource stewardship.

If we are to have any hope of addressing these core issues, we are going to have to come together. That means not dividing ourselves into factions dedicated to certain types of production (organic vs. GMO vs. no-till vs. pastured, etc.), but collaborating to support restorative agriculture of all kinds, values-based supply chains and regional markets.

Putting on your best prognosticating hat, what are the issues you think are going to be at the top of the list of the new administration, and how do you think it will address them?

This administration appears to be focused on profit-maximization and deregulation, but seems unaware of how its policies, particularly on immigration and trade, would affect agribusiness. In addition to deleting all references to animal welfare from the White House website, the president has signaled a preference for commodity agriculture over "backyard tomato farming,"  which is how he seems to be characterizing non-commodity production and regional supply chains. The reality is, however, that many types of differentiated production have been shown to yield a higher profit per acre, and consumer demand for food free of antibiotics, pesticides, animal cruelty, added sugar and other unnecessary additives is not going away.

What’s more, a growing number of consumers want their food system to reflect their values, including livable wages and fair treatment for both farm workers and service industry employees, equitable access to nutrient-dense food and higher standards for animal welfare. Eaters are going to have to find their voices and speak up. The good news is that because food is so connected to other issues—climate change, children’s health and ability to learn in school, immigration, equity, aging, and many others—speaking up for food has a ripple effect on many other important issues.

What do we as citizens need to be paying attention to? What are the best sources for information on the issues?

If you care about any of these challenges, you would do well to read Civil Eats regularly. The foremost repository of news, thought, analysis and solutions being piloted in regions across the country, Civil Eats carries the pulse of food and restorative agriculture and is completely accessible to eaters of all stripes.

For those actively working or volunteering in food system reform, I can also recommend the Food & Environment Reporting Network and its partner publication, Ag Insider, along with Mother Jones; the weekly newsletter of the National Sustainable Agriculture Coalition; Food Tank; and Food Tech Connect.

In your opinion, what’s the most effective action citizens can take in the short term? In the long term?

Show up for local, practical, immediate causes. For example, the Oregon Legislature is considering eliminating funding for farm to school in this legislative session. This would be an incredible blow to Oregon children, farmers and processors all in one hit. Research conducted by Ecotrust has shown, without question, that every dollar spent by schools on local food creates an additional dollar of economic activity in our home economy, and creates jobs as well. Parents and supporters can stay tuned to the Facebook pages of Ecotrust and Upstream Public Health for regular updates and calls to action.

What organizations most need our support?

Becoming a monthly Ecotrust giver puts any eater squarely in the fight for an equitable, restorative, prosperous and delicious food system, and the gifts are used locally for the benefit of Oregon farmers, ranchers, and fishermen, as well as children and families facing system disadvantages in food access. Yes, of course I’m biased, but I can certainly vouch for the work!

Read more in The Future of Our Food series.

Top photo by Chloe Aftel.

The Future of Our Food: New York Times Looks West

The New York Times panel described below was held on October 5, 2016, a month before the recent election, but brought out some key insights that I hope to explore in future posts in this series. Installments over the next few months will include interviews with farmers, food activists, plant breeders and policy wonks to try to get a handle on the seismic shift in our local food landscape due to the change of administrations in Washington.

The New York Times has been fascinated with Portland for years now, featuring it as a travel destination, for sure, but mostly focused on watching its food and restaurant scene evolve from a backwater of middle class meh to a powerhouse of groundbreaking local, seasonal, chef-driven cuisine. In its own transition from a national newspaper to a national media corporation, the Times has been expanding its New York-centric, issues-based series called Times Talks to a more national platform.

Recently it brought this form of live journalism to Portland, sending out Times national food correspondent Kim Severson to moderate a panel titled "The Future of Food in Portland.” The panel featured local food notables Piper Davis of Grand Central Bakery; Kanth Gopalpur of the Business Oregon Commission; chef Joshua McFadden of Ava Gene’s and Tusk; and Amanda Oborne, Vice President of Food and Farms at Ecotrust.

In an interview before the event I asked Severson why the Times chose to come to Portland.

"I’m just fascinated with where Portland is going to go now," she said. "Because [the city] got really cute and we all fell in love with it. Portland was like a really attractive 20-year-old college sophomore with a great life. But now what?"

Echoing that question after introducing her panelists, she opened the discussion asking if it wasn't time for Portland to mature a little bit.

"It all goes back to Colin the chicken," Piper Davis answered, referring to a much-joked-about sketch on the TV series "Portlandia" where two foodies pester their server with questions about their entrée. "Those of us who care where our food comes from can no longer ask that question." Instead, she said, the concern has shifted in her mind: Did this food leave the soil in better condition than it started?

"Major problems still need to be solved," she continued, saying that the national perception is that most of the work is done, when in reality people aren't talking about the gaps in the food system when it comes to the environment, sustainability and universal access to good food regardless of income or where a person lives.

Severson then turned to Josh McFadden and asked him about the city's "cheffy culture," asking how its Olympic-level chef game will affect Portland's producer-driven reputation.

Answering that he initially moved back to Portland from stints in San Francisco, Chicago and New York because of the people more than the food scene here, he said he found that "the product is as good or better than anyplace else," and that local farmers like Anthony and Carol Boutard of Ayers Creek Farm and John Eveland and Sally Brewer of Gathering Together Farm are producing innovative crops at the highest level.

Severson herself is no stranger to the Northwest, having lived in the region and worked for newspapers in Seattle, Anchorage and right here in Portland during a short stint at the Oregonian.

In our interview I asked what differentiates the Northwest and its food from that found in the rest of the country. She paused.

"There’s just something about the mix of the ruggedness of the place and the purity of the raw ingredients here," she said. "The most memorable things I’ve eaten come from the Northwest."

She added that when she was working in Alaska she got sick of salmon, referring to it as "the zucchini of Alaska." But having been away for decades now, and with wild-caught salmon a rare thing to find on the East Coast, she had an epiphany.

"Last night [at a Portland restaurant] I had a beautiful, perfectly seared piece of wild salmon," she said. "It was like heaven to me and, especially on the East Coast, the beauty of wild salmon—I know it sounds so cliché and terrible even as I’m saying it—but it’s spectacular."

Bottom line?

"I think your baseline of deliciousness is very high here," Severson said. "Your baseline, how good food that grows around here tastes, I think that’s exceptional. Exceptional."

In the South, where Severson is now based, she said, "There’s some really great produce, but it’s so crazy hot it’s tricky to grow stuff there. But there’s something very clean about it here that other places don’t have. There’s a freshness here that makes it super special to me."

Any Portland cook can tell you that freshness also has a lot to do with the proximity of local farms to the city's core, a point that was brought up by Grand Central's Piper Davis.

"No one talks about the urban growth boundary and food, but it's critically connected," Davis said of the line drawn around the city in 1980 as a land use planning boundary to control urban expansion onto farm and forest lands.

Amanda Oborne of Ecotrust, tasked with developing The Redd, an effort in inner Southeast Portland's former produce district designed to support local food enterprises, said that Portland is a city of innovators and, as with the urban growth boundary in the '80s, is still experimenting with ideas to provide services to make food more accessible and sustainable.

"The Redd is not about the food scene, it's about the food system," she said of what is envisioned as a working hub for the regional food system.

It's an idea that Severson echoed in our interview as a distinguishing characteristic of the city.

"The ability to make things happen in this city, foodwise, the potential [that] if you have an idea you can probably make it happen, is exciting," she said, attributing it to both the city's size and its culture.

"There’s not a lot of people who say no here," Severson mused. "It’s a function of size, of culture and people who are, like, 'Huh, you wanna like have a chicken-powered ancient grain mill and coffee shop? That could be cool.'"

One thing that surprised her, in a city so well known for its food culture, is that there is no food council here to direct, support and develop food policy for Portland, Multnomah County or the metro region. [The now-defunct Portland/Multnomah Food Policy Council served as a citizen-based advisory board to the City of Portland and Multnomah County from 2002-2012 and was dissolved in 2012 due to "lacking relevancy."]

As to the future, Severson seemed of two minds about where the Northwest is headed. "You certainly saw Berkeley get very popular, [but] San Francisco and Northern California cuisine is very hidebound," she said of larger West Coast cities known for innovation in the past but hampered by stagnation and the cost of doing business there. "Maybe Portland can do it differently."

Read the first installment in this series: Post-Election Pondering.

Top photo from The New York Times: (l to r) Josh McFadden, Kanth Gopalpur, Kim Severson, Amanda Oborne, Piper Davis.

The Future of Our Food: Post-Election Pondering

It seems like almost everyone, from pollsters to pundits to journalists to voters and non-voters alike, was taken by surprise by the results of this week's election. For myself, I'm still trying to get my brain to form synapses that connect a reality TV celebrity, accused sexual predator, racist and President-elect of the United States into a coherent whole. So far it eludes me.

How it's all going to shake out, well, that's the big question, isn't it?

Farmer supporting ban on GMO crops in Jackson Co.

Given that the Republican party habitually takes a hard right in the direction of industry, and with both houses of Congress and the White House in Republican hands, it stands to reason that a Trump administration will be pretty industry-heavy. Including in the food and agriculture sectors, where, according to an article in the magazine Modern Farmer, his list of 65 agriculture advisors is "a who’s who of industrial agriculture advocates, including senators, governors, state ag commissioners and agribusiness executives," going on to point out that "it’s safe to say that the Trump ag team supports feedlots over farmers' markets."

Concentrated animal feeding operation (CAFO).

So I've decided to put together my own list of "advisors" and ask them what we can expect going forward under this new administration and what, if anything, we need to be doing about it. What are the major issues? Who should we be paying attention to? What questions should we be asking?

The series will be called, as it is above, The Future of Our Food, and it'll start with a report on a recent New York Times LookWest panel I attended before the election titled, coincidentally, "The Future of Food in Portland" moderated by New York Times staff food writer Kim Severson. Other installments over the next few months will include interviews with farmers, food activists, plant breeders and policy wonks to try to get a handle on this seismic shift in our food landscape.

Read the second installment in this series: New York Times Looks West.