Publications & Links

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Agroecology

Productive, Resilient, Fair & Sustainable
Agroecology is the science behind sustainable agriculture, from the ground up.  According to Pesticide Action Network, agroecology combines scientific inquiry with place-based knowledge and experimentation, emphasizing technology and innovations that are knowledge-intensive, low cost, ecologically sound and practical. By listening to farmers, and using the most up-to-date science, agroecology provides a modern framework for thinking broadly about agriculture in terms of its four key systems properties: productivity, resilience, equity and sustainability.




Presentation:Presentation by Bob Watson, Janice Jiggins, Rajeswari Raina and Michael Appleby following conclusion of final Intergovernmental Plenary.

Report:
The report is by Eric Holt- Gimenez, PhD, Executive Director, Food First/Institute for Food and Development Policy, and Annie Shattuck, Policy Analyst  with Food First.

An Ecological Definition of Sustainable Agriculture
       By Professor Stephen R. Gliessman

Sustainable agriculture:
A whole-systems approach to food, feed, and fiber production that balances environmental soundness, social equity, and economic viability among all sectors of the public, including international and intergenerational peoples. Inherent in this definition is the idea that sustainability must be extended not only globally but indefinitely in time, and to all living organisms including humans.
Sustainable Agroecosystems:
  • Maintain their natural resource base.
  • Rely on minimum artificial inputs from outside the farm system.
  • Manage pests and diseases through internal regulating mechanisms.
  • Recover from the disturbances caused by cultivation and harvest.

Click here to read more about the principles of agroecology and sustainability.

Food Democracy

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What happens when we view people as citizens rather than consumers and treat food as a human right? Food democracy. 
Food democracy emphasizes fulfillment of the human right to safe, nutritious food that has been justly produced. It means ordinary people getting together to establish rules that encourage safeguarding the soil, water and wildlife on which we all depend. It is also a pragmatic politics built around the difficult lesson that food is too important to leave to market forces — that we all have a right and responsibility to participate in decisions that determine our access to safe, nutritious food.

This push to re-localize control over food and farming in the U.S. has an international equivalent in the "food sovereignty" movement. Both were born in the late 1990s in response to the increasing corporate control over the global food system. 

Food Democracy Experiments

Examples of how to feed people by re-localizing control over food and farming are as variable as the communities in which these food democracy experiments take place.

  • Belo Horizonte, Brazil, "the city that ended hunger." Their award-winning participatory Food Security Program (PDF) links urban consumers to small-scale farmers through municipal procurement of food for public schools, daycares and a large network of the traditional Brazilian “Popular Restaurants.”
  • The U.S.-based Farm to School Network likewise connects schools to local and regional farmers, improving K-12 kids' access to healthy food while supporting small-scale farming.
  • Local and regional Food Policy Councils are springing up all over the world.
  • People's Grocery in West Oakland, CA, is re-weaving community through urban agriculture, economic development and health outreach.

For more information please visit, Pesticide Action Network. 

Important Publications & Links