While it’s been almost exactly a month since the brilliant and inspiring Nourish Scotland conference 'Our Common Wealth of Food', we thought that a little look at some of the highlights from it might whet your appetites for our own Making Food Fair event - at which we will welcome Pete Ritchie, Scottish farmer and Nourish Director.
This year, on World Food Day, Nourish Scotland and 200 or so individuals and organisations from across Scotland and beyond (including Kindling’s Helen), were asking: 'Can we use a Common Wealth approach to food'?
There is enough food for everyone, but people go hungry in Scotland as well as in poorer Commonwealth countries. With increasing inequality, food poverty and diet-related diseases are escalating. Meanwhile, family farmers across the world are being squeezed off the land, and the food system is harming biodiversity and driving climate change, which in turn makes farming dangerously unpredictable.
A range of topics were explored at the conference, looking both at the global situation and the realities in Scotland, with day two looking particularly at how to influence Scottish Government food policy.
Here are Helen’s thoughts on a great conference.
“While it’s really difficult to choose from all the interesting things I heard and learnt, I’ll try and share a few of the interesting insights I gained below. If you are interested to learn more, have a look at the presentations on the Nourish website, and definitely come to Making Food Fair here in Manchester on the 22nd November (to get a taste of Nourish by hearing Pete talk, and to explore some of the issues and solutions ourselves).
Food Banks were of course high on the conference agenda. Martin Johnson from Faith in the Community talked about the generosity of people’s giving, but highlighted the need for more sustainable solutions that deal with food poverty as an issue of justice not charity. He gave the inspiring example of ‘Bridging the Gap’, a project in the Gorbals area of Glasgow where young people, families and asylum seekers come together to cook a hot meal every week. Graham Riches, academic and world expert on food banks, described them as a failure of the neoliberal system. A ‘dumping ground for supermarket waste’, he said, they are a dream of right wing governments which mean they don’t have to think about people not having enough income to access quality food. He argued it’s time the conversation (and government policy) changed from talking about food poverty to the right to food.
Rucha Chitnis from the Women’s Earth Alliance joined the conference by Skype to give an inspiring address about empowering women farmers as a way of addressing food poverty. Women do 80% of the farming in India but have no rights to the land. Rucha told us a number of stories of hope including of farmer Ram Ratti who from being heavily in debt to chemical companies now trains and organises other women farmers.
The need to reduce meat consumption to reduce the CO2(e) produced by the food system, and at the same time to increase access to quality food to everyone was one of the clearest themes of the conference. Professor Olivier de Schutter (former UN Special Rapporteur on the Right to Food, who sent a video message), Professor Pete Smith (Soils & Global Change, University of Aberdeen), and Sue Dibb (EatingBetter.org) all argued that the only way we will be able to produce sufficient food, lower carbon emissions and feed people fairly and sustainably in the future is to eat substantially less meat. Professor Smith cited a very interesting study on the climate impact of various diets and Sue Dibb presented their campaign for less and better meat that 43 environmental, health and welfare organisations have signed up to.
In the panel discussion, views varied on GM crops. We heard about 500 farmers who stood up against politicians bribed by Monsanto and stopped GM crops being grown in Malawi, whereas Nigel Miller from NFU Scotland talked about GM as win win for everyone, needed for climate change. This was refuted passionately by Dr Krishan Bir Chowdary who spoke of the experience of Indian farmers: of agricultural costs rising 15 times for farmers using GM seed, an increase in soil degradation, pesticide use, and debt, leading to an increase in suicides among farmers.
Mo Sampson, one of the trainees on the Nourish new entrants to farming training programme, brought us back to Scotland with her great talk about Muddy Boots, her family farming business. I was amazed to hear that when Mo’s Dad was a young farmer supermarkets used to help farmers by taking surplus on sale or return – which seems impossible to imagine now.
There was so many interesting speakers that it’s hard to stop – but I will! Have a look at the presentations on the Nourish website, and come to Making Food Fair on the 22nd November to get a taste of Nourish by hearing Pete talk, and hopefully to explore some of the issues ourselves”.