The Food, Faith and Farming Network is inspiring rural and urban communities to work together, through faith and cooperation, to feed their neighbors. It’s not a new concept, but it’s one that’s finding new participants across southern Wisconsin.
Roger Williams, professor emeritus at UW-Madison and treasurer of the Food, Faith and Farming Network, says they’ve just summarized the results from five separate listening sessions they organized in southeast Wisconsin last fall. Williams says the listening sessions in Racine, Saukville, Neosho, East Troy and Milwaukee were actually the second phase of conversations that started in southwest Wisconsin in 2018. The overall goal of these conversations was to allow citizens from different areas and backgrounds to identify what they thought were significant issues related to local foods, sustainable farming, food security, and rural/urban connections.
The responses were then directly mapped to a solution(s) that could bring communities together.
Central Themes from Listening/Networking Sessions
Providing Rural and Urban Education
- Provide education to rural & urban consumers about where their food comes from
- Inform consumers about the benefits of local and sustainably produced food
- Involve urban youth in urban agriculture and food preparation programs
- Create directories to connect producers and consumers of local food
Fostering Rural and Urban Food Security
- Connect farmers with rural and urban food deserts
- Initiate food gleaning and distribution programs
- Identify and provide quality, culturally appropriate foods for urban consumers
- Address the nutritional needs of school age youth, seniors and economically disadvantaged, and connect local farms to meet those needs
Supporting New and Small Farmers
- Mentor and provide educational resources for new/beginning farmers
- Support affordable access to land and equipment for new/beginning farmers
- Initiate/support slaughtering facilities for small scale meat animal farmers
- Address issue of disappearing farms and competition from industrial farms
Addressing Food System Issues
- Provide fair wages to food producers and affordable prices for consumers
- Reduce the environmental impacts of pesticides and monoculture farming
- Reduce food waste through education and creation of composting programs
- Create a shared forum for discussing and addressing food system issues
- Foster a trusting “We are all in this together” attitude with rural and urban people
Williams said the network issued a call for proposals for Seed Money Grants to look for solutions to community-based problems. “We emphasized that the Seed Money proposals should focus on rural/urban connections, local foods, sustainable farming, and food security.” Williams says they’ll evaluate requests based on four criteria:
- Does it address a significant community issue?
- Does it outline an innovative solution for confronting the issue?
- Does it build a network of individuals/groups to collaborate on the issue?
- Does it demonstrate energy and commitment to achieve the stated goals?
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