The Human Right to Food

Panelists: Molly Anderson, Partridge Chair in Food and Sustainable Agriculture Systems, College of the Atlantic; Frances Moore Lappe, Author; Cofounder, Small Planet Institute

Anderson and Lappé will share stories about the right to food-and the people and policies behind these stories-illustrating transformations achievable with sufficient political will.

Feeding Captive Audiences

Panelists: John Cook, Assoc. Professor of Pediatrics, Boston University School of Medicine and Senior Research Scientist & Principal Investigator, Children’s Healthwatch (Moderator); Chef Kate Adamick, Founder, Cook For America; Marydale Debor, Founder & Managing Director, Fresh Advantage; David Waters, CEO, Community Servings

This panel addresses the challenges and responsibility that come with serving food to people who have varying degrees of agency, control, or choice as to the food they eat. Panelists focus on food programs such as those for public schools, healthcare settings, and homebound people.

#quinoaguilt: Problems and Solutions for Conscientious Consumers

Pilar Eguez, Postdoctoral Fellow, University of Illinois at Urbana Champaign

Lack of awareness about basic issues of global food politics and social privilege are informing new modalities of racism, classism, and First world, colonialist consumer practices and attitudes in the health conscious community.

Cultivating Change: Visioning and Planning the Food System in New England and Massachusetts

Panelists: Alli Condra, Senior Clinical Fellow, Harvard Food Law & Policy Clinic (Moderator); Joanne Burke, Professor of Sustainable Food Systems, Sustainability Institute, University of New Hampshire; John Lebeaux, Commissioner, Massachusetts Department of Agricultural Resources; Winton Pitcoff, Project Manager, Massachusetts Food System Plan, Metropolitan Area Planning Council

This panel will explore efforts in New England and Massachusetts to use food system planning to create a strong, resilient, and just food system. Panelists Joanne Burke and MDAR Commissioner John Lebeaux will provide a snapshot of agriculture in Massachusetts and the state Food Policy Council. Winton Pitcoff, project manager for the Massachusetts statewide food system planning process, will discuss how the planning process is working toward a just food system in Massachusetts.

Bridging the Gap: How to Make Just Food Affordable for Farmers to Grow and Consumers to Buy

Panelists: Rebecca Berkey, Associate Director & Service-Learning Coordinator, Northeastern University (Moderator); J. Harrison, Director, The Food Project; Jennifer Hashley, Executive Director, New Entry Sustainable Farming Project, MA; Karyn Moskowitz, Executive Director, New Roots, KY; Peter Rogers, Professor of Environmental Engineering and Applied Sciences, Harvard University

This panel will explore several models that are successfully connecting peri-urban farmers to urban consumers. These enterprises have developed systems to support farmers struggling to make a living while also providing fresh, healthy, local produce to low-income urban populations.

Food Oppression: How "Neutral" Food Law and Policy Creates Racial and Socioeconomic Health Disparities

Andrea Freeman, Asst. Professor of Law, University of Hawai'i William S. Richardson School of Law

This talk focuses on food oppression and examines how food laws and policies that are neutral on their face in fact disproportionately harm marginalized and subordinated communities, creating and perpetuating health disparities along race and class lines. It explores the role of corporate influence on food policy, as well as how popular social values of personal responsibility and racial stereotypes make health disparities appear natural and structural reform seem irrelevant or futile. The session highlights examples of food oppression and then identifies other instances of food oppression that activists can challenge.

The Whitest Profession: Combating Racial and Class Inequality in American Agriculture

Panelists: Nathan Rosenberg, Fink Food Fellow, Natural Resources Defense Council (Moderator); Natasha Bowens, Author, The Color of Food; Chris Brown, Executive Director, Agriculture and Land-Based Training Association; Jennie Stephens, Executive Director, Center for Heirs' Property Preservation

This panel will begin with narratives of farmers of color and segue into a discussion of how modern U.S.