"Neighborhoods Must Be Building Blocks"
"Neighborhood groups must be building blocks for an urban food agenda," said Manhattan Borough President Scott Stringer yesterday. And the Building Blocks Project could not agree with him more: neighborhood groups and organized workers have to stand in solidarity and speak out for food democracy.
On November 19, 2008, Manhattan Borough President Scott Stringer and United Food and Commercial Workers Local 1500 parterned with other community groups to present The Politics of Food: A Conference on New York's Next Policy Challenge. The conference included keynote speeches from U.N. General Assembly President Father Miguel D'Escoto, NYC Mayor Michael Bloomberg, and Director of the Center for Social Inclusion, Maya Wiley.
650 members of the New York City community to discuss a blueprint for a city-wide food policy agenda.
D'Escoto: U.N. G.A. President Miguel D'Escoto called for a new spirit of solidarity locally and internationally: now is the time "for a new spirit of food that starts from the bottom up." D'Escoto said of Wal*Mart, "Their days are numbered."
Bloomberg: Mayor Bloomberg expressed his commitment to end the food crisis. "You cannot get fruits and vegetables in a lot of bodegas in this city," he said. He also spoke of the need to "spur development of supermarkets" by using city-owned land for supermarkets and developing zoning and financing initiatives.
Wiley: Maya Wiley spoke out against the lack of food access and the lack of opportunities for New York City's minorities. She also pointed out that a supermarket-based strategy will not work in the longterm unless we also "drastically and radically restructure" so that workers and minorities are afforded credit, living-wages; and supermarkets must begin to source locally-grown food if they are to remain relevant.
Conference participants broke out into 7 'working groups' that discussed problems with the City's food system; and together we developed solutions that will form the basis of a city-wide food blueprint. Those recommendations will be released before the end of 2008.
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