Q&A: L.A. Food Policy Council’s Clare Fox on Building a Network, Overcoming Disenfranchisement in L.A.’s Food System

December 23, 2014 | Nina Ignaczak

Clare Fox is the Director of Policy and Innovation for the Los Angeles Food Policy Council, an independent non-profit created by the City of Los Angeles to advance food systems policy. In this role, she collaborates with a large network of food advocates and public and private sector partners to catalyze projects and build leadership capacity build Southern California’s local food system, with an emphasis on food access and equity, urban agriculture, street food vending, and community economic development.

Fox shared her work in a panel discussion at the Seedstock Reintegrating Agriculture conference in November. We caught up with her after the conference to find out more about more about her efforts to create a local food system in L.A. Read More

Sustainable Ag + Food News: Seedstock’s Weekly Roundup

December 18, 2014 | Nina Ignaczak

What The Change In U.S.-Cuba Relations Might Mean For Food

Excerpt: As you’ve probably heard — or seen, if you’ve traveled to Cuba — food (and, at times, the lack thereof) remains one of the most striking emblems of Cuba’s dysfunctional economic system. Let’s just say that the agreement between Obama and Cuban President Raul Castro will probably eventually mean big changes for the food supply in Cuba.

Source: NPR Read More

Q&A: Nurit Katz Helps Move UCLA Toward 20 Percent Sustainable Food by 2020

December 16, 2014 | Nina Ignaczak

Nurit Katz is UCLA’s first Chief Sustainability Officer, a role that has her working to advance a variety of sustainability goals at the university, as well as teaching in the UCLA Extension’s Global Sustainability Certificate Program.

Katz participated in a panel at the Seedstock Reintegrating Agriculture conference in November,where she provided insight into efforts to move UCLA towards its goal of having 20 percent of its food procurement qualify as sustainable by 2020.

We caught up with her after the conference to find out more about how how she does her job, and what projects she is working on to achieve this ambitious goal.

Seedstock: Describe the path of your career; how you did you come to your role as UCLA’s First Chief Sustainability Officer?

Nurit Katz: My background is in environmental and outdoor education. I used to work with kids a lot, taking kids from the city who’d never been hiking out on the trail. I also brought kids to a farm-to-school program where they learned about how to grow healthy food. A lot of kids don’t even know where the food comes from, and they got to participate and help grow food and interact with the farm.That was a really great program. Read More

Q&A: Robert Egger on Food Security and the Aging Population

December 14, 2014 | Nina Ignaczak

Robert Egger is the Founder and President of L.A. Kitchen, a culinary arts job training program for people coming out of foster care and incarceration. He also launched D.C. Central Kitchen, a similar effort, in 1989. L.A. Kitchen is currently in pilot phase and will launch in a new space in 2015. Read more about L.A. Kitchen in Seedstock here.

At the Seedstock Reintegrating Agriculture conference in November, Egger delivered a keynote in which he talked about waste, both in terms of food and human potential, and opportunity, in existing community resources and in the impending wave of older people who will be hungry in coming years. Read More

Sustainable Ag + Food News: Seedstock’s Weekly Roundup

December 12, 2014 | Nina Ignaczak

Groundbreaking Study Shows How Sustainable Farming Practices Can Improve Yields

Excerpt: According to the analysis, led by Lauren Ponisio (and published today in the Proceedings of the Royal Society of London), there is evidence that sustainable agriculture – when done right – may have the potential to match the productivity of our dominant agricultural systems.

Source: Union of Concerned Scientists Read More