ancestors and

let them know that I have not forgotten them.

I stand strong because I stand on the shoulders of your ancestors as well.

I want them to know that I have not forgotten them.

I am an activist.

I've always been an activist and I always will be an activist.

And I became a food activist

because my son, Wade,

developed food allergies at a very early age.

He's allergic to all dairy products, shellfish, eggs and peanuts

and I wanted to get the healthiest food that I could for him.

I wanted food that was free from genetically modified organisms; I wanted

food that was free from pesticides; I wanted food basically that was grown

healthy,

organically.

I really wasn't any different than any other mother

and in my community I wanted the best for my son.

I want the best for both of my children;

but that food - the best food -

was not available in my neighborhood on the west side of Chicago.

So to change that situation

I got involved with what I really didn't know at the time was food justice.

We started converting vacant lots

to urban farm sites;

lots that had not been used in decades.

To grow food on them, we started to hire people from the community

and

we started to build what we thought would be a local food system that

responded to urban

concerns.

And so for me to food system looks something like this

It's very simple

not too complicated but that was what I understood the food system to be.

And then I was introduced to this larger food

movement,

the one that says, you know, you have to eat well but don't eat too much.

Eat mostly plants.

i'm like, yes, i got that. I'm with that a hundred percent.

But where's my food?

And I live in a community where I can get a semi-automatic weapon quicker than I

can get a tomato.

Now a lot of people have tried to make this statement cute; they said that you can

get ketchup quicker than you can get a tomato. I want us to really appreciate

the public health message that I'm trying to get across here.

And it's that

the public health issue of violence is connected

to the public health issue of chronic diet-related diseases.

It's not about cute phrases or cute terms.

It is about life and death, and my community is about living

or dying.

You can die by the gun or die from a lack of the proper food.

But still the food system is not changed. We've done all this work; we know

all these things but the food system, still, my idea of the food system, still

remained

like that.

And then I started to think, you know, I really have to step this up a notch.

What is food justice 2.0?

Well, for me, food justice 2.0

is really about the narratives of people of color

and beginning to understand that the story

that we tell ourselves in the food movement

is as important as the stories that we've left out.

So, for me, the food justice movement

tells the story

of colonialism

and the impact

in historical trauma on communities of color.

Food justice talks about manifest destiny.

It talks about

settling the land in the west; the nineteenth century philosophy is that we're

gonna go west.

We're going to settle the land

but in food justice we know that the Native American people were there.

We know that they were pushed off of that land

and many of them killed

so that others

might be able to live.

Now we know that that's not the fault

of the arriving European immigrants,

but we must understand

that the land

that we stand on we stand on it because someone else's blood

is also on it.

We understand that food

has been used as a weapon.

Food used as a weapon

during that period of time was used to push people off of the land.

We understand

that the movement of people for the purposes

of exploitation

is a part of our food justice movement.

We understand that the importation

of African slaves into the United States;

the enslavement of the Africans provided the labor

for what we now call

our industrial food system.

At the very beginning

folk were forced to work the land

and they had no choice

in the conversation. They were not paid.

At the core

of what I believe to be

the problems in our community, particularly when we start to talk about

the accumulation of wealth

or the lack of health

is really the conversation around slavery that has not been had in the

United States.

We have not

reconciled

the event of slavery or its impact.

We have to understand that those Africans

that were in the South

after slavery

were pretty much still enslaved after the signing of the emancipation

proclamation.

We also want to recognize in the food justice movement

that the homestead act and the emancipation proclamation were signed at

the same time, but the Africans could not

take advantage

of the homestead act so they were forced to stay in the south and stay in a

version of slavery - share cropping -

through the black codes

and then be forced out of the south

through the jim crow laws and up into the North

to a different version

of racism in slavery.

The food justice movement understands

that in the nineteen sixties

there were lots of things going on

but in the nineteen sixties for us that's where civil rights meets

food justice,

right at the Woolworth lunch counter,

in nineteen sixty three,

when those students sat down

and demanded the right

to be treated

as a human being.

So, for us,

food justice

is not just about

the nutrition -

that's important -

It's not just about growing the food. It's about dignity.

It's about being visible.

The nineteen sixties also represent

a time where

the Black Panther Party

started

the free breakfast program in Oakland.

We called these things into being because sometimes on the merits of the

larger food movement it gets lost. In the nineteen sixties we talk about the

hippie generation and the back to the

land movement and the beginnings of organic food and all of that is true and

wonderful

and we like those stories too.

"Both" "and"

have to exist

and so we have to begin to tell a narrative

or tell a story and develop a narrative that's much more robust

then the narrative we tell ourselves today.

We must also include in this narrative

modern-day slavery.

We cannot forget that our food system today is still based on the exploitation of

the labor of immigrants

in this country.

While we're talking about access to free range chickens and grass fed beef,

we need to also be talking about immigration reform,

fair wages for those farm workers,

and, in the entire food chain, workers

also. The people who serve us;

the people who fix our food also should be paid fairly.

We have to say no to food deserts.

I don't live in a food desert; I never have.

Food desert, as a phrase, is another one of those cute terms masking the harm of the

food system in my community.

It really is the trojan horse of increased corporate control of the

food system.

I was not digging in the dirt on the west side of Chicago

thinking - I sure will be glad when that walmart comes and builds that store

there.

That was not my thought,

and yet there's still people who are hungry.

And many of us would say, you know, let's build a 501(c)3 let's get

one of those 501(c)3's; let's get some more grants; let's get the

foundation thing here; let's fix the problem.

That's fine.

But the food justice movement is calling for jobs -

economic justice.

Let's pay people -

not just raise the minimum wage. Let's pay people

a living wage so that they are not hungry.

Let's address really the core issue appalled

poverty.

and, so, we try to say, you know - well, maybe there's some period of time where

we could go back

and we could find the fair

just and healthy food system

that we're looking for. If we could just go back to the time

where the food system is lit

by the sun and driven by the energy of the sun; we will just be great if we

could just go back and turn back time.

And the food justice movement will tell you that that time does not exist.

There has never been a fair, just or healthy food system

in the United States of America.

And, so,

what we have

is a global food industrial complex.

This is what we have to dismantle.

This is what we have to address.

And there's a way to address it.

We can be successful if we are able to really recognize

that we have never ever

had a food system, and we must join together,

create a narrative where all of us can sit around a table and

create the food system

that we need.

We have to return

to the kitchens of our ancestors, the tables of our ancestors.

Reclaim your kitchens; claim your stove, your table,

your grill - reclaim it. Cook your food. Make your food. Know where your food comes from.

But we must organize.

We have to come together across this country

and turn our non-profit will into political will to change the food

system

because we absolutely have to go beyond the farm bill.

We can't keep talking about the farm bill and thinking that the farm bill is

the vehicle that can change our food system. Clearly, it is not.

So, what's the vision?

My vision

is that

we have

President Obama

sign an executive order

mandating food justice

for the United States of America,

much like the environmental justice executive order.

It's my hope and my dream

that you will join me

in the journey

to change our food system.