A shared new direction

This is in response to a recently published article “Who Owns Good Food” by Zachary Adam Cohen on the Huffington Post. Being too lengthy, this comment exceeded the 250 word limitation of the blog, hence this post.

Nothing can be accomplished in the effort to reshape our food system from a broken, misdirected trajectory to a sustainable triple bottom line system, without shedding old paradigms and practicing a true policy of inclusion and open mindedness.

The lauded triple bottom line adds the operations’ ecological and social impacts to its profitability metrics as enlightened organizations gauge their overall performance. The combination of the 3 P’s (Profit, Planet and People) can indeed claim to have created the perfect archetype for a common ground that must bring conservatives and liberals together.

Both sides feature polarized extremist groups, radical left or right advocates, who do not operate in nuances, but rather vociferously paint everything in primary colors, to simplify arguments (at least for themselves) and extract rarified slogans that are more often than not, far removed from the original intensions of the opposite side. Your article is nuanced and a welcome statement from a conservative perspective (not to be confused with a republican point of view).

As a professed liberal, living, for the better part of the last decade, in the middle of a largely republican swath of land in the San Joaquin Valley, I have been able to observe, first hand, the difference between conservatives and republicans. As a member of the local Slow Food board, I have discussed, at length, issues of sustainability in agriculture, as the concept relates to food production, workers in the various trades and the profitability of the current practices.

One must hope that if the argument about the current direction, is well constructed, factual, and respectfully delivered, anyone can “get it”, regardless of the political affiliation of the interlocutor. Indeed, as you aptly point it, this is about food and about a broken system which does not require ideological goggles to be understood.

As a liberal, I welcome you, not because the liberal side owns the “sustainability movement”, but because it has been wrongly politicized over the past decades, with shared responsibilities. The food system has been broken with republicans or democrats in the White House and/or commanding control of the House of Representatives. Neither side has seriously attempted to change the status quo; in fact, the last two administrations have arguably further enabled the consolidation of the food production industry and allowed its premises to become axiomatic, when their conclusions are now increasingly recognized as flawed and potentially devastating.

This is about creating and driving in a new direction, away from a broken system. This new direction requires a clear separation from the past, a new thrust that must do away with pointing fingers and diminishing individuals, especially those who make the effort to help move our country and our world away from failed practices.

People, here in the San Joaquin Valley, often say, “let bygones be bygones”… a phrase I will gladly repeat, as we work together towards our stated common goal of not just mere survival but that of a flourishing world for us to share.