Spring 2009 News & Views--Highlights of Food First's Impact in 2008
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Spring 2009
Volume 31 Number 112
What a difficult, challenging, yet hopeful year it’s been! Widespread food price riots and the global financial meltdown formed a tumultuous backdrop for the unprecedented election of Barack Obama, the U.S.’s first African American president. The publication of the ground-breaking IAASTD report, the UNDP’s report on Sustainable Agriculture in Africa, and Ecuador’s new Food Sovereignty law all advanced people-centered, agroecological alternatives to the failed policies recycled at the disappointing 2008 Rome and 2009 Madrid food summits. On the ground—in the face economic adversity, the re-appearance of conditions of modern-day slavery in the industrial food system, the steady march of agrofuels, land grabs, and “new” corporate-driven Green Revolutions—people, communities and social movements are putting food first, steadily bringing about the “changes we can believe in” in our food systems.
At Food First, 2008 pushed us to double our efforts to expose the root causes of the “four-fold crisis” of food, fuel, finance and climate. Our conclusion? To solve the food crisis we need to reform the food system.
