We learned recently that our friend Michael Pollan has been chosen as one of four recipients of The Lennon Ono Grant for Peace 2010. Pollan holds the Knight Chair in Journalism at the University California Berkeley and is the author of several wonderful books, like Food Rules. Pollan has designated one of our favorite non-profits, the Community Alliance with Family Farmers, to receive some of the grant funds.

How fitting that several leaders in the food world have been recognized in a prize that focuses on peace. Hunger does follow war, chaos and injustice. The difficulty is in finding the path to peace! John F. Kennedy, when he was President in 1961, said, “Food is strength, and food is peace, and food is freedom, and food is a helping hand to people around the world whose good will and friendship we want.” He was talking about the U.S. ‘Food for Peace’ program, that used American-grown food exports as part of our overseas aid program.

With one in seven people on earth still severely hungry, it is so unfortunate that food is such a political football and that there is precious little agreement on how best to feed our hungry and malnourished neighbors.

The Economist (9/11), in their leader on agriculture, said:

“Self-sufficiency is inefficient…Food markets are often treated with suspicion by farmers, environmentalists and governments alike. This is short sighted…More food requires more investment, but investors need large commercial farms to invest in, and they need global markets.”

We don’t share this view. Policy makers should be looking for farms that are resilient and community based. Agriculture that is heavily dependent on fossil fuels and just a very few main food crops is destined to become too expensive and vulnerable. The global food chain advocates tell us that the only alternative to an industrialized food model are inefficient little farms. In fact, this is a false and dangerous dichotomy. Eighty-five percent of the world’s food is grown and consumed within national borders. Most of this food is grown from peasant-bred seed without synthetic fertilizers. Peasant farmers breed and nurture a much wider diversity of plant varieties, livestock and fish species than the few that dominate world trade. These farmers, not connected to the global food system, grow at least 70 percent of the world’s food. If we are to eat in 2050, we will need all of them and all of their diversity.

Thank you Michael Pollen and Yoko Ono for your work on sustainable agriculture.

By Judith Redmond, Full Belly Farm

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