Abstract
The term “food justice” has gained traction among various social justice advocates, yet it is not uniformly defined or understood. In their book simply called Food Justice, authors Robert Gottlieb and Anupama Joshi apply the term to describe not only those efforts to alleviate inequities in the food system but also to initiatives to create structural change in areas like environmental policy, worker and community protection, and access to healthy foods.
Included under this large umbrella are farmworker advocates such as the Coalition of Immokalee Workers, environmental activists promoting sustainable land use, middle school students named the “Rethinkers” (who worked to bring local, healthier food into their New Orleans school), urban gardeners bringing healthy foods to low-income neighborhoods, and advocates for changes to policies that have supported industrial agriculture. The authors make a compelling case for food justice to become a social justice movement aimed at bringing about community change as well as transforming our entire food system.
This work initially identifies the numerous injustices inherent in the U.S. food system. These issues include growers subjecting U.S. farmworkers to slavery, mistreatment, and rampant wage theft; the dangers inherent in an animal food supply raised on antibiotics; the domination of the supply chain by multinational corporations such as Walmart and Tesco; and how farm policy, often through subsidies, has supported the corporate industrial model over a food system that provides access to healthy foods produced sustainably.
In the second part of the book, the authors provide a well-researched and documented review of a number of programs and strategies that could improve the food system. The discussion of these programs, and particularly the personal conversations described, provides hope and inspiration that changes can be made, even as the authors argue for broader programs of greater impact.
The book examines programs to support local farms and farmers’ markets, and “farm-to-school” programs. For example, the authors discuss the work done by Nuestra Raíces, a Western Massachusetts organization engaged in farming, training, and locally selling its produce, to establish “how community based food enterprises can be a tool for economic development and building capital” (p. 125). They also examine public-private partnerships such as the “Fresh Food Financing Initiative,” aimed at financing the availability of fresh food in low-income Philadelphia neighborhoods, and programs to improve access by WIC (a federal food assistance program) recipients to farmers’ markets. Another “alternative food model” that could be greatly expanded, especially by use of institutional participants, is the Community Supported Agriculture (“CSA”) model, in which the community (or institution) commits to purchase from and support local farmers.
Gottlieb and Joshi argue that the use of food producer guidelines, requiring fair wages and the right to organize, could be strengthened. Another initiative that requires negotiation between communities and the large corporate suppliers such as Walmart is called a “Community Benefits Agreement” that can “address issues such as land use, displacement, the environment, and workplace conditions” (p. 160). The authors also advocate sensibly for increased funding for community food projects, use of Food Policy Councils to influence local food policy, and local food procurement policies.
This book should appeal to a broad audience interested in social justice. While labor educators may be familiar with workers’ contributions to social justice, this book provides the necessary background on activist campaigns around other aspects of our food system, including efforts to produce food with minimal damage to the environment, and to improve access to healthy, affordable food, particularly in low-income urban communities. Food Justice persuasively argues for greater collaboration in efforts to transform our food system into one that is more sustainable and that provides healthy, fair, and affordable food to all. The authors have succeeded in their effort to elevate the discussion of food justice, as a topic for research and a further call to action.