‘It’s not a matter of enough food…’

Last week’s conversation on New Mexico in Focus was all about food waste and food justice, and I loved getting the chance to learn from panelists Sandra West (City of Albuquerque), Amanda Rich (Three Sisters Kitchen), and Anton Becker-Stumpf (Southwest Organizing Project).  

During the show, the three talked about the problems, the solutions, and what people can do right now to address food waste and associated problems like climate change, food justice, and more.

To accompany the show, our website includes links to all the studies, organizations, businesses, tipsheets, and information the three panelists mention. While they were talking, I also jotted down some advice for myself:

• Ask grocers what they do with expired food, especially produce. (If they’re tossing it, share info about food rescue & other opportunities & support grocery stores that are being responsible.) 

• Buy local produce & support local farmers & food producers.

• Buy the ugly produce to keep it from being tossed. It doesn’t have to be perfect looking to taste good. 

• Keep food out of landfills by composting (either at home, through a service, or by dropping off kitchen scraps at community compost collectors).

 • Get your hands in the ground! Learn how to grow food & connect with the food cycle & community.

And of course, we all need to consider what Amanda Rich said during the show about food access, food prices, food waste, and food justice: “This whole conversation really has to be couched in this larger issue of economic justice because as we know, it’s not a matter of not enough food, it’s a matter of food distribution.”

You can watch all three segments of the conversation on our homepage. 

Speaking of economic justice, coming up this week, my guest is Arturo Sandoval, founding director of the Center of Southwest Culture. Sandoval, a longtime civil rights activist, was one of the organizers of the first Earth Day in 1970. 

(By the way: I wanted to use these photos of the organizers, including Sandoval, from Life Magazine, but they wouldn’t grant us the rights to show them during a broadcast show, so please go check them out here.) 

Sandoval talks with me about that first Earth Day and what has changed since 1970 — and about his vision for the future. It’s an awesome conversation and I can’t wait for it to air. I promise that it will be refreshingly free of greenwashing or corporate public relations.

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