On January 26th, CFF partnered with Northeast Sustainable Agriculture Working Group (NESAWG) to host a webinar titled, A Regional Imperative: Making The Case for Regional Food Systems. In it, authors Kathy Ruhf and Kate Clancy present an overview and key findings from their new report of the same name, which updates and greatly expands on the authors 2010 working paper, It Takes A Region.
A Regional Imperative explores the concepts, practices, challenges and promise of regional food systems. It focuses on the Northeast U.S., a laboratory of regional food systems thinking and action, but it also describes regional food systems development across the country. The report contains dozens of examples of region-scale endeavors. The report and an executive summary are available online.
In their presentation, Ruhf and Clancy lead us through a background and overview of ‘regionalism’, define what is meant by ‘regional food systems’, and hone in on the Northeast to offer examples. They define an ideal regional food system as one in which as much food as possible to meet the population’s food needs is produced, processed, distributed, and purchased at multiple levels and scales within the region, resulting in maximum resilience, minimum importation, and significant economic and social return to everyone in the region.
They end their presentation detailing the constraints and challenges preventing this ideal, and some ideas for what is needed next.
The slides from their talk are visible in the video below, but you can also download the presentation here, and the report is available on the Thomas A. Lyson Center website (as of September 2022, this link now leads to an updated report as well as reflections from the authors)
A recording of the session is shared below. You can use the following time markers to jump to different sections:
- Start – Welcome by Adam Liebowitz, CFF Director
- 3:10 – Remarks by Nicole Sugerman, Interim Executive Director, NESAWG
- 5:00 – Presentation begins by Kathy Ruhf and Kate Clancy
- 5:00 – Introduction
- 12:30 – Language & concept conundrums
- 14:25 – Regionalism & regional thinking
- 35:00 – The Northeast region
- 40:55 – Regional food system attributes & dimensions
- 1:03:45 – Conclusion: core concepts & what is needed
- 1:06:25 – Q&A
A note about the webinar
During the webinar, it became clear that the handling of racial equity and justice issues did not meet the standards many of our partners have come to expect from CFF and NESAWG. We agree with those concerns. A number of comments in the chat and Q&A raised such concerns, and we thank the people who elevated them so that they would not be ignored. We want to affirm that CFF and NESAWG’s values and approach to our work center racial equity and BIPOC voices, and that these values were not upheld during this event.
Staff from both NESAWG and CFF have been in discussions since the webinar about what could and should have been done differently during the crafting of the report and the preparation of the webinar. We own our role, and agree that we did not live up to the standards and expectations we have set for ourselves and that our partners rightly demand of us.
We turn now to the important issue of repair. To that end, an announcement will come from us in the near future about next steps we are taking to make space for a more inclusive conversation. While we do so, we welcome your thoughts and ideas about how best to move forward. We know that many people came to the webinar excited about this approach and came away unsatisfied and feeling unseen/unheard and we aim to remedy this in the near future. Please don’t hesitate to reach out with any questions, feedback or thoughts about the session, or anything else.
Read about NESAWG’S next steps in their blog post.