{"id":741,"date":"2009-07-27T13:25:06","date_gmt":"2009-07-27T17:25:06","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.marthabayne.com\/wordpress\/?p=741"},"modified":"2009-07-27T19:51:59","modified_gmt":"2009-07-27T23:51:59","slug":"so-er-whats-this-about-a-green-food-resolution","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.marthabayne.com\/wordpress\/so-er-whats-this-about-a-green-food-resolution\/","title":{"rendered":"So, er, what’s all this about a “Green Food Resolution?"},"content":{"rendered":"

Local food-policy wonks were scratching their heads this weekend at a New York Times report\u00a0<\/a>that the City Council has passed a “Green Food Resolution.” The news, it turned out, was premature — the nonbinding resolution, introduced by 39th ward alderman Margaret Laurino — hasn’t passed, it’s just in committee. \u00a0But its provenance is still sort of mystifying.<\/p>\n

Background: this spring I worked for a bit as a contributing writer and editor for\u00a0a report on the regional food system commissioned by the Chicago Metropolitan Agency for Planning’s Go To 2040<\/a> initiative. The lead authors of the report were the Chicago Food Policy Advisory Council<\/a> and the city’s Dept. of Zoning and Land Use Planning — and a\u00a0sweeping coalition of regional experts on food, farming, and urban agriculture backed these folks up as coauthors and consultants —\u00a0the final contributors’ list includes just about anyone with their finger in any piece of the local-food pie.\u00a0<\/p>\n

The report, which wraps up with extensive recommendations as to how regional agencies might move forward to build an environmentally and economically sustainable local food system, does not appear to have not been published yet, but the executive summary is here <\/a>.\u00a0<\/p>\n

So, how come this “Green Food Resolution” came as (apparently) a total surprise to the brigades of active, mobilized people like these, who’ve been working on local food issues in Chicago for years?<\/p>\n

I left a message with Alderman Laurino’s office asking for more info; the woman who answered the phone said that the staffer running point on this was out today, but would call me back.<\/p>\n

According to the NYT, the resolution “urges the city to make healthy, locally grown food more available to Chicago residents.” Nothing wrong with that, right? Local food: yay! Factory farms: nay!<\/p>\n

But, read the fine print. The resolution is part of a national campaign organized by Farm Sanctuary<\/a>, the farm-animal protection group behind, most notoriously, the foie gras ban<\/a>.<\/p>\n

Boilerplate language on their web site reads as follows:<\/p>\n

\n

Draft Green Food Resolution for City of ______<\/em><\/p>\n

Whereas, the City of _____ strives to be a Green City that promotes lifestyles that are ecologically sustainable; and<\/em><\/p>\n

Whereas, food and farming systems have significant impacts on our health and the ecological wellbeing of our planet; and<\/em><\/p>\n

Whereas, there is growing popular concern about problems associated with industrialized animal agriculture, including environmental destruction, threats to consumer health and rural communities, and the inhumane treatment of animals; and<\/em><\/p>\n

Whereas, plant-based foods have been shown to be healthful and nutritious; and<\/em><\/p>\n

Whereas, shifting toward plant based agriculture can help to lighten our footprint on the planet; therefore<\/em><\/div>\n

\n

RESOLVED that the ______ City Council encourages individuals, institutions and businesses to provide more plant-based foods, especially those grown locally and organically; and<\/em><\/p>\n

RESOLVED that the ______ Council promotes expansions of the number of Farmers\u2019 Markets, Community Supported Agriculture (CSA) programs, Community Gardens, and other venues for providing healthful plant-based foods, and encourages food retailers to offer more plant-based options.<\/em><\/p>\n

So, there you have it. Is this “Green Food Resolution” simply the latest salvo in a well-organized, well-funded campaign to promote vegetarianism (or, “plant-based foods”), this time tricked out with local-food lingo?<\/p>\n

Hell if I know. But I’m trying to find out more.<\/p>\n

UPDATE: Here’s the text of the Chicago resolution<\/a>. (pdf)<\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Local food-policy wonks were scratching their heads this weekend at a New York Times report\u00a0that the City Council has passed a “Green Food Resolution.” The news, it turned out, was premature — the nonbinding resolution, introduced by 39th ward alderman Margaret Laurino — hasn’t passed, it’s just in committee. \u00a0But its provenance is still sort … Continued<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[110,1,42],"tags":[171,170,172],"class_list":["post-741","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-local-food-news","category-uncategorized","category-urban-agriculture","tag-farm-sanctuary","tag-green-food-resolution","tag-margaret-laurino"],"acf":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.marthabayne.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/741","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.marthabayne.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.marthabayne.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.marthabayne.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.marthabayne.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=741"}],"version-history":[{"count":20,"href":"https:\/\/www.marthabayne.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/741\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":759,"href":"https:\/\/www.marthabayne.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/741\/revisions\/759"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.marthabayne.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=741"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.marthabayne.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=741"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.marthabayne.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=741"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}