From Justice to Sovereignty

 The key idea of this reading was that food security on its own is a necessary requirement for food sovereignty, but it is not equal to food sovereignty on its own. Specifically, food security was defined as having the means to provide oneself or family with food. But the exact nature and quality of that food is left undefined, and we are led to believe that was purposeful. Food sovereignty is this reading was generally defined as a community being able to provide each person with food that they desire, produced in ways they endorse, and without damaging the health of the community or its surroundings like ecosystems. 

Prior to this reading, I am sure most of us thought of food justice as some in between definition of food security and food sovereignty, or at least I did. We have been talking about expanding access to healthy foods these last few discussions, and how to do that. Some of that discussion was taking place within international markets, and hence our discussions leaned more towards food security if one had to be chosen, but we all would agree with the methods of food sovereignty more-so than security. That alone is eye opening to me because this weeks reading mentioned that the UN's definition for food security was limited to distribution, and thus less sensitive to cultural, indigenous, and environmental needs. The reading mentioned that this makes it more likely to miss unknown harms as a result of equal distribution, and that's exactly what we failed to talk about in discussion last week. In some way that has indirectly affected at least my own views of food justice up until now as I too was mostly focused on distribution of healthy foods over all of the terms in food sovereignty's umbrella.

Lastly, the example given with salmon was a very good one. It paints the picture clearly that fulfilling a communities food needs through distribution of anything called food does not always solve the initial problem, and can even create or fail to see other problems. It shows clearly how food is being manipulated to be treated as a common product more so than as a fruit of nature. A world where all nations are food sovereign does strike me as very hard to reach, but definitely not impossible. 

Food Security and Food Sovereignty

 In Samantha Noll and Esme Murdock's paper. The differences between two different approaches to fighting world hunger, food sovereignty and food security. Food security's stance on the matter is giving access to food of all kinds to everyone whereas food sovereignty is similar but also focuses on how healthy the food is, the location, and methods used in agriculture. The paper then goes onto note that many attempts to combat hunger using food security have happened in the past with noticeable "gaps" which can cause unintended harm to minority populations. A way to fill those gaps as suggested is by addressing the issue using food sovereignty as well. However there are still conflicts between the two approaches. For example, the Columbia River salmon contamination situation highlights the issues with food security at the least because while the solution met the demands of food security organizations, high levels of mercury causing deformations and exposing the indigenous tribe to increased risk of cancer due to industrialization upstream and downstream of the tribe does not allow the situation to meet the standards of food sovereignty organizations. 

Rethinking Justice in Our Food Systems

What stood out to me most in this article was the idea that the disagreement between food security and food sovereignty is not really about food itself, but about different understandings of justice. Food security focuses mostly on making sure people have access to enough safe and nutritious food. On the surface, that sounds like the obvious solution to hunger. But the authors argue that this approach is rooted in distributive justice, meaning it is mainly concerned with who gets what and whether resources are evenly distributed. While that is important, the article shows that it can be too narrow.

Food sovereignty, on the other hand, looks at food in a much broader way. It emphasizes the right of communities to make their own decisions about how food is grown, distributed, and consumed. I think this is important because it shifts the conversation from simply giving people food to giving them power. The example of the Detroit Black Community Food Security Network really helped me understand this. It shows how leadership and decision making within the community matter, especially when outside groups might unintentionally take control.

The section on Indigenous models of justice was also really powerful. The idea of justice being relationship centered, focusing on restoring balance between people, land, and nature, feels very different from just counting whether everyone has enough food. The Columbia River salmon example made this clear. Replacing contaminated salmon with processed food technically solves the access problem, but it ignores cultural traditions, spiritual meaning, and environmental damage. That really made me see how a food security solution could still create harm in other ways.

Overall, I agree with the authors that food security is necessary, but not enough on its own. Making sure people are not hungry is essential, but justice also involves culture, environment, participation, and self determination. Looking at food through a more holistic lens helps reveal issues that might otherwise be overlooked.

Whose Justice is it Anyway?

 Relating food justice to the way that indigenous groups view justice was an interesting concept to read about. The “holistic philosophy” that they have that emphasizes the major issues that need to be solved in order to achieve peace for everyone involved is an effective way to put into perspective the significance of food justice. It also brings up the need for calling attention to issues, finding solutions, and restoring what had been previously broken. Awareness is the first step, and it’s very important for people to know what’s going on and what the issues are either where they live or in other communities. Calling attention to food injustice issues can lead to possible solutions. 

I also think it’s important for people to be able to feel empowered within these communities as mentioned in the article. Neighborhood gardens help to support the people living there in more ways than just giving them more access to fresh produce. It helps these people recognize their democracy as well as have the ability to embrace their cultures. Maybe by making traditional dishes with the produce they make, and sharing it with other people within their community. In my opinion, people should have the ability to share their cultures with their neighbors. It goes beyond the context of food justice and is tied to the importance of human connection and support for one another. 

I like how this article also brought up environmental justice, specifically the example of the location of toxic waste sites. I find this to be extremely unjust and cruel to the communities living there, these companies and the government don’t care about these people and don’t consider how it could affect them either. 

I can definitely see how focusing on only food access and distribution could be harmful, and it shouldn’t encourage ignoring other issues just to meet the needs of these issues. The article mentions that sometimes if a food justice movement only focuses on the distribution aspect of it, it doesn’t really involve members of that community. This further silences their voices and avoids listening to what they truly desire and need. We are then led back to the holistic approach to food justice, that will tackle any issues that might’ve otherwise been overlooked. As I mentioned before, this is extremely important, examining and reworking everything that is an issue within the system is necessary to achieve a stable food system.

The Evolution of Food Justice Solutions

The approach of food sovereignty encompasses the distribution of adequate food supplies (food security), includes the autonomous right of the community to control it's own food system, and addresses a range of social and environmental justices. 

Something that I have understood in my own personal and spiritual life is that everything is connected; however as I further my studies, I see more and more instances of this in our society and the scientific world. Poverty, racism, deforestation, climate change, food access, corporate greed, they are all intrinsically linked to each other and should not be address in a vacuum. Much of science has been whittled down to hyper-specific fields and specialties that rarely cross boundaries. Not to say specialization is a bad thing, but I think when you lose sight of the connection with other fields or issues, the work you are doing can be futile. And I think that's what the approach of food security is. It looks at one problem, food access, and addresses that by increasing access of food. No concern for why the food insecurity exists in the first place, or the repercussions food distribution may have on communities. Food sovereignty takes this approach and widens the lens to allow more factors and consequences be visible. Just as it has been said we need large and small changes to fix these problems, we also need narrow and broad lenses to develop the solutions. 

The case study at the end of the article demonstrates this in many ways. For one, whatever reasons dams were built and water in the river contaminated looked only at the direct problem at the origin, whatever that may be - most likely poor agricultural practices. A broad view would have considered the effects that these practices would have on the nearby ecosystem (the river and the salmon), as well as communities along the river relying on those resources (the indigenous groups). Secondly, the "solution" of providing the community with canned seafood as a replacement only looks at the sustenance angle. Completely forgoing long term health effects of eating processed food, or the spiritual connection the indigenous culture has with the salmon. Of course no solution will ever be perfect (probably), but by taking into considered multiple aspects, we can get pretty close to true food justice (along with all the other justices).

Food Sovereignty: Indigenous input

 The article “Whose Justice Is It Anyway?” explores a central tension in contemporary food debates: whether food security and food sovereignty represent opposing paradigms or whether they can be productively integrated. According the paper, food security as traditionally framed prioritizes distributive justice, ensuring individuals have access to sufficient, safe, and nutritious food through market-based and governmental distribution systems. In contrast, food sovereignty movements emphasize the right of communities to self-determine food production, agricultural policies, and cultural food practices, challenging the limited justice framework implicit in dominant food security approaches. Their argument reframes food sovereignty not as antagonistic to food security but as a broader justice framework that encompasses and informs the rights claims necessary for equitable food systems.

This philosophical framing resonates strongly with themes in an article I found on Indigenous food systems. The article states that for American Indian and Alaska Native communities, food security defined solely in terms of access and availability fails to capture Indigenous values, which include cultural foods, reciprocal relationships with land and more-than-human relatives, and community sharing systems. It argues that Indigenous Food Sovereignty (IFS) embodies a holistic food system grounded in relationality, reciprocity, and cultural values, suggesting that conventional food security measures are insufficient and sometimes inappropriate for capturing Indigenous food realities.

Taken together, these works support a critical point: food security is necessary but incomplete. Noll and Murdock’s justice-based critique parallels the article’s decolonial critique of dominant food security concepts. Both suggest that expanding our understanding of justice in food systems, whether through community agency and self-determination (food sovereignty) or through Indigenous worldviews that include environmental, cultural, and spiritual dimensions, offers a richer, more equitable basis for addressing hunger and inequity than access-focused frameworks alone.

https://pmc.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/articles/PMC11938391

It's Just Wordplay Sire

Food security being based merely on distributive justice will not solve the issue of world hunger. However, the word food security encompasses more than just distribution; as evidenced by one of the more accepted definitions according to a paper published by SupAgro in Montpellier, France and the University of Roma Tre documents that “Food security exists when all people, at all times, have physical, [social] and economic access to sufficient, safe and nutritious food which meets their dietary needs and food preferences for an active and healthy life”. (FAO, 1996) Food preferences imply a broader meaning; when you look at religious laws and regulations in governmental organizations they explicitly state that food preferences for religious accommodations should be met. 

There are four dimensions to food security and the more accepted definition of food security states that food preferences need to be addressed. Food preferences are not one of the domains when considering; access, availability, utilization and stability. 

However, when you think of stability one thing shifts in a routined schedule for the day, it makes people susceptible or vulnerable to have to adapt. Therefore leading to a lack of stability. When food security is not merely viewed as solution that can be solved via distribution, but as a logical process by its very definition it's understood that food security considers the marginalized groups. Vulnerability occurs in the future, it defines people that are at risk. In the example of the Indian tribe they were put at risk once their main supply of food became contaminated. I believe that this is indeed a matter of perspective and how you view the use of the word. In my opinion the article seems to be trivial in the sense of finding a solution to the problem. But maybe, the bigger issue at hand here is how we are being divided in masses over the jargon that policy uses to govern what is deemed as acceptable or not in aiding others in need. 

Whose Justice is it Anyway? - Thoughts

    "Ending world hunger" has been a headline for decades. This normally comes with images of high-tech farming solutions that have been built to maximize yields, grain silos, or grocery vouchers. This is a hard topic to argue with, as we should be getting food to the hungry people. But having enough to eat is not actually enough.

    The term "food security" has been a gold standard around the globe. This is the idea that everyone can have economic and physical access to nutritious and safe food. However, this idea is focused primarily on distributive justice, which treats people as though they are buckets that simply need to be filled. It does not take into account where it came from, if the food is culturally appropriate, or if the people eating it have any say in how it is made. In most cases, getting food for a community entails flooding the area with imported surplus that ends up putting local farmers out of business. This ends up leaving the community even more dependent on those global corporations.

    Food sovereignty, on the other hand, is the right for people to define their own food and agriculture system. This looks more at who controls the seeds, who owns the land, and if the meal respects the culture. This idea and the idea of food security are at odds. By focusing on local control and more traditional methods, it would almost be impossible to feed 8 billion people around the world. 

    Instead, this problem should be looked at as one cannot exist without the other. Food sovereignty is what keeps you healthy and out of the emergency room while food security is the emergency room. You do not want to live in the emergency room, but it can be a necessary thing to get you back on your feet. It is the same for the food justice system. Groups of people do not want to be reliant on the global organizations for all of their food.

    Justice is not just making sure that there is a fair distribution of "stuff" across the world but is instead a recognition of both the producer and the autonomy of a culture. Instead of asking if there is enough food to go around, we should be asking whose system are we getting out food from and what is the cost of that (both economically and at the expense of our health/culture). 

Food Security vs. Food Sovereignity

 McClintock & Noll discuss their ideas of conflicts between food security & food sovereignty beyond the effects of food distribution and how it is marketed.

They state that food sovereignty encompasses wider food justice endeavors that includes key points of food security. Using Food security as a strong base with emphasizing food security lesser role to build more just food system.

Goals of food security are dictated to provide the population with adequate, safe, & nutritious foods. Providing our food are assessable through economic and physical parameters. (ie: "Food Desserts").  Heavily relying on free market and its corresponding economic abilities.  Identifying food as a commodity letting the free market dictate growth and control.  Cons to food security its strong relationship to Neoliberalism's dynamics, inducing fewer local influences & opportunities.  Thus, allowing for more environment damages.

La Via Campesina (LVC) is an international movement representing 200 million farmers.  This cohort established the term food sovereignty in 1996. It gives people the right to healthy, culturally appropriate & ecologically purchased food. Emphasized on its local production, smaller-scale farming & community control, over resources of the land, seeds, & irrigation.

"KEY GOALS FOR FOOD SOVEREIGNTY"

• Individual rights - enact personal agriculture/food policies, not dictated by market demands.
• Main focus on sustainable, agroecological practices.
• Food for the people, local control building knowledge and skills in tangent with nature. 
• Giving farmers rights to needed Agri materials. Ending misogynistic threat in rural areas.
• Priority over food as a commodity eliminating corporate controls. Viewing human needs as a priority.

Food security & food sovereignty should not be allowed to conflict.  Both should encompass 1) access, 2) culture, 3) ecology, 4) shared power, 5) rights of the community.

From Industrial Gardens to Food Deserts

In Chapter 5 of industrial Garden to Food Desert by Nathan McClintock, he argues that food deserts are not accidental and are caused by systemic racism, demarcated devaluation, and redlining. McClintock states “Most have concluded that in the United States, food deserts disproportionately impact people of color.” this is true because it highlights the injustices people of color face in their communities. Demarcated devaluation is the action of isolating people in less desirable areas usually with people of color living there. This makes their houses and land less valuable and often poorly built. Grocery stores were too expensive for the people living in the food deserts, so they moved to the hills of Oakland and fast food restaurants and convenient stores with old poor quality produce and processed food was available. McClintock cites “There are four times as many fast food restaurants and convenience stores as grocery stores and produce vendors in the East Bay (Spiker, Sorrel green, and Williams 2007).” While white people and people living in the hills of Oakland blamed the obesity and health problem in the flatlands on the people living there not what they have access to and that the system had screwed them on purpose. A quote from this article where people are being interviewed about how they feel about the food in the valley, an individual says “ I wish we could have more fresh foods rather than junk food, candy, and soda that we’re all used to eating because that is the only thing around” (Ibid.). further proving that the crisis does not come from the flatlands it comes from the people devaluing their land and homes and isolating them as a form of racism and gatekeeping nutritious food and good living situations.   

From Industrial Gardens to Food Desert

  I found it really surprising that an area that started off as promising, has turned into a food desert and has remained that way decades later. Having more grocery stores in the 1930s than the 1980s was baffling to hear, as I would typically expect the opposite. Especially considering the overall population increase since then, I believed that there would be more grocery stores in these areas since they have more residents. I also found it strange that liquor stores and convenience stores are more accessible than fresh produce. It enables addictions and unhealthy habits. Why is accessibility to beer being valued more than to healthy foods? Thinking more about this fact makes me think of this statistic I heard once that over 60% of tobacco stores are located close to elementary or middle schools. By exposing children to things like this, it teases their curiosity to try it, potentially leading to addiction. I can’t imagine this effect is much different in these food deserts. 

In my opinion, I think that educating people on nutrition and how to grow their own food is a good way to start making a change in food deserts. Rather than just donating nonparishable foods and such, teaching people what they can do personally to improve their situation is much more effective. However, as McClintock mentioned we have to “rethink and rebuild the entirety of the metropolitan and regional food system”. Doing this requires more than just educating people about nutrition, how to cook, or grow food. It will require a lot of larger corporations to change their policies, and how they function, which will take a while to get there. Despite this, smaller efforts do count and they do positively impact others within food deserts. 

Food Deserts in the United States

     As Nathan McClintock stated in his writing: From Industrial Garden to Food Desert, Food deserts are proportionately popular in low economic areas, specifically urban communities of color. This hypothesis has been brought up in our class discussions and is unanimously accepted as many people have had personal accounts to validate this claim. While the article focuses on areas of California, this same problem can be seen across low income urban areas of the United States as a whole and is a significant problem and also indicator of the disproportionate distribution of nutritious food which also highlights the overall economic issues the country faces.

    McClintock also highlights how these low income areas have congregated people of color using the military industrial complex boom of World War One to gather these citizens, with their hopes being that there would be stable jobs that pay decently. While this may or may not have been the case and intention  of the US government at one time. this has now inadvertently created and sustained the food deserts we see today which has now essentially forced these communities to take whatever jobs a shipyard offers regardless of pay or the person's skill due to that corporation dominating the job market in the area and also forcing these communities to live in subsidized housing with no perceivable way out of the arrangement. Personal accounts in class discussions have also supported this argument. 

    The current situation these communities face show signs of past and present racism and prevent these communities from escaping their food desert and economic standing.

Industrial Gardens to Food Deserts

While I have been aware of historical ideologies having a negative lingering effect on societies today, I was not aware of the exact history of the process and why specifically some areas receive repeated cycles of poverty. I've known about zoning and other policies restricting grocery access to areas of low income, but it is an eye opener for me to learn now about how and why these things stay the way they are, more so than just "racism". It is quite clear that racism is a huge proponent to how this ball started rolling. Looking at the historical Oakland zoning maps was crazy to me, seeing how they were labeling other people as "lower graded elements" of a system as an excuse to restrict where new investment flows into is just hard to comment on. But I don't think thinking about the past and how it all started in the first place is going to solve any of the problems the past has left behind for this specific issue. 

Today, as we just read, these areas still exist. Today, people are still struggling to have fair access to fresh food. McClintock is right to say that food deserts exist once existing capital is no longer performing as much as is wanted. But how do you even fix that? How do you convince businesses to move back into areas where they know they will lose money? It certainty won't be out of the goodness of their CEOs hearts, at least not a significant or meaningful amount. McClintock talked about that even restarting the cycle that once brought capital in just continues to yield the same result of poverty for those in previously labeled red or yellow areas. This can be due to things mentioned like majority of businesses and housing not being locally owned, people spending money in adjacent towns due to higher quality selections, and repeated loan disapproval and caution against investment in previously labeled red and yellow areas. Racism likely does still play a role as a barrier to changing this system, as even today, grocers are not running to re-open their doors in the areas they previously closed them in, but I think today the hesitation is more because of an economic fear than a racial matter. For areas like Oakland to change, they will need numerous things, but most importantly, more stable, paying jobs, majority local ownership of businesses, and locally owned housing options. I think this because if you provide capital influx in some way to a system like Oakland, and it is all being spent in adjacent towns, or on rents to landlords over seas or in different states, the city is ultimately losing money even when subsidized, and to restore incentive for a grocer to reopen its doors, you need to prove to them you have enough purchasing power to keep their grocery store running. 

Food Deserts - Where Do We Go From Here?

Food deserts across the country are the results of racist and classist economic and political practices and laws. Through decades of segregation, redlining, racist zoning laws, and economic booms and busts, much of the United State's abandoned post-industrial urban areas are lacking adequate access to healthy foods. McClintock summarizes in the discussion some food justice organizations working toward supplying the people of Oakland, CA with fresh foods, however then goes on to say that in addition to this, policies and zoning laws need to be updated for real change to be made. I understand this viewpoint, however, I think much of the solution to these problems comes in the form of community work and collaboration. We discussed last week the balance of individual community action and large scale policy changes, however I don't think the government in it's current form will be likely to produce any substantial changes to help communities in a timely manner. The system that brought about food deserts will not be the system to bring about their demise. It is up to us as individuals and community members to work in an alternative setting outside the bounds of capitalism that creates a new system of food production and supply.

This article also got me thinking about where I live in Pottstown. While a majority of the population is white, there is a large black population percentage, and almost 20% of the population lives below poverty (above the national average of 12.4% ; https://datausa.io/profile/geo/pottstown-pa/). In town on the main street, there is a Redner's Mini Mart and a small health food store for groceries. The mini Redner's is comparable to a large-sized gas station in terms of selection, most of the store is taken up by processed food, and there is one small refrigerator section with a small selection of produce. The health food store offers some produce (at prices that I would consider rather steep), but still primarily sells processed "healthy" foods. To access the chain grocery stores one would likely need a car or access to the bus. The bus system in Pottstown is rather robust for a small urban area, I think. There are several lines that stop at several grocery stores just outside of town, and most run every hour throughout the day, with the exception of Sundays. Another constraint to the access of these stores, as highlighted by McClintock, is the segregation produced by highways. The majority of the grocery stores surrounding Pottstown are on the other side of Route 100, making walking there challenging and unsafe. I am fortunate that I am physically able to walk to one of these stores (about 25-30 minute walk) to get my groceries, but I know that is not the case for many members in my community. In all, Pottstown certainly is not the worse place to be able to access food, however improvements should be made to increase accessibility in the downtown.

Food Deserts and Power Struggles

In light of discovering what redlining means and seeing how the housing markets used it to isolate people, along with viewing the societal impacts of industry and war, this article made me reflect on my own upbringing. Having watched Janelle's video clip from Jiang Xueqin in a previous comment from last week's posts and hearing Xueqin mention consumerism being the new form of slavery; I couldn't help but think on where I come from. Pittsburgh, more specifically Jeannette, PA a city that thrived on industrial factories such as Westinghouse and Jeannette Glass. Both companies took a turn for the worse after WWII. Which led me to consider a more famous critical war theory based on the military-industrial complex. C. Wright Mills that is detailed in his book "The Power Elite." McClintock had mentioned that with the rise and fall of industry not only did the economy suffer, but mainly the people who lived in the city where the industry once was. Mills's theory in essence describes a revolving door of war and those who have power stay in power even once they retire to continue operating even behind closed doors. This theory accredits that the decisions made by the government are not actually in the business of bettering the lives of their citizens but only for themselves. I can't help but question if Wright's theory was at play here with the housing market redlining areas and providing cookie cutter homes. 

Food desert

Nathan McClintock’s chapter argues that food deserts in Oakland did not just happen naturally or because of crime, but were created through long histories of economic decisions, racism in housing, and the movement of industry and supermarkets to the suburbs. His idea of “demarcated devaluation” shows that certain neighborhoods—especially the flatlands where many low-income residents and people of color live—were intentionally left without investment. Because of this, access to fresh and affordable food became limited, while liquor stores and convenience stores became more common. This shifts the conversation away from blaming individuals and toward examining the systems that shaped these neighborhoods over time. What stood out to me most is the contrast between Oakland’s past as an “industrial garden” and its present reality. The area once combined industry, housing, and the ability for residents to grow some of their own food, which created a kind of everyday security. Over time, that balance disappeared as land was paved over, factories closed, and capital moved elsewhere. Residents were left dealing with pollution, unemployment, and fewer food options. This makes the food desert feel less like an empty space and more like evidence of historical choices that prioritized profit and suburban growth over community well-being. I also found the discussion of community gardens interesting because it shows both hope and limitation. On one hand, gardens and local food programs can help people reconnect with land, culture, and healthier food. They can feel like acts of resistance and rebuilding. On the other hand, expecting small volunteer projects to solve problems created by decades of policy and disinvestment seems unrealistic. From my perspective, gardens are meaningful socially and culturally, but real change would also require larger policy shifts, economic investment, and fair access to housing and jobs. Overall, the chapter suggests that food deserts are not just about food—they reflect deeper inequalities in how cities develop and whom they serve. Understanding that history helps reveal that these neighborhoods are not empty or broken, but shaped by decisions that could, in theory, be changed.

Food Desert Thoughts

    Unfortunately, a lot of the time, when people hear the term "food desert", it is associated with areas where the crime rates are so high that grocery stores have moved out of that area. However, this idea receives some pushback from McClintock as he uses the term Darcated Devaluation. This means that food deserts do not occur naturally, but are the result of paving over fertile land, disinvestment, and redlining. It suggests that hunger is designed by capital and policy. This term assigns responsibility for this desert to concepts, rather than a specific race or group of people.

    Previously, Oakland was what's known as an "industrial garden". This means that the area was a patchwork of truck yards, factories, and residential gardens. This area was one of the most fertile areas in the country. Now, residents struggle to find any kind of fresh food. This transition illustrates disregard for the value of the land. The soil was healthy, and the people were self-sufficient, but this was traded in for short-term gain. The people are left with the pollution and the bill for all of this industry. The working class used to have a "safety net" within their backyards. Now, they must rely on big corporations. 

    In this debate, there are two common sides. The radical opinion states that planting a garden in a space where the soil is contaminated, and the capital has left, is an act of reclaiming power. The critical opinion says that if we only focus on the gardens, then we run the risk of letting the big corporations off of the hook. A bunch of volunteers running a garden should now be responsible for solving a systemic crisis created by decades of redlining. I think that a garden is a great idea socially, but not something that should be used as an economic tool without massive policy shifts to accompany it.

    This paper reminds us that the corner liquor stores and empty lots have a genealogy, a history to them. We have to stop looking at these food deserts as blank spaces and instead look at them as scars on history. The food desert is what we have been prioritizing, while the "industrial garden" shows us what is possible. 

Food Deserts

Food deserts affect millions of Americans. Giving people limited access to quality nutrient based, healthy food stuffs. Lack of outlets, distribution, and transportation are key issues to food desserts. Communities having food deserts effects significant lower-income populations.

Steps to reducing food deserts can provide positive gains towards improved economic opportunities, increase values of that community, most importantly better health equity to the people. Food deserts are prevalent in large cities, small towns, and rural farmer locations. 

Economic growth followed by decline contributes to creating large food desert pockets. These areas grow due to product innovations or war production demands. This loss leaves areas with high unemployment and polluted land and buildings, leaving little investment appeal.

Addressing options to lessen food deserts include government involvement along with corporate support, Government's crucial role requires providing incenting programs, that supplement investment s to these areas. Providing tax breaks, loans, and/or grants increasing economic investment.  It's extremely important that viable strategies be established that have hard set requirements.  Without open visibility on how the money is spend and it's ROI will lessen throwing "feel good" money that neglects a concrete solution.

Can the proper security be provided to guarantee real success to establish profitable supermarkets, pharmacies, and C-stores. Being realist on effect on the local people's rights will be one of the significant challenges, including low profit margins, high operating costs that plague these dead zones.

I support government programs such as. SNAP, WIC, The National Lunch School, Food Banks, and National Education & Public Health Institutes. In addition, I support companies that actively donate and encourage these programs, by not only with dollars and products, but requiring full and open visibility and financial responsibility. We should demand public disclosure for how our spend is benefiting everyone. 

Food deserts & minimum wage

 I had noticed that our article to read was published in 2011. In it, it mentioned the importance of a livable wage for food security. Back in 2011, the CA minimum wage was $8/hr compared to the current $16.90/hr in 2026. I found two sources of how with the raise in minimum wage there is an increase a higher caloric purchase in CA (raising minimum wage improves nutrition among food insecure households). Now, while the data is able to show that more food has been bought, there hasn’t been as significant data on if the food is healthier. The second article touches more on the US as a whole, with the percentage of households facing food insecurity, the use of SNAP, and the federal proposal to increase minimum wage. Currently the two states with the worst food insecurity are Arkansas (20%) and Mississippi (22%), or about 1 in 5 households. The second article goes more into the effects of minimum wage on food security and how a rise in wage would have a positive effect.

https://tcf.org/content/report/the-impact-of-a-15-minimum-wage-on-hunger-in-america

https://poverty.ucdavis.edu/post/raising-minimum-wage-improves-nutrition-among-food-insecure-households

Farmers and Pesticides

One of the statements that really stood out to me in our reading was how farmworkers are particularly vulnerable to pesticide poisoning and, ironically, often lack steady access to healthy food. Having worked on a peach farm before, I was aware of the chemical use there however none of the farmers used any PPE, in field or not. Even having been on a farm, I was detached from health hazards. Farmers feed our nation, facing health hazards daily, and yet there is a gap in protection for them. One of the most pervasive risks isn’t from heavy machinery or heat alone: it comes from pesticides, the chemicals are sprayed to protect crops but not only do they harm pests, they can also harm the people. I wish to emphasize how easy it is for this occupation to harm someone. Below are two articles I found regarding farmers and health risks.

https://pmc.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/articles/PMC11056488/#abstract1

https://www.ruralhealthinfo.org/topics/agricultural-health-and-safety

The World Health Organization estimates that up to 1 million people are affected annually by pesticide poisoning worldwide, and acute and chronic exposure can cause a range of health issues in agricultural workers. Research shows that pesticides can enter the body in multiple ways: through the skin; inhalation; even through ingestion when workers eat or drink without washing off residues. In the short term, exposure can lead to symptoms like headaches, dizziness, nausea, skin irritation, respiratory difficulties, and visual disturbances. Longer-term and repeated exposure is even more concerning. Pesticides have been linked to carcinogenesis (increased cancer risk), neurotoxicity (nervous system damage), reproductive problems, and weakened immune function; effects that may not appear until many years after exposure. Some neurological effects and cancers can take a decade or more to surface, making prevention and long-term monitoring vital.

Farmworkers who mix, load, or apply pesticides often without adequate protective gear face the highest risks. Even workers re-entering recently sprayed fields can absorb residues through their skin or breathe in pesticide drift from adjacent fields. Children and family members living with farmworkers may also be exposed indirectly through contaminated clothing or household dust. Across rural agricultural settings, workers are exposed not just to one but often multiple chemicals, sometimes without proper training or safety equipment. Widespread pesticide use (including chemicals like glyphosate, which research has connected with cellular toxicity and potential long-term disease risks) underscores just how hazardous these exposures can be.

Pesticides are just part of a larger pattern of health risks in farm work. Agricultural workers also face hazards from dust, fuel and fertilizers, extreme heat, and physically demanding labor which can interact with chemical exposures to worsen health outcomes.

Addressing pesticide risks requires better enforcement of safety standards like the EPA’s Worker Protection Standard, broader access to effective personal protective equipment (PPE), and much stronger training and education for workers about chemical risks. Researchers and rural health advocates also call for improved occupational health services and more community health resources in agricultural regions. Farmworkers deserve the same protections we expect in any workplace, especially when it comes to chemicals that can affect their health today and decades into the future.

Food Justice and the challenge to neoliberalism

 Alkon’s Article discusses the injustices that aren’t always seen regarding food. Sustainable agriculture is hard to put into play because as of right now, to minorities it feels like something for privileged or wealthy individuals. The stigma we talked about for a good portion of last discussion is also mentioned in this article stating that farming is glorified into being something for white people and white wealthy people go to farmers markets. The price of healthy organic food being so high speaks this into existence, that organic and healthy produce is for only those who can afford it. Americas health problem also heavily relies on the fact that healthy food is unavailable in populated low income areas. Alkon makes the point that Organic agriculture is incomplete without food justice. Organic food may be better for people and the environment but if it is only available to those who can afford it, it isn’t benefiting society as it should. By subsidizing healthy organic food, everyone would ahve access to vegetables and organic food, and by providing fair wages more people would feel compelled to farm and iyt would broaden the scope of cultures, races, and backgrounds of people in farming not just white men. By banning and regulating pesticides and harmful chemicals not only are we protecting the consumer and the environment but the farmers and people who work with these harsh chemicals everyday without proper PPE who produce the crops we need. This would also broaden the scope of who wants to farm because I know with all of the chemicals out there I would not want to be a conventional farmer. 

Food Justice + Neoliberalism

    From this reading, I took away the idea that Alkon wants us to see both the differences and the similarities between food justice progression and neoliberalism, and how the two can and are being used to forward food justice and related movements. It is highlighted that other researchers/scholars tend to argue that food justice movements are using neoliberalism ideas to advance or are neoliberal. A core idea of neoliberalism is minimal government intervention in a capitalist free-market. An increasingly common core step for many food justice groups is to market their cause in some way. This can be done by starting an organic farm, joining a group to provide fresh food for all, telling others to not buy from the businesses they oppose, or telling others to buy from like minded groups only, and many more. The point I believe she is making is that even though many food justice advocates/groups may oppose some neoliberal agendas like only using the free-market as their tool, they utilize neoliberal strategies to push their own, then attempt to dismantle something that one could also define as neoliberal.

    Personally, I think this has lots of truth to it, but I am not sure if neoliberalism is the absolute correct path of capitalism. According to Alkon, workers co-ops and food workers movements have shown to pave paths of success through neoliberalist strategies, which is great for those groups and can serve as proof of neoliberal strategies being linked to food justice progression, but I don't think it is neoliberal in itself. The strongest example in my opinion is groups mentioned like the CIW that can force a food justice advocates agenda onto a big corporation (or 11 of them), this is real systematic change happening at the business level with minimal governmental interaction needed. It is a real example of Alkon's point that even if CIW used neoliberal-labeled-tactics to gain the ground their on now, they are also using their power to rework places affected by neoliberal ideas, like how they were able to make wages better for countless farmers. 

    The last thing I want to say is that I don't exactly understand why, for example, an advocacy group using the capitalist market we live in to progress their cause gets labeled as neoliberal. I get that neoliberalism involves free-market tools, but that does not mean free-market tools = neoliberal. To me it reads the same as saying a worm is a harbinger of death for apples because it ate an apple, but killing apples was never the worms ultimate goal. How exactly is any group neoliberal for simply existing and operating inside a neoliberal market. "Scholars" who are quick to labeling these groups as neoliberal are defining their means as their ends.

Food Justice and Neoliberalism

 When I think about the word “activist,” I think about open-minded, passionate people. I forget to think about the possible biases and tunnel vision that could come with such personal intensity towards a specific issue. This article on the Food Justice and Neoliberalism critiques on the food system and its advocates helped me have a broader understanding of the community. It also has led me to think about my own activism journey, and to remember to look at something from all angles, despite how I want to say that [insert a solution here] is the way to fix it. It is easy to see the negative when looking at things. It’s hard not to be like, “I got this” and take things into your own hands. I didn’t realize how advocating for change within individuals, instead of for change in the government could potentially release responsibilities from higher up and the system and prevent wide-scale change. Specifically, the line about power being achieved by the individual participating within capitalism was influential to me. I hadn’t thought about the detriment of pushing change onto just people within the economy, because I thought small scale change would then lead to greater change. Alkon points out that this can set a precedent of people being the ones to take responsibility. I knew that change needed to happen within the government, but I didn’t realize that advocacy could potentially hinder its own efforts to promote change. 

Overall, I feel like this article was a very valuable read, for me, but for people in general. I learned more about the relationship between people and the economy, the barriers that POC face within the food system (and its corresponding movement), and the solutions that can propel society to a more sustainable and equal food system.

Human & Labor Rights Vs. Neoliberalism

  If I had to make an analogy, which I love doing, I can only seem to relate neoliberalism with the 70s and the Vietnam War. Why you might ask? A separation of government from the people of the state. The people want help, but they don't want the government's help, people want peace, but they don't want to fight for peace. It's an interesting dichotomy and it seems to me at least from a surface value I can understand why sociologist would be concerned with neoliberal worldviews.

Addressing two "solutions" if you will that I found quite intriguing were the CIW and ROC. First and foremost, I believe that it's critical to make the distinction that when nothing but NGO's pop-up the problems can't be solved in communities because you need the proper funding. Having worked for an NGO previously gives me a unique perspective. While I agree that there needs to be a healthy push back from the citizens of said state I think that completely separating yourself from the government, although they appear to cause nothing but conflict, needs to be viewed under a different light. When enemies come knocking at the door feuding brothers unite.

The CIW is a doing some fantastic work, for being able create the Fair Food Program has enabled countless migrants to be heard and have better pay. I'm curious to see other coalitions like theirs that have pushed big corporations to raise their standards. I've know several farmers that hire migrant workers that are very grateful for their work, because without them, we wouldn't have as high quality of food that we do.

The ROC sounds like a long lost friend that is there to be a voice for all of the silenced voices behind the kitchen doors. Health insurance and sick time in restaurants is almost unheard of. Between farm workers and line cooks they are amongst the most underpaid and undersupported in the industry. I really wish there were more worker owned cooperative restaurants, when you give people the resources to make positive changes in their life doing something they love, it's almost unmatched what they will do for their company.

Making the connection between workers labor rights and taking a stand against neoliberalism was a huge eye opener for me. If we don't have the proper policies enacted we can't really enforce change on a large scale in today's society.

The Benefits of Neoliberalism in Food Justice

In Alison Alkon's text: Food Justice and the Challenge to Neoliberalism, Many subjects were touched upon regarding inequality in the food industry from production and harvesting of raw materials to taking those products and making a finished product. What peaked my interest the most was the focus on GM crops and the impact they have on the market. On one hand I agree that GM crops cause a shift in the market which segregates communities based on their economy and background, on the other hand I do believe humanity has reached a point that using GM crops is necessary to sustain the population we have on this planet. With the way trends are going currently, removing crops that grow faster and produce more would only expand food deserts and create an even larger gap to close to remove those food deserts entirely. While I disagree with removing food deserts I also disagree with the monetization of GM crops and believe that they should be accessible to everyone rather than being selectively built around specific pesticides and monopolized. This and continuing to move towards working with communities that live in these food deserts and helping them become sustainable would increase our liklihood of removing food deserts in their entirety. Alison also touches on “bad actors” and notes that while they may be activist groups working towards a sustainable food system for all, they specifically focus on restricting agribusiness products such as pesticides and GM crops. I agree with fighting against pesticides and how they are currently weaponize to restrict choices in crops to produce and from who you can purchase these seeds from, I still believe GM are a necessity, I think we should focus effort on fighting the weaponization of GM crops rather than GM crops in their entirety. 

Neoliberalism and the Transition to Sustainable Agriculture

Neoliberalism and capitalism have created a plethora of issues in our food systems. These issues range from accessibility/affordability of healthy foods to minorities, to the use of dangerous pesticides, among many others. 

As we discussed in more detail last week, many racial and economic minority groups have very limited access to healthy, whole foods and have been forced into food deserts. I did my GIS project on this topic last semester, titled, "Minority and Low-Income Access to Sustainable Agriculture in Pennsylvania". Below is a pie chart I made of some of my findings - 85% of sustainable farms in Pennsylvania are located in counties that I considered to have Very Low (1.69%-11.97%) to Low (11.98%-22.25%) racial minority populations (sorry if the quality is bad). A limitation to this is that the website I used to gather sustainable farm data is user-submitted and not inclusive of all sustainable farms in Pennsylvania, and there is not a standard for what is considered "sustainable". However, I think it is still jarring the disparity in this small sample I collected and I would be very interested in delving more into this. I did not incorporate a financial aspect to this, it is simply based on location of farms and minority representation, however it is evident that sustainable, organic agriculture tends to be more expensive that it's counterparts, furthering hindering minority populations from accessing it.

 

Pesticide (and other -icide) use comes with a great cost to our health, which many scientists warned about to policy makers in California regarding the use of methyl iodide. Policy makers and large agribusiness companies ignored these warnings and approved the use of methyl iodide anyways, despite the knowledge of the negative health and environmental impacts that go along with it. It wasn't until a lawsuit that would have hindered future use of other pesticides that the company pulled use of methyl iodide. Which was a big win, but had the judge in the lawsuit voted against the company, as he intended to, they would have been faced with hurdles using pesticides in the future. It was not out of care for the community or workers that they stopped using this pesticide, it was so that they could continue their detrimental practices, just in a different font. 

Changes to our food systems will not be able to be substantial whilst still following neoliberal rules. "Voting with your dollar" is great in theory, however it is still perpetuating the system that got us here in the first place. Additionally, many people can't vote with their dollar. The neoliberal capital system is designed to prevent change from being made, as the people and corporations at the top will lose their wealth. As we saw in the article, many groups are working towards developing alternative, mixed economical systems that do not solely rely on business-as-usual capitalism, which I think is great. However, I don't think it is the end all solution. In my opinion, a new economic system is required where money is not the basis. I am not sure what that would look like, but you cannot heal in the environment where you got sick, and the environment we are getting sick in is neoliberal capitalism.

 

Food Justice and the Challenge to Neoliberalism

Reading Alkon’s work made me realize how many problems in the food system I had never really thought about before. I usually think about food in simple ways, like price, taste, or whether it is healthy. After this reading, I started to understand that food is also connected to unfair wages, race, and power. It made me notice that the people who grow and prepare food often struggle the most, even though everyone depends on them every day. One idea that stood out to me was that food justice is about more than access to healthy food. Alkon explains that it also involves challenging exploitation and unfair treatment within the food system. This made me rethink common solutions like organic stores or farmers markets. While those options may help some people, they do not fix deeper problems like poverty or discrimination. Real change has to happen on a larger level. I was also interested in how society focuses on individual choice instead of responsibility from larger systems. Many food movements encourage people to create change by buying certain foods, but this mainly works for people who can afford those choices. This made me think about how easy it is to blame individuals for unhealthy eating without considering limits like money, time, or transportation. Overall, Alkon helped me see that food justice is really about fairness and human rights. It is not only about eating healthy, but also about treating workers with respect and creating a system that supports everyone. This reading changed the way I think about where food comes from and who is affected by it.

Food Justice and the Challenge to Neoliberalism

     This article brought light to topics I never knew about, many that surprised me. Farmers not having accessibility to healthy foods is jarring, since they are the one’s growing the organic foods. Receiving minimal wages for back breaking labor and pesticide poisoning while not receiving proper health benefits. They should be recognized more by larger corporations that sell their organic produce. 

    I also never thought about how conflicting it is for farmers to raise their prices, because while they deserve more money, it also means that people who are lower middle class cannot afford it, making it more difficult for them to have access to organic foods. The idea of community gardens seems to be the best option for this specific issue. However, as we talked about during our last class, many don’t want to do the work in order to get their food. Which I completely understand, they don’t want to wait long for their food to grow, and even when it does grow how can we guarantee that it’ll be enough to sustain a family. 

    I have never heard of a worker cooperative before, and they have begun to be more present within the past decade. I decided to look more into the Mandela Grocery Cooperative to see how it functions. People who shop there can apply for an EBT card which allows them to purchase California grown produce for half off. This allows people who have lower incomes to get produce at a reasonable price, while also supporting local farms. The fruits and vegtables they sell at Mandela change based on what’s in season.