food, class, and what can you do about it?

this is not the first time i've referred to an arcticle by tom philpott. yet, this is a very fitting article because today is the first farmer's market of the year here in town. here is another by him from grist. tom speaks about the slow food movement and touches on sustainable agriculture, affordable alternatives to industrial-over-processed food, and those people that may have the opportunity to affect change and yet...may not take that opportunity.

i usually enjoy tom's writing and i woudl love to sit down with him and talk, yet this piece ended rather unsatisfactorily for me. i want to see solutions, and ideas, and resolutions, and suggestions, and the answeres to these questions. how do we make some of the principles of this "slow food" movement and the organic movement and the local movement part of most people's everyday lives? (hey, look, even the slow food movement is it's own little empire!)

how do we provide better food for the masses, at the same time providing the same qulatiy, and allowing farmers an adequate wage, and making the better food availble to more classes of people, and more local. you might ask, well, when will pigs fly. but if i were to be going back to school or getting a phd right now i would love to study the process of making better organic more natural food available to the masses. (despite the fact that it is all intimately tied to economics and subsidies and large corprations and governmental control....all subjects which are rather less intersting/arousing/tangible ... and yet all have very real effects on what we eat everyday and even our personal health...and thus the costs of health care.)

i'd love to delve more into these issues. i am becoming increasingly intersted in food and where it comes from and health benefits and availability and cost and what we can do about it. i'm off to the farmer's market.

Ruminations on food, class, and Carlo Petrini By Tom Philpott 07 Jun 2007