Real Food takes the Midwest

By Katie Blanchard

On March 7-8, 125 students gathered at Maharishi University in Fairfield, Iowa for the Midwest Real Food Challenge Summit. They built coalitions and strengthened their voice as students working for bold changes to our food system, most specifically in their college and university dining services. When asked whether their campuses were at most 10 miles from an industrial agribusiness cornfield, if not within one, almost every student raised a hand. From a wide array of specific interests and backgrounds, the students came together around a common goal: real food.

Real food is fair, humane, local, and ecologically sound. It is what students are demanding from Sodexho at DePauw and growing in the Burning Kumquat Student Farm at Washington University. At Illinois State and the University of Minnesota, students are working in solidarity with farmworkers rallying for fair labor practices. At Macalester, they are creating an edible campus landscape. At Carleton, they are working with the local community for regional food security and sustainability.

At the Summit, students participated in workshops about organizing, group building, seed saving, fair trade, food policy, co-ops, art and activism, and more.  They heard from activist Erik Esse about the important place of this food movement in a long history of activism for fair, local food and organic pioneer Denise O’Brien called on the students to consider farming in considering their future and the future of our food. In open space discussion, students formed focus groups to share and learn about green roofs, urban gardens, campus community gardens, co-ops and how to hold dining services accountable.

Spread across the vast heartland of the country, Midwest students do not have quite so many opportunities to gather, network, share, dream, and plan. The Summit was a unique and powerful opportunity to gather, connect, and share, and commitments were made for further communication and action. In one workshop, students were asked to draw a farm, and almost every drawing included a red barn and huge grain silos. In discussion, they came to the conclusion that such an image did not represent their goals of a diverse, dynamic, healthy, fair, bountiful, beautiful food system.  That is the challenge—working on our campuses, connecting with our communities, and communicating in our coalitions to bring our dream-seed to the full fruit reality of real food NOW.