Including: Listening Sessions for State Board of Food and Agriculture, ROC Fellows, San Francisco’s Urban-Rural Roundtable, and 21st Century Food and Agriculture Policy
June 23, 2008
By Micheal Dimock
It is a time of transition into robust action here at ROC. First, I’ll cover the transitions, then the actions. After three years of hard work and dedication, our friend and colleague, Nicole Mason, has stepped out of her role at ROC to embrace new challenges. I speak for all of us in the ROC community in saying we wish Nicole every success and we thank her for her good service. She will be consulting with us through the fall to ensure that Changemaker’s Day at Slow Food Nation is a success. Many of you will be seeing and hearing from Nicole on ROC’s behalf through the summer. You can read more about Changemaker’s Day and Slow Food Nation in this newsletter and on line at www.slowfoodnation.org.
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Sustainability: Agriculture's Pathway to Reclaiming Center Stage |
May 22, 2008
Here is the speech I gave for the Sustainable Agriculture Resource Consortium (SARC, www.sarc.calpoly.edu) at the Cal Poly San Luis Obispo College of Agriculture last week, May 16th.
Sustainability: Agriculture's pathway to reclaiming center stage in the American social and political landscape
Thank you for inviting me to share some thoughts with you about a subject of common interest: agriculture and future of California.
I am delighted to be on this wonderful campus again. As a graduate of the California Ag Leadership Program, Class XXXI, I had the opportunity to spend time here studying public speaking with Robert Flores. I hope he will be pleased with my talk today, if not the content, at least, the structure.
As President of Roots of Change, I am involved in a very interesting project that is attempting to align a wide diversity of food system actors around a common strategy that aims to create a sustainable food system in California by the year 2030. This is very big idea. The whole concept of sustainable agriculture and food systems is fluid and evolving, but there are definite stakes in the ground that may be taken as signposts to be followed.
I recognize I am sure you do, that this lack of clarity around sustainability can be frustrating for people who must deal on a daily basis with earthbound realities on the farm or ranch where market rules, regulations, finances, and long-held perceptions create a powerful framework guiding action.
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May 15, 2008
As you may have noticed, ROC is always talking about “the network” or the “Leadership Network.” That’s because it’s a central part of our theory and strategy about how to make change. The upcoming listening sessions that the State Board of Food and Agriculture is holding in May and July to set 30 goals for 2030 around the food system (see calendar) provides a wonderful medium for applying network power. And ROC will be encouraging the network in the next ten days to engage the State Board. Therefore, I thought it might be important to provide a more thorough explanation of the term “network” from my perspective. If we hope to effectively collaborate, coming to a common understanding about the words we use is essential. So here is what I think about the network.
Simply put, a network is a system of intersection points (nodes) and flow routes (links). Applied to human dynamics, a “social” network describes the relationship between the nodes (individuals and their organizations/businesses) and the links (common purpose, values, principles, information, goods, services, and activities). The network is free of overarching bureaucratic structures and this freedom increases effectiveness and accelerates progress. The network’s vitality is important in a time when rapid innovation is required.
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A Letter from the Secretary of Agriculture |
April 2, 2008
California is blessed these days with a Secretary of Agriculture who is hip to the many profound realities that affect farmers and ranchers who seek to keep their operations viable in perpetuity. AG Kawamura – UC Berkeley graduate in Comparative Literature, specialty crop farmer from Orange County, tireless advocate for eradicating hunger, and promoter of sustainable farming systems – is a wonderful example of a person who represents the diverse interests needed to rally the State’s many stakeholders who seek a sustainable food system. You will find AG’s eloquent request that the State Board of Food and Agriculture to undertake a strategic visioning process that will prepare California for what he calls the “unpredictable future,” attached below.
AG Kawamura Letter
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March 19, 2008
The weekend before last, March 15th in fact, spring sprung in my garden in Santa Rosa. It was near 70 degrees and the sun was bright. The volunteer grasses were out of control and I was harvesting them, roots intact, for my compost pile, which at last look was up to 120 degrees. The daffodils were about finished, the peach tree was about to pop, and the first iris blooms were 2 weeks away. I knew spring had begun because, front and back, my yard was full of tiny white, fragrant and spade shaped blooms that had me sniffing around on my knees. They are the violets, viola odorata, that mark the start of spring for me. Despite the fact that humans have cultivated them for over 2 thousand years, my annual bloom lasts maybe ten days; so I must savor their existence. And what an existence it is.
Roots of Change, like the garden, is beginning to see a beautiful bloom. Holly King, Charlene Orszag, Anya Fernald (all 2007 ROC Planning Fellows) and Joseph McIntyre from ROC’s Coordinating Team will share some exciting work underway within the ROC Network. Here is my brief rundown on other developments since mid-February when the Stewardship Council met to review ROC’s 2008 plans and budget. The Coordinating Team’s proposals, with Council refinements, were adopted and we are off and running to towards important milestones.
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