Edible City: Grow the Revolution

Dig in and Grow the Revolution at http://www.ediblecity.net

Edible City is a fun, fast-paced journey through the Local Good Food movement that's taking root in the San Francisco Bay Area, across the nation and around the world. 

Introducing a diverse cast of extraordinary and eccentric characters who are challenging the paradigm of our broken food system, Edible City digs into their unique perspectives and transformative work, finding hopeful solutions to monumental problems.

Inspirational, down-to-earth and a little bit quirky, Edible City captures the spirit of a movement that's making real change and doing something truly revolutionary: growing the model for a healthy, sustainable local food system.

http://www.ediblecity.net

Look around you. Look to your neighbor. These
are the people who are digging their hands

into the dirt. And they're going to begin
to take the first step: independence from

a corporate industrial food system. Take the
first step towards community-based regional

food system that focuses on the health of
our bodies, the health of the planet, the

health of the soil, and respects the farmers
and the food for the precious gift that it

is. This is not a new idea. This is where
we were in 1943, right? San Francisco had

one of the best victory garden programs in
the country. We had hundreds of urban productive

gardens like this throughout the city. That's
how you start to solve the food crisis; by

digging in.

If food isn't brought to the forefront,
the people are going to bring it to the forefront

because people are asking questions. They're
getting involved in organizations. And you

get those little bubbles in the water, a few
minutes later the water is boiling over. The

bubbles are in the water.

I got involved because I saw the immediate
needs of people who hungry.

The people here in this country are already
seeing that the system the way it is, is not

working. What are you going to do as an alternative?
There are other models out there -- ways

in which we are going to make our systems
more socially just, more economically viable,

more environmentally sound and more important
than anything, more resilient.

You could compare it to if you're painting
or trying to mix colors to get a certain new

color. I think we're trying to get a more
intense color for the good food movement right

now. And by linking up all the different people,
it's giving us more colors to work with.

Richer colors. And I think more power in the
system.

It's a challenge for everybody to look deeper
and see that the issues are really complicated.

They're not black and white. And we need
to look at every element as it is now. And

really look forward and see, well where do
we want to get to and how can we get there?

Every neighborhood would have a corner store
that sold fresh, healthy, affordable, local

food. And those stores would be owned by the
people who live in the neighborhood.

We need to look at putting new community institutions
into place that are part of the solution rather

than part of the problem. All we can do is
change course. Right where we are, stop and

shift and do things differently

We were put on this earth to eat. That's
it. And we just added all this. Whoever created

this said ok, let me, let me put some happy
people on this planet and giv'em some good

food to eat and let'em go.

It seems to me that people get it when I put
it this way. The twenty-two year old has lived

through 54% of all the oil ever burned. The
ten-year old has lived through a quarter.

Now that points out the speed that this is
coming on.

The solution then was bring more fossil fuel
to bear on agriculture. Step up production.

More monoculture. more pesticide to support
the monoculture, more chemical fertilizer

to support the monoculture. Drive down the
price of food. And it worked. We have been

eating oil for thirty years, forty years.
When we began industrializing agriculture

we were taking labor out of the farm and replacing
it with fossil fuel and technology. Most of

the big innovations in agriculture were fossil
fuel products. And they were very much the

products of World War II. We took the munitions
-- ammonium nitrate fertilizer is bomb fuel

-- and we converted that to fertilizer. The
same factories that were making bombs one

day and nerve gases, which became our pesticides.
What those technologies allow you to do is

monocultures -- very large fields of the
same thing. Moving from diversity to this

monoculture allowed you to greatly increase
production. Monocultures are also supremely

vulnerable to pests. So you can't have a
monoculture without pesticides to defend them.

And this has been our policy. We have rewarded
farmers for planting monocultures. If you

are a corn farmer, we'll give you money
to grow corn and soy. But if you want to put

in a row of broccoli, that land is permanently
ineligible for subsidies. It is illegal for

you to diversify your farm.

For the past maybe fifty, sixty years our
society has viewed food very much as a commodity.

And it's been mostly valued in terms of
the economics of it. And it's also seen

as fuel for our bodies that we have to gas
up and then we can go a few more hours and

we have gas up again. Eat so that you can
do the thing that you are supposed to do;

you can be productive. There is something
really, really missing. There is this hole

where the hearth should be in our society.
And yet in our society we somehow think that

this fuel can come in like a little paper
bag out of a window in a drive-through. And

we can gobble it up and then we can move on.
It's not just destroying our health, that

kind of fast-food culture. I think it creates
unhappiness and stress and you start looking

for what's that thing that going to make
me feel better? You're this prime target

for advertisers to say, "oh, here's what's
missing!" I really just think our bodies

are just chronically deprived of the nutrients
that they need.

The food system is slowly poisoning all of
us. It's almost like a silent, self-administered

genocide for the population. And we don't
notice. If we just ate real food most of the

time, we'd probably be a whole lot healthier.
But then you have to figure out, what's

"real" food? And what's "real" food
doesn't come from concentrated animal feeding

operations and it doesn't come from the
big poultry companies.

I think people have to realize that we are
in a deep crisis here in this country, not

only economic, but ecological, and cultural
and social. And food. There is a food crisis

here in terms of the quality of the food.
There is a problem of obesity so there are

a lot of people that are eating too much and
there's a lot of people that are eating

very little. The problem is that the crisis
is hidden by all the subsidies, the bailouts,

and the printing of money that is coming out.
It's hiding the crisis -- postponing it.

So people don't feel it like the people
in developing countries feel it. When you're

poor, you're poor down there. Nobody is
going to hide that poverty from you. Nobody

is going to dump subsidies or bailouts or
anything like that.

It is a dysfunctional food system for the
majorities, which works very well for a few

corporations and works very poorly for the
majority of the people of the world. And is

beginning to work worse and worse for the
people here in the United States.

So the fact that we are up against it is actually
the most hopeful thing. Because there are

short-term problems -- the price of oil,
water shortage. Problems that are much faster

than the long-term problems of climate that
we are going to have to wrestle with. And

we are fortunate that the solutions to the
short-term problems are solutions to the long-term

problems.

This is a lot easier of a problem because
7 times 2 X is just X minus 6. So I would

like for us to talk about Chapter 12, but
also I know you guys have been behaving better

than I've ever seen you behave so I will
share the bunnies with you guys.

Yay!

So I only have 5 bunnies so that means every
other person.

Can I get one fifth of all these bunnies?

Well, not in this form.

Aw. Haha. Yay!

I grew up different, but I think that made
me question the world because I think that

when people approach me they see me as someone
who can't do something or having limits

that are their projection. I often break people's
perceptions of what they think can be done

with just a few fingers.

Get the gloves. You want the gloves? You don't
need no gloves?

You got some hand sanitizer?

Don't step on it. Walk on the side. Huh?

You got some hand sanitizer?

Yeah you can go to the bathroom and use the
soap in the bathroom. That's the hand sanitizer.

[Laughs]

Why do you think we are weeding? Why do we
have to get this grass out of here?

So it won't kill the strawberries.

Exactly. So the grass eats up nutrients that
the strawberries need to grow. Many hands

make light work. Y'all heard that before?
Anybody?

Nope. Never heard of it. Serious.

You know what I'm talking about though right?

Yeah.

What I love about strawberries is you don't
have to plant them every year. You just plant

them one time and they come back. They love
you. Hey what's with the language!?

I love these peas. I used to hate these as
a kid. Then I started growing them and I developed

a taste for them. I learned how to do this
in Mexico in a garden program. It was all

organic. They liked organic because it cut
their costs down and raised their yields,

which is the exact opposite of what you hear
here in the United States. Most of the farmers

that I still work with today are organic farmers.
I don't think any of them are certified.

It's much too expensive for them. They're
not interested in an export market anyways.

They are interested in feeding their own people.
I think it's good to get your hands in the

dirt.

The vision is huge and to accomplish it is
huge. Baby carrots. Except we don't whittle

ours down with a machine. Because we cannot
change the economic system as it is right

now, we said, well let's try to take food
out of the economic system a little bit and

go back to self-sufficiency as a concept.
The woman who I'm working for she just decided

that she wanted to use her backyard to grow
vegetables. And so it turns out we can have

enough to serve probably twenty people out
of this backyard.

When I first got to Alemany it was basically
just five feet high in annual weeds. In those

first eight months to ten months, Alemany
Farm was kind of a gorilla garden because

we didn't have permission from the city,
who owned the land. I actually didn't know

very much about farming at all. It was mostly
due to my friend Justin, who was also involved.

He was basically teaching the rest of us,
who were all amateurs, how to do what we were

doing. We just started going there and just
tried to figure out, ok how are we going to

do this now?

So right now we're going to go over to the
dining hall where people can come get served

a meal. It's probably for some people it's
the only meal they are going to receive for

today. I was hungry one day and I said, free
dining hall!? And I said ok let me go over

there and look. So I ate that day and I said
well, how can I not just get served, but now

I can serve. And you're going to always
deal with unless you create the paradigm shifts,

the larger systems. Only thing that connects
everything -- you know food systems. Because

everybody eats.

I had sort of made a decision that I wasn't
going to have children. You kind of have these

abstract ideas about population and the question
is, "is it ethical to add another person

to the planet?" And also is it ethical to
offer this planet to this person that you

care about so much. But then I got pregnant
and am now just completely in love with my

baby. It gives you a different sense of urgency
about what you see going on around you. Everybody

out there is somebody's baby. And we all
need these things. We all need good food to

eat. We all need clean water to drink. We
all need clean air to breathe. These things

aren't optional. They're really not optional.

My greatest hope is that we'll actually
learn how to farm with nature. And now is

the moment when that struggle over the future
is being understood. Food production is the

most impactful human activity on the planet
earth probably. I mean in terms of landscape

impact there is nothing like agriculture.
Because we have a generation of farmers who

weren't taught those methodologies and that
frame of mind -- that we're going to work

with nature - they were taught to basically
battle with nature. But we understand more

now because humans are evolving. Our knowledge
is evolving. Our understanding of nature is

so much greater now than it was even thirty
years ago. I think it's the greatest challenge

that human's face now -- how to actually
produce food and not destroy the base upon

which civilization exists, which is the natural
world.

The Bay Area is my place. I grew up here.
So this is a place that is deeply written

into my cells and into my soul. My grandfather,
he had a corner store and an apartment on

top and he raised a family and made a living
and there is something very fundamental about

that I think appeals to me. The more supermarket
chains and the more concentration there is

in the food industry, the fewer opportunities
there are for people like my grandfather in

today's world to do what he did. I think
that the way our international, industrial

food system works is destroying local economies
not just in the flatlands of Oakland, but

all around the world. If we can't fix things
in Oakland and we if can't fix things in

the flatlands we have absolutely no business
trying to fix things anyplace else.

Honestly I said to a group folks the other
day, we have to start thinking like squirrels

about our food and the food system that we
have here in Oakland. Meaning that we should

have little micro-distribution points in our
neighborhoods where there is always fresh

food available. We should have like mad gardens
like this that are in their various stages

of development growing food and giving food
to people and to educate people about food.

As long as we are thinking about food and
it's part of our conversations in our communities,

I think that over time those sources will
be there. People will think more wisely about

how they treat the earth and how they interact
with people because all of that, it's all

connected.

A friend of mine calls my chickens "chicken
Prozac." She says they really soothe her

when she looks at them and sees them scratching
in the soil. And I think that seeing happy

animals and the thrill they get when I throw
them some snails that we find in the garden

-- it's enjoyable to see them have a pleasurable
life. Chickens have basically been bred to

be little egg bazookas that just shoot them
out. Poof. Poof. Poof. My great grandfather

was born on a pig farm in these hills. He
raised a lot of livestock on small plots like

this. My great grandfather fed the family
during the depression so they could survive

during that harsh economic time, which we
may be on the precipice of right now. I hope

not, but the world does seem kind of precarious.

Because depression is coming. We ain't fooled.
And when it comes, city's that have not

put infrastructure like that in are going
to see anarchy. You're going to have poor

people who can't afford food and if they
could afford it, the shelves are going to

be bare. This generation is not built for
a depression. So when that pressure hits,

people react in all sorts of crazy ways.

I think there is plenty over on that side.
Did you get the broccoli? Did you want to

weed the broccoli?

Sure!

You want this out, right?

Yeah the big radish. Here I'll show you
where the broccoli is. In about 2004 I was

really intrigued by this notion of peak oil
and the fact that our food system and most

of our systems are based on cheap fossil fuel
energy. And I was really concerned with how

I personally and my community were going to
respond to increasingly expensive foods. Clearly

a lot of it was on this macro-level that I
felt like I had no control over -- the federal

government, even our city governments -- things
that they could do. But really what I thought

is my experience is working grassroots with
people and having people change their existence

through direct action. And so what I felt
like was out of all of the issues -- transportation

and energy and all these things -- that food
was something that people could really do.

Alemany is an interesting place because to
one side is the neighborhood, The Excelsior,

and to the other side is Vernal Heights, both
of which have long been working class. And

then right at the bottom there is the low
income housing projects, situated of course

right next to the freeway.

It's just rough out here. It's real rough
out here. Sometimes people can't come in

and out of their doors. Sometimes just to
live out here, to get along with people -- sometimes

you have to blend in with the community. Even
though at times you don't want to. But you

can get trapped.

I was really focused on, ok I want to start
a food-growing project somewhere. And what

I realized was that the space next to my Mom's
house was abandoned and didn't have anyone

there and was a perfect location to do it.
We were trying to do organizing with the community

to figure what were their needs, what did
they want to see there. And for the most part

what we heard was jobs. It's not something
we as young, punk anarchists who were looking

to grow food had an ability to offer.

They want to work. And that's what would
help keep these kids in school, get good grades.

They want to work.

It took a little while until we started meeting
with people in the community and also got

in contact with people in the rec and park
department. Eventually we got funding to have

a youth program where kids from the community
were actually being trained in ecological

horticulture, learning those different systems
of irrigation, how to plant, landscaping,

and all that stuff and getting paid to do
so. We also do environmental education. And

so there are school groups. People come out
from all parts of the city even sometimes

people from outside the city who come out
and work a few hours doing whatever tasks

need to be done. And then at the end of the
day we harvest all the produce that's available

and distribute it to all the volunteers. We
also have a free CSA program. Twenty or so

families get a bag of produce twice week.

It's a farm in the city. We got a little
country in the city. You ain't even got

to go down the highway. All you got to do
is walk up here in the farm in San Francisco.

The garden projects that are going on in San
Francisco and all the major cities in the

nation that are creating food for neighborhoods
are vitally important in terms of transforming

the way people think about food, vitally important
in shaping consciousness.

The only country where urban agriculture is
massive is Cuba
where you have fifty thousand hectares of

urban agriculture. That's about one hundred
thousand acres of where they produce about

33% of the food that they eat in the major
cities. And this came about because of the

crisis of Cuba.

Cuba is a very interesting case because Cuba
allied itself with the Soviet Union and adopted

Soviet style agriculture, which is basically
industrial agriculture. It's very similar

to U.S. agriculture. You know the large state
farms, which were all mechanized, used tremendous

amounts of fertilizer and pesticides, were
all monocrops. The basic industrial model.

And that fell apart when the Soviet Union
fell. And Cuba had no more access to cheap

petroleum.

When you are confronted with a situation where
you don't have petroleum, no matter what

you produce in the rural areas, you cannot
bring it into the urban areas. That was one

of the big problems they were facing.

Just as that "special period," it was
called, was taking off and Cuba was on the

brink of starvation, they couldn't turn
to the west. They certainly couldn't turn

to the United States because there was an
embargo. And so they turned to their old farmers,

their peasant farmers. And they said, you've
got to feed us. Teach us again how to plow

with oxen. Teach us again how to fertilize
with manure. Teach us again how you manage

and cultivate the old seeds. And luckily Cuba
still had those farmers. The farmer-to-farmer

movement sent some farmers from Mexico and
from Nicaragua over to Cuba and they put on

some workshops. They had all kinds of demonstrations.
They taught about agricological approaches

to food production, sustainable agriculture,
organic methods. And it exploded in Cuba.

Across the country the farmer-to-farmer movement
grew to about one hundred and fifty thousand

in the space of five years. It took twenty
years to grow that much in Central America.

But in Cuba, right away.

Which produces today on average about 16-20
kilos per square meter per year. That is a

huge productivity that I haven't seen any
garden anywhere in the world that can have

that level of productivity only with organic
methods and ecological horticultural methods.

I think the Cuban example just tells us that
changes happen when you confront crisis -- a

deep crisis.

Oakland is divided by 580. We have the flatlands,
which is here. This is East Oakland all the

way to West Oakland. 95% of all homicides
occur in this area. Obesity, diabetes, chronic

illness, you name it.

I would love to be able to do something on
this parking lot to start off. And to get

the youth involved in the community so that
the city sees that this is a viable spot to

do something. So what's the agenda here?

Well the agenda is to bring some folks who
haven't seen the store before to see the

store. And then to talk about some ideas about
how this could be a fresh, healthy, affordable,

local food store.

I have a question. How long will the process
take to get this place running?

We need the support of the people.

They're putting pressure to demolish this
whole store. They haven't bought into the

idea of a community run store yet.

If the city wants to demolish this what's
going to happen to this place?

They'll fence it off and they wait for a
developer who come in and build some housing.

No I think it would be better to build a community
store here with organic produce.

You need this store here, but the only problem
we're going to have is that we have to work

out something with the food bank because the
food bank provides this neighborhood with

food four times a week. Free food. And most
of the people in this neighborhood are Latino

and they like organic food. I think they have
experience in the field, they know that all

those little pesticides don't do your food
any good.

Doesn't do your body any good either.

In Oakland we have what some people call "food
deserts" and other people call "food apartheid"

because you have huge areas -- neighborhoods,
complete neighborhoods -- which basically

can't get good food. They can't get fresh
vegetables. They can't get whole grains.

They can only get this cheap, processed, packaged
food, which is actually expensive. They've

got to travel miles and miles to find a supermarket
and oftentimes those supermarkets don't

have the best food either.

We need to bring in healthy foods so that
we can start having choices and fight the

health problems that have been going on. So
that that murder rate can go down.

I grew up in a neighborhood like that. I can
remember at the age of 5, my friend Crystal,

her father was a known drug dealer and his
brains got blown out when I was what, seven

years old, in the middle of the street at
nine o'clock at night. My brother, who sold

drugs with the neighborhood drug dealers down
the street and who eventually died from drug

overdose, he learned all of this stuff from
these guys and ultimately he died from that.

People who experience stuff like that, they
don't want to come back. I joined the Air

Force. It was when I went to Kuwait in 2000
that I was able to understand the connections

between the military industrial complex, what's
that's all about, and how it affects communities

of color all around the world. The reason
why I came back is because I learned about

all those connections. I wrote on the destruction
of 7th street in West Oakland. How BART, when

building the overpass -- where the train
goes from West Oakland to San Francisco, that

whole area -- how it destroyed those four
thousand black-owned businesses that were

on that street. People were doing well there.
People owned land. People were making money.

People were taking care of their families,
but when BART was built there it wiped out

business for lots of people. It wiped out
whole communities. If I'm going to do this

anywhere in the world I better start in my
own neighborhood. I better start where I grew

up and that makes the most sense.
How we doing everybody?

Alright.

Everybody here?

Yeah.

Is everyone here right now?

Yeah! We're here!

Alright. My name is Jason Harvey. I am a long-time
resident of Oakland. I grew up at 9303 E street

down in alphabet city. Folks know where that
is?

Yeah. Sure do.

Tonight is just a big overview of what the
Hope Collaborative is about, what we hope

to achieve, some things like that. So we just
want to give you a lot of information at once.

We found that people travel 20-40 minutes
one-way to get to a supermarket. And most

people do shop in supermarkets. People outside
of the neighborhoods do not know this. They

think you do not cook. They think you do not
eat healthy food or care. How many people

don't care about what they eat? Thank you.
How many people here cook meals at home? Thank

you. How many people want fresh, healthy affordable
food? How many people here like what you find

here in the corner stores? Thank you. The
point is, corner stores as you already know

don't have much fresh food.

No they don't.

And what they sell is expensive.

Yeah it is! Embarrassing!

What happens when the husband has to go to
work and there is only one car? Where does

the mother go to get milk?

The corner store.

Right. So we want to make sure that that corner
store has healthy, affordable food. So what

can we do? What solutions can we find? And
that's what we're all searching for.

The amount of land that is available in Oakland
-- where you have the most food insecure

people, where you have the highest concentration
of liquor stores, where they don't have

access to any fresh food, not even Safeway
-- there's 200 hectares, that's about

400 acres of available land. Well that land
should be given to the people so that they

can produce food.

It really did come out of just living in this
community, seeing the conditions. There are

no grocery stores here and there is a wealth
of corner liquor stores. I saw that and I

also saw that there is all this vacant land,
there are all these empty lots that are just

sitting here. So as a person with a background
in gardening, those empty lots to me looked

like, "wow, gardens!"

You want a strawberry? You want to go help
her set up the eggs?

It was responding to what seemed like people
wanted.

Oh what are these? Greens? Oh, turnips. Yeah.

We started growing food here and then it wasn't
enough. And so then we said ok let's see

if we can borrow some more empty lots. And
that wasn't enough. And it always flowed.

It was never difficult. People would always
ask us how did you do outreach to the community.

And we never did outreach. It was word of
mouth.

Mmm. Seeds for arugula.

That's the best part of growing a garden
is collecting the seeds.

We are really about how can we really significantly
grow produce in the city? How can we do that

while involving our community?

In 2007 I quit my job, went to UC Santa Cruz
Farm and Gardening Program and I got a certificate.

I learned how to farm organically and grow
food organically. And I wanted to take that

knowledge and that skill and pass it on to
the students here at the alternative high.

People at Berkeley High have determined that
they can't fit in somehow at Berkeley High

and they send them here. That says to me they
need more. If they're not making it in mainstream

-- in the Berkeley High -- and you separate
them out, well you give them more services.

It's just the opposite. They give them less.
And five years ago they didn't even have

any food. They didn't even have any lunch.
We're going to do bean soup today. Now remember

last week I was talking about how vegetables
can be used for breakfast. There's nothing

wrong with vegetables for breakfast. There's
nothing wrong with soup for breakfast either.

When you eat Lucky Charms and they got a pink
charm in it, where do you think that color

comes from?

Artificial flavors? I mean colors.

Open up your mind. Try things. Don't just
say, oh I've never done it before and I

feel funny doing it. You always feel funny
doing something the first time.

Alright, I'm here.

Yay! Joy! Hi Joy! Joy!

In 1978 I was a single mom and my daughter
was having health problems. And she developed

petite mild seizures. She wasn't sleeping
properly. She had behavior problems. She wasn't

doing well in kindergarten.
All of the products on your tables have lists

of what's in it. I want you, as a group,
at your table, to come up with how many grams

of sugar are in the products at your table.
I took her to the doctor and they said, we

don't know what's wrong with your daughter,
but we're going to give her Ritalin to control

the seizures. And I was like, no. I mean if
you don't know what's wrong with her how

do you know what you're giving her.
120 grams of sugar in this can.

No, 126.

Excuse me. 126. Let me make sure we get it
right.

We realized that she was getting severe allergic
reactions to processed foods. Particularly

petrochemicals, artificial color, artificial
flavor, and preservatives that have petroleum

as their base. So we changed the way we ate.
From that day to this. My whole family actually.

And it took about two weeks -- a little more
than 2 weeks -- and all of her symptoms all

went away. And I realized there was a difference
in me. You know I was different. Learning

how to read labels was my first food awareness
exercise in my life. So this heightened my

awareness about food -- the importance of
food. And to think that something you put

in your mouth can affect your behavior. It
was a very revolutionary idea.

So this is an all fruit smoothie. It doesn't
have any yogurt or anything. How many of you

have ever been to Jamba Juice?

Oh yeah! All the time! Jamba Juice is my favorite!

You like Jamba Juice?

Yeah I love it!

Well I think this is better than Jamba Juice.
That's just my opinion.

Well then give me a double.

No, I ain't given you no double. So this
is what I'm loving about the smoothies.

It's a premium. You guys all come in and
try to scam smoothies out of me.

I got a witness.

He worked, but he didn't work double. I
made an announcement. Didn't I? Didn't

I make an announcement? Whoever weeds with
me gets double smoothie. I made an announcement.

This is what I do, I say oh my goodness! You
guys like the smoothies? Smoothies are great!

We'll have strawberries in the smoothies
this summer before you get out of here. We'll

have some strawberries. But we won't have
some strawberries if you don't get out here

and weed this garden right now. And so it's
always back to the strawberries or something

that they can relate to and value right at
this moment and understand. And I'm trying

to connect the importance of farming and gardening
to their stomachs directly, to the table,

to their experience, and then of course to
their behavior.

So what are some of the vitamins that are
in the fruit that we are eating? What are

the fruits? Anybody remember I put in?

I saw you putting the oranges in.

Yep. Vitamin C. Absolutely. Now what is vitamin
C good for?

Your immune system.

Immune system. Absolutely. Who else? You can
get up in the morning, make a blender-ful,

drink some of it, put some in a container
or a thermos and bring it to school.

I'd make a 40oz! Messing with me.

40oz, ok. That's a lot

Food for me, it should be a subject at school.
Period. Not somebody who's going to be pre-med

student or a nutritionist. No. Everybody learns
about nutrition just as part of their daily

day. And that does happen when you have a
garden. The good gardener is also talking

about the importance of nutrition. How do
you harvest this food? How do you prepare

this food? What does it do for your body?
What's the essential vitamin in it? If people

get to know that and appreciate that, that
sort of sets the appetite for lunch.

Oh my god! It's good!

What's it taste like? Oh my god, I was like...I
can't eat that stuff in the morning.

It's really good. Just try it.

It's delicious isn't it?

You didn't even try it.

No.

Man, I should have told y'all people anybody
who don't eat my soup don't get smoothies

next time.

You know I always try everything you bring.
Every time.

As long as you try it. I didn't say eat
it. I said as long as you try it.

Alright you want me to try it? Will it make
you happy if I try it?

Yeah.

Ok then I'll try it.

Too late.

Alright y'all let's go do smoothies.

Sweet. My favorite part of the day.

If they have that skill and that knowledge
then it would be passed on to the next generation

this would be a healthy family that's producing
healthy kids. Now we've got a healthy community.

Oh my god we've got a healthy nation.

When I was 7 years old I had a garden on the
side of my house. When I was 10 years old

I worked with elders who lived in our neighborhood,
who were really into gardening and would grow

10lbs cabbage heads and all these different
fruits and vegetables. I started to think

about that; I did that as a kid. In high school,
at Castlemont, I worked with setting up a

school garden there. I said wow, I've been
doing this for my whole life, but I'm just

now starting to connect the pieces in my adulthood.
I see canneries here in Oakland. I see all

this fruit that's dropping on the ground.
I see youth out there gathering it up. I see

them working with adults and canning and preserving
that food. I see that food being distributed.

I see this whole food system being connected
here in Oakland. And I see the people leading

that charge.

Imagine if you will, if you owned the store
within a five-block radius of your house.

Every time you go to that store you receive
a profitary check. Imagine that for a second.

Right now we're going to other people's
stores, buying stuff and that money goes out.

Now through the collective power of a community
that money stays in and recycles because you're

receiving a profitary check every month or
every quarter or every year. Imagine that

for a second. Now you got people who have
hope.

Local ownership, that's the key. Local ownership,
where the neighbors own the store. All the

profits of the store goes out to the residents,
which then recaptures the wealth. You're

looking at 150,000 potential people who can
be brought online. People who have never even

heard of the stock market would now be stockowners.
When people have ownership, they have a future

they can give to their children, that makes
them get involved and want to participate.

And communities can come together around that.
And it's not just the stores, but the whole

delivery system -- from the farming networks
to the processing and distribution centers.

That creates a whole new economy.

Misa, financial report.

So in spite of our all difficulties last week
we did really, really well. We had 360 orders

for $25,023.72. So our adjusted gross is $22,968.47.

The whole idea of the community-supported
kitchen was to create a model that would be

replicable throughout the country. Anybody
can come down and see how things were made.

We're not about hiding recipes. We're
about sharing information. That kind of accessibility

into a kitchen is very unusual. That not only
can you see, but you can actually come in

and do it. Here's an apron. Here's a knife.
Let's chop some broccoli. We're a worker

owned cooperative. So there's 5 worker-owners
and we all have an equal share in the business.

We ended up financing the kitchen through
loans from members of the community, rather

than -- we never had a bank loan and we didn't
go to a bank. We are very committed to supporting

local farms and providing the kind of nutrient-dense
food for families that they can't get anywhere

else based on traditional diets. One of the
things that we do a lot of in the kitchen

is we make bone broths. Bone broths are throughout
the world known to be incredibly nourishing.

They're incredibly rich in minerals that
you're body really needs -- calcium particularly.

The term is nutrient dense and they are. Every
calorie is packed with nutrients. That's

the idea of nutrient-density. So if you eat
a lot of broth, you need less meat. Your body

needs less protein. And so this is a way that
traditional cultures throughout the world

nourish themselves economically and ecologically.
The idea was not the boneless, skinless chicken

breast or the meat patty. You use the whole
animal -- you use the organ meats, you use

the fat, you use the bones -- you make broth.
Making food this way -- processing food this

way -- is really a lost art in our society.
But at Three Stone Hearth we're trying to

rediscover those arts.

Butchering an animal for me always is a very
mixed emotional time. I feel a lot of sadness

and then I feel also a certain amount of respect
for that animal and a responsibility. But

also I feel a certain connectedness to that
animal. It's always tense and difficult.

And I usually try to get the animal to be
calm and relaxed. I use a pellet gun and get

a pellet into the brain so that it's brain
is scrambled immediately and so it's an

instantaneous changing. I meet a lot of meat
eaters who are freaked out that I have such

a connected relationship to the animals that
I eat. They say, oh I could never do that.

And I think that's a representation of our
alienation in our society that people don't

really know where their meat is coming from.
And as I talked about injustices in the world

and people looking the other way, I think
people also do that with meat. They want to

eat meat, but they don't want to know where
it came from and I think that's wrong. So

I feel like as a meat eater it's my place
to try and educate people where does meat

come from. And yes this bunny is meat and
those boy baby goats back there are meat and

that's where it comes from. And people should
face that or consider being a vegetarian.

Nature is cruel and kind. It's beautiful
and ugly all at the same time and we need

it to survive.

I definitely think of myself as a city person
primarily. After this experience living rurally,

it's kind of been more defined for me. It
taught me a lot about my own work ethic -- my

own interest in farming. And I realized that
what I liked more than anything else was the

knowledge of it -- was understanding it,
was practicing it to know more, to get feedback

from the actual experience, but not to spend
my entire life doing it. My personal goal

and desire is to be a catalyst to help start
projects and organizations and businesses

that will train new farmers in the city environment.
...spot where we want to do heavy agricultural

production -- that's usually more when
you get into floatation. You know we just

want to make sure we're not growing the
same thing over and over. And in a small scale

like this...

My thoughts right now are really around how
do we scale up the work? We reach hundreds

of people and for those individuals what we're
doing is extremely significant. But we need

to really look at thousands of people -- there
are 30,000 people in West Oakland -- we really

need to reach them. If I had a million, two
million, three million dollars right now,

I would bring our backyard garden program
to the whole city of Oakland. These projects

are springing up everywhere.

I took about 2 months with a friend of mine
where we traveled around the state interviewing

people -- farmers, activists, non-profit
workers, people who lived in farmworker communities

-- all these different people who had something
to do with what I was considering the sustainable

food system.
If we roll down these roads - these country

roads - we see these other dairies and it
looks just like a poop stew or something.

It is. It's a monoculture of manure.

And my goal was to really get a sense of who
was the system? What was it? And what were

the main challenges to actually making a sustainable
food system more mainstream?

So the water pollution, the extinction of
the species, the extinction of the salmon,

the air pollution quality, the cancer rates,
are all yields of your design. You're just

not booking them on your balance sheet. And
so how do we look to becoming eco-literate

and go into the university of deep wisdom,
which are native ecosystems and emulate that

with our agricultural endeavors.

Just feeling like I really am part of a movement
-- there are people all over who are doing

very similar things. And we have a lot of
very similar values. Sometimes there are different

approaches.
So I'm always interested in how you get

people to see themselves as more than consumers;
to see themselves as political actors in every

aspect of every day of their lives. I feel
like people in this country act like the only

thing you can do to be political is vote for
a new president every four years. And that's

why having a garden - or participating even
better in a community garden where you're

working with other people - that's directly
engaging in that struggle. You're directly

growing food. Making this positive change.
As well as challenging the things you don't

like. The only way that change has ever really
happened has been when people create these

grassroots, alternative movements combined
with actually putting political pressure on

the system as it is.

We're right now in the midst of writing
a memo for the USDA and we'd love to bounce

that off you because what I'd love is to
have us echoing each other so that the USDA

is getting the same kind of data you're
giving to the White House.

I would say that 10% of my job is trying to
figure out how rich changes to an organization

could work. 30% of my job is networking, meetings,
making new connections. 60% of my job is writing.

If we're going to be a movement, we have
to think about the language. The language

becomes a way of seeing the journey to a new
place.

We're working to combine the NGO, the Dept.
of Ag. In California, the Dept. of Health

and the Dept. of Education to bring to bear
about ten million dollars of money from -hopefully

the CDC -- in order to really leverage and
get more good food to low income families,

to the farmer's markets because we're
doing this double voucher program. When you

change your paradigm you have to re-conceptualize
it. You have to think differently to create

the world differently. The other big piece
is to bounce the thinking off people. And

that happens in the meetings.
So what I have here is basically is our port

that grew out of the policy that was created
for San Francisco, which is a regional food

policy in which the city is going to commit
to buy regionally with it's buying power.

It's going to develop up to 40 urban farms
in the city.

Talking about an idea. The struggle over what
do we really mean by the reintegration of

human beings into the natural world as manifest
to the food system. But that has to be bounced

off other people. If it just stays up in one
person's head or a bunch of people in their

own silos, then it doesn't mean anything.
You have to bounce the ideas and create synthesis

in the way people think.

Connect at a local level. And I think that
we probably have a sympathetic audience over

there. So I'll give it a good pitch.

That would be great.
And then they get to have the conversation

at USDA and then their going to have it with
the Congress. Eventually all that thinking,

which begins in all those different rooms
on peoples' computers, ends up being written

into law over time. That's the system of
how society changes, I think. That's how

I conceptualize it anyway.

There are possibilities in this city. Oakland
has high unemployment in a lot of these neighborhoods.

And as I said, there is tremendous spending
power there, that if captured could be put

into jobs -- local jobs in the community.
And one of the key challenges that we've

experienced in terms of barriers is this issue
of scaling. How to actually scale the models

that we see beginning to work at the ground
level? That are starting to take root. That

are starting to integrate into a more comprehensive
solution. When we looked at our performance

as one single, small organization, we found
that over almost seven years of work, time,

effort, blood, sweat, tears, budget and staff,
we had met less than 1% of demand in the community.

Less than 1% of total demand in the community.
And that was for me a very significant wake

up call to the imperative of scale. That there
are grassroots innovative models that need

to get traction - that need to get bigger.
But we've hit the ceilings as practitioners

at the grassroots level. We've hit the ceilings
again and again and seen oh, policy is major.

You know we're doing all this work for sustainable
agriculture. And it works. And yet, these

are still small islands of sustainability.
Even if you're more resistant, more resilient,

more sustainable, spread the wealth better,
feed more people, employ more people, it won't

make a difference if the food system is not
democratized. It's not enough just to be

a good farmer. In fact you also need to be
an advocate and an activist. And you need

to create the political will in order to make
the changes that you need.

It's a political change. It's social and
political. And the only people that are going

to change that are social movements -- massive
social movements.

We're open to a dialogue to deal with this
and get them to approve it. And support us.

Please support us because this is for you
as well.

In other words, you need to have control over
the food system so that the people who are

doing the things that work can actually have
a chance. And the other people who say, hey

that's great, let's do that, actually
have a voice.

We are the 99! We are the 99!

That's where it comes a new concept, called
the "Food Summit" concept, which is developed

by the Via Campesina in the developing world.
It's basically a concept on not only food

security, not only access to food, but also
to provide all the resources that people need

in order to have food. That is land. That
is the seeds of the crops that are not patented

-- the local seeds that have been preserved.
The water. The education and the human capital.

Everything that is needed -- all those components
have to be present.

This isn't something one legislates even
though it entails legislation and policy and

what not. It's something that is socially
learned. And that means sharing our knowledge,

sharing our experiences. As people move towards
food sovereignty, they not only have to share

amongst themselves, they have to share with
others. How did they do this? How did you

do that?

By educating people, by engaging in discussion,
by promoting more awareness of what's going

on in other parts of the world maybe people
can see that if in other countries it's

possible, it is also possible here. This is
concretely happening in other countries. And

I think it's time now for the North-South
exchanges. Not just the North always teaching

the South, but the South has a lot to teach
us today in terms of alternatives to the system.

Farming is the kind of work that people are
really, really hungry for. Anyone can do this.

Anyone can find a place that is misused or
unused and get a group of people together

and go and start using it to grow food and
empower your community to connect to each

other and be themselves.

The struggle to preserve this land, I think,
needs to continue. Focusing on closing the

gap between production and consumption is
perhaps the most revolutionary act that can

happen today because then it will also have
implications in terms of energy use, in terms

of greenhouse emissions, in terms of resilience
to climate change, and in terms of food justice.

I like to refer to the "Occupy Moment,"
not the "Occupy Movement" because I think

that we've all been working towards different
projects. The food justice projects that have

been happening before Occupy, they're going
to keep going. And now they are just inspired

and influenced by the tactics and the models
and the rhetoric of the Occupy Movement. Now

we're at this Occupy Moment where we're
able to take that opening, where people are

actually having to have to discuss these issues
and confront them. Even people in power who

don't want to discuss these issues are having
to deal with them. We have an opportunity

to actually bring this up and to combine the
Occupy Moment -- the Occupy Movement -- with

all our values as the food movement. And that's
what I think is happening here.

Things are happening. It's like seeds being
planted. The mass population doesn't know

there is this bubbling coming up. And the
longer this goes on, the more people will

join and see the common cause that we all
have.

We're not going to be able to just wait
for the senators to realize that food justice

is important or for the president to decide
that Monsantos' dollars for his campaign

are not as worth it as his constituents'
voice. We can't wait for these things to

happen because they never will happen. We
know where power really lies. Power lies in

people. And we intend to start slowly, but
certainly taking back the power we know we

have from those who have been deciding arbitrarily
that they are the ones who know what's best

for us. We're doing it with diverse communities
- trying to do it openly and transparently.

And hopefully create some of the structures
that we want to see exist in our future, democratic,

ecological, economically just society. But
also have a good time while we're doing

it. Grow some food for some people. Be out
in the sun working together. I think there

are so many ways in which this kind of action
defines both the opposition to the things

that are wrong and the creation of what's
right.

This is lateral and it's growing outward
and there's more and more people involved

every time. Everybody having a say, everybody
being involved. And so this is just a small

microcosm of what I hope can grow into a bigger
political system in this country. Am I too

lofty? Yeah. Too idealistic? So what. I love
it. I love the way it feels here.

So we're talking about social movements
that are not necessarily revolutionary, arm

struggle movements, but are movements that
can make changes because of the pressure that

they are putting on their local politicians.
And also they are putting their own politicians

in power -- like the MST in Brazil. The MST
in Brazil is a movement of landless people

-- 10 million people -- that already took
over more than 10 million hectares of land

-- that's the size of Italy. Regardless
of what the government says. And the government

has to negotiate with them and explicate the
land in order to give it to them.

We're not alone. We're not the minority.
We're not the fringe. We're the cutting

edge. And there are cutting edges all over
the globe.

I need to constantly remind myself that the
world has always been crazy. That people have

always lived in crazy times because you look
around and it seems nuts. I went from the

peak oil, I am going to escape to the country,
I just need to learn how to grow food first,

to the only place we're going to solve these
issues is the city.

I feel like I'm part of a large group of
people who are trying to steer a boat through

an incredible storm. And there are a lot of
people in mainstream agriculture and organic

agriculture and industrial food systems. Even
in those places I come across lots of people

who see the same problems and want to deal
with it. And so I have lots of hope when I

see that. So, it's good.

We have to find lots of ways to rediscover
that food can connect us to the earth, to

animals, to plants, to our families, to our
friends, to the farmers, to all the hands

that bring that food to us. It's just assumed
in so many societies that you won't eat

without acknowledging that whole web of connection
that every plate of food has.

We've changed it all. And I think that the
basic tenet of life is to wake up in the morning,

work really hard growing food. Share the work
and the experience with your community and

your family. Come home, prepare a harvested
meal -- a great, well-cooked meal -- and

have fun and laughter. That's the day. That's
the life. That's what it was about. And

we've added too many things to it. And that's
why a lot of us are ill. We don't take care

and eat the food that we're supposed to
eat. That's a huge mushroom boy.

There's an old saying, if you keep doing
what you're doing, you're going to get

what you got. And that's what society is
going to happen to society. We're going

to keep having this crazy cycle of violence,
crazy cycles of disparity, inequity, injustice.

But when you try to do the right thing -- when
you forsake your interests for the betterment

of your fellow man, that's a proper cause.
That's how you fight the bad with the good.

You fight evil with love. So that's what
we're trying to do. I'm going to catch

this ride ok.

Ok thank you Leon.

Ok c'mon. Stand. Stand. It's amazing the
amount of denial around the problems on this

planet. Or our potential to screw this planet
up. I hope the world doesn't go all Mad

Max on us. It could happen.
Ok, let's go. C'mon. Hup, hup. C'mon

let's go. C'mon. Let's go.

What? What is that?

Goats.

Goats, huh?

Yep.
I hope that sustainable living could be one

of the things that could allow people to disengage
from the destruction around them and engage

in building something and communities here
in the city. I hope that we're like a seed

of possibility that might sprout.

This is the tip of the iceberg right here
- all of the vegetables and things like that.

But the massive underside of it is thousands
of worms and decaying matter. And all sorts

of interesting microbiological activity happening
down here that just blows my mind the more

I learn about it.
You just take these little bulbs and you just

stick'em all around and hide them in the
garden. Make sure you get them right under

the soil. You put them down like maybe an
inch in the ground.

This thing already got one Mr. Harvey.

Oh it's cool. You can just make sure that
goes to the bottom because that's where

the roots go out. I put garlic in my sicket.
I put garlic in my eggs too.

Oh yeah, that's hecka good.

Some old gentleman who lived around the school
came over and we were talking about the garden.

We were excited about it. And he said, oh
baby we did this before. We had a garden here.

Y'all just don't know we had a garden
here. We had a victory garden here. Gardening

is a tradition here at Malcolm X. I'm so
glad to see you back. And I was like this

is the history. We thought we were doing something
new and should have known that the history

of the school's been there a hundred years
- somebody had a garden there. This is not

nothing new we're doing here, but it is
a renewal in a way if you think about it.

Because what have we done in our society.
We have added iPods and technology and communication

and cars and telephones and texting and sexting
and all these things. But we've forgotten

why we're here. What's the most important
thing? You can't text, iPod, sext, or anything

without good health. This is hard work, but
it's fun too. It can be. So I'm doing

the Zen meditation -- this is what I call
it. So I'm telling them in the classroom,

you guys want to go out and do some Zen meditation?
And their like yeah, yeah what's that!?

And I'm like, it's gardening. It's weeding.

I think it's a real opportunity to truly
understand and feel -- you know physically,

emotionally feel -- the fact that we're
not separate. That we have to come together

in communities in order to deal with the messes
that we've created.

Good afternoon!

Buenas tardes!

Buenas tardes! Como estan?

Bien!

How are you doing?

Is everybody having a good time?

Bienvenidos! Come estan pasando?

This is a very special event. We are blessed
today to have Ollin Yolitzli, which is an

Aztec dance troupe. It is a way to bless the
community and this garden project and this

area. The dance is going to be a blessing
dance. Whoo! Listen to that. That's the

wind. That's the spirit.

Es el viento. Y los spiritu.

I thought, so why don't we start a culinary
class -- get people job skills they needed.

So we started the culinary program. And I
was in that coach class to see how it went.

And now they're about to go out and do their
thing. It's what you can be and what you

can do in this moment.