Information, discussion & community! Monday Night Forum!!
Occupy Forum is an opportunity for open and respectful dialogue
on all sides of these critically important issues!
Occupy Forum presents
Two films on the politics of food
Ripe for Change — a film by Emiko Omori &
Jed Riffe and Occupy the Farm (Trailer)
by Todd Darling
Ripe for Change: California — always a fascinating marriage of opposite extremes — is at a crossroads in agriculture. Many Californians are struggling to fend off over-development and the loss of farming lands and traditions while embracing innovative visions of agricultural sustainability. At the same time, California is where fast food was born and a center of the biotechnology industry and large corporate agribusiness. The debates raging in California over issues of food, agriculture, and sustainability have profound implications for all of America, especially in a world where scarcity is the norm and many natural resources are diminishing.
Ripe for Change explores the intersection of food and politics in California over the last 30 years. It illuminates the complex forces struggling for control of the future of California’s agriculture, and provides provocative commentary by a wide array of farmers, chefs, and noted authors and scientists. The film examines a host of questions: What are the trade-offs between the ability to produce large quantities of food versus the health of workers, consumers, and the planet? What are the hidden costs of “inexpensive” food? How do we create sustainable agricultural practices?
Through the window of food and agriculture, Ripe for Change reveals two parallel yet contrasting views of our world. One holds that large-scale agriculture, genetic engineering, and technology promise a hunger-less future. The other calls for a more organic, sustainable, and locally focused style of farming that reclaims the aesthetic and nurturing qualities of food and considers the impact of agriculture on the environment, on communities, and on workers.
Occupy the Farm will premier November 7th at the UA Berkeley (see link below — OccupyForum will preview the trailer!) On April 22, 2012, hundreds of urban farmers (and many Occupy peeps) marched onto the land in East Bay’s Gill Tract in Albany�an agricultural research center for the University and the last large piece of farmland in the East Bay, which had been marked for development by UC Berkeley. They brought 15,000 seedlings, farming equipment, camping gear and a powerful conviction about the human right to grow their own food and to connect with the land. Students, community members and even UC Berkeley professors and researchers joined forces to “take back the tract” and protect the land for important food research and as a valued public resource for access to land and agriculture.
On that same day, film director Todd Darling received a text about the protesters who were occupying the Gill Tract, and he grabbed his camera and followed their story for five months. Out of this was born Occupy The Farm, a documentary film about the plight and triumph of hundreds of urban farmers during their campaign to protect the tract from development. This film focuses on the human need for access to local agriculture, and shows the possibility that local communities can change the direction of powerful institutions and have a lasting impact on generations to come.
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http://www.snagfilms.com/films/title/ripe_for_change
http://ediblesiliconvalley.com/2014-articles/occupy-the-farm/