What is Food Sovereignty?

Localization has become the mantra of many people who are concerned about issues like peak oil and climate change. It's a matter of self-reliance. How can we develop communities that can better serve our needs: our need to clothe ourselves, our need to move around, our need to eat, our need to have health care. The list goes on and on. The need for food sovereignty is often bandied about.

What is food sovereignty? Like the sovereignty of a nation, the idea of food sovereignty is the idea that we must do more within our own national boundaries to feed ourselves. In my world, these boundaries could also extend across nations but between communities. In Canada, we have many ties with our United States neighbors, and the ecosystem that I live in spreads across our national boundaries into Washington as well. To me, that's local too. Why support food sovereignty? Well, we're starting to rethink the distances that we ship food, the ethics and production of the food that we ship. It's not just an ethical conundrum either. As oil prices rise, we may be pushed into local eating through economic necessity, and it would be useful to have the capacity to respond.

What enables a community to become more self-reliant and to develop sustainable sources of local food? First of all, community members need to develop an understanding of the land, which means developing an understanding of the general climate and the very specific neighborhood and backyard-level issues that accompany growing food. Is the area rainy much of the year? When is the first and last frost? What crops grow well in a semi-shade backyard?

We need to work together in our communities to build local places that support food security. Does the local government allow chickens? Are community gardens supported? Do fruit trees grow on public land? Are farmers supported instead of told to sell their land to growing suburban sprawl? Local bylaws can be a driving force for change, but they can also be limiting for potential urban farmers. Reshaping a community to support local food can be a daunting task, but it's vital to becoming a community that eats well and eats locally, even in lean economic times and in a changing world of transportation and climate.

There is more to food sovereignty than an understanding of plants and climate, though. In my mind, the largest impediment to relocalization is our fear of the local, long-developed by living in urban and suburban areas where our neighbors are strangers. To find mentors who can help us create and sustain urban food plots, we need to get to know our neighbors. We need to share our skills with them, and they with us.