CEO Corner: It’s Time to Rethink our Food System
Andy Naja-Riese, AIM CEO, March 14, 2022
The state legislative season is getting active, and AIM has joined up with 14 other organizations working in agriculture, environmental justice, and environmental groups as part of the Food & Farm Resilience Coalition. We previously came together to support AB 125, authored by Asm. Robert Rivas. AB 125 was a bond measure to lift up investments in farmworker safety and wellbeing, healthy food access, climate-resilient farms, and regional food economies. With the state’s significant budget surplus, we pivoted to invest in these key areas now through the state’s budget process. With leadership from Assembly member Robert Rivas (D-Salinas), AIM is co-requesting $551 million in state funding during fiscal year (FY) 2022-2024 to support the economic viability and climate resilience of our food and farming system. Our goal is to secure funds for equitable solutions to the climate crisis that bring jobs to our communities, protect our essential frontline workers, and create a secure and resilient food supply. This includes funding for farmland conservation, healthy soils management, farmworker housing, and much more. Our proposed suite of investments will focus funding in disadvantaged communities, socially disadvantaged farmers and ranchers, Tribes, small and medium-sized farms, and small businesses.
Why now?
The pandemic and ongoing extreme weather events, drought, wildfires, have revealed long-standing weaknesses in our food and farming systems, highlighting everything from a lack of worker safety to inefficient food processing and distribution that have contributed to skyrocketing rates of hunger among Californians.
The pandemic and ongoing extreme weather events, drought, wildfires, have revealed long-standing weaknesses in our food and farming systems, highlighting everything from a lack of worker safety to inefficient food processing and distribution that have contributed to skyrocketing rates of hunger among Californians.
As a coalition, we are seeking key investments in food & farm resilience to build the infrastructure needed to provide Californians a safe, reliable, and environmentally sustainable food supply.
Healthy Food Access Infrastructure
Our request includes $50 million in state funding for a new statewide program that AIM has proposed called the “Climate-Friendly Healthy Food Access Infrastructure” grant. We are seeking approval of this program with Roots of Change, NRDC, and the Praxis Project to create new statewide competitive grants for communities, non-profits, tribal governments, and agricultural cooperatives to build infrastructure that would shorten the distance between farm to table at retail outlets, including certified farmers markets, CSAs, food hubs, produce prescription programs, mobile markets, community food gardens, and much more. Our perspective is that communities should have control over how and where their food is produced, be able to access culturally relevant and climate-friendly foods, rather than relying on mass commodities in the industrialized food system that harm our bodies and planet.
This week and next, we’ll be meeting with state legislators to earn their support for this budget request.
We are also supporting two key bills:
AB 2499 (Maienschein): Organic Transition.
AB 2499 provides underserved farmers additional tools to steward natural resources and stay in business by creating an Organic Transition Program. For more on challenges of transitioning to organic - Organic Transition Advocacy | CCOF
AB 2538 (R. Rivas) Emergency Notification for Farmworkers. It will fund a cell phone-based smoke notification system for farmworkers and residents.