Is slow food a marketing tool that could make change in the social economy? Could slow food build a market for local food from the middle and upper class work that extends to transforming school lunches?

1. Slow Food and the Social
Economy & Environment
Class Agenda
1. Presentations & video
2. Social Economy - Slow Food
has been considered an
example of one of the largest
Social Economy experiments
globally – what do you think?
• Exercise: CED & scale,
sustainable livelihoods , etc
3. The apple & environment
4. Agriculture and Farm Plans

2. The story is now iconic….
To protest fast food --
the celebration of slow food…..
Italian Journalist Carlo
Petrini was so incensed
in 1986 when a McDonald's
outlet opened next to the
Spanish Steps in Rome,
an "epicurean revolt” was
launched.

3. The problem: Fast Food
• Corporate food
• Capitalist Food
• Processed Food
• Cheap Labour Food
• Kid Food
• Salty, sweet Food
• Chemical Food
• Unhealthy food
“Fast Food Nation has lifted the
polystyrene lid on the global fast food
industry … it could even change the way
we eat” Observer.

4. The Solution: Slow Food Manifesto
The Slow Food international movement officially began when delegates from 15 countries endorsed this
manifesto, written by founding member Folco Portinari, on November 9, 1989.
Our century, which began and has developed under the insignia of industrial civilization,
first invented the machine and then took it as its life model.We are enslaved by speed and
have all succumbed to the same insidious virus: Fast Life, which disrupts our habits,
pervades the privacy of our homes and forces us to eat Fast Foods.
To be worthy of the name, Homo Sapiens should rid himself of speed before it reduces him
to a species in danger of extinction.
A firm defense of quiet material pleasure is the only way to oppose the universal folly of
Fast Life.
May suitable doses of guaranteed sensual pleasure and slow, long-lasting enjoyment
preserve us from the contagion of the multitude who mistake frenzy for efficiency.
Our defense should begin at the table with Slow Food.
Let us rediscover the flavors and savors of regional cooking and banish the degrading
effects of Fast Food.
In the name of productivity, Fast Life has changed our way of being and threatens our
environment and our landscapes. So Slow Food is now the only truly progressive answer.
That is what real culture is all about: developing taste rather than demeaning it. And what
better way to set about this than an international exchange of experiences, knowledge,
projects?
Slow Food guarantees a better future.
Slow Food is an idea that needs plenty of qualified supporters who can help turn this
(slow) motion into an international movement, with the little snail as its symbol.

6. Slow Food Movement
“A tantalizing mix of politics,
environmentalism and the
pursuit of pleasure.” -CBC

7. Slow Food Principles
• the product tastes good;
• the product is produced in a clean way that
is sustainable and does not harm the
environment, animal welfare or human
health;
• producers receive fair compensation, no
discrimination of any kind is practiced in
the community and there is no exploitation
of minors.

8. Slow Food Canada—
http://www.slowfood.ca/slow-canada/ 18
Convivium in Canada

9. Carlo Petrini:
in the Independent 10 December 2006
• "These chefs should get out of their golden
cages, let loose their media chains," he says.
"They have to become more a part of society.
They should cook for a village, teach children,
feed old people in [care] homes, prepare food in
hospitals. The cook is a social being. ….
• The network of small local economies is stronger than
the multinationals because it has its feet in the soil," he
says. "The global market economy is destroying the
Earth. We give more strength to local economies and we
have better sustainability, better human relations and no
need to fly food halfway around the world."

10. What would happen if
Chefs participated in
schools and transferred
knowledge to kids.
If private sector chef
became social economy
cooks?

11. Vanadana Shiva--
the Manifesto on the future of Seeds
• “Every year in my country 120,000
farmers, indebted to Monsanto and
other agricultural holdings, commit
suicide. No one cares, because profit
has become more important than
human life. Agriculture lacks free
distribution of seeds.
• There is fear of small, decentralized
producers, who are being destroyed
by absurd regulations.
• Terra Madre is a tool for escaping
from these food prisons, through
valuing biodiversity and respecting all
countries; and here begins the
agricultural revolution, without
hybrids, that will respect nature and
labor.”

12. Slow Fish -- a movement to save
the fisheries
http://
www.slowfood.com/
slowfish/
Avoid endangered species such as bluefin tuna, Atlantic
salmon, tropical shrimps, swordfish, etc.
Choose a local fish, i.e. caught in seas or rivers near to you.
Ensure the fish are of the minimum size necessary to
reproduce (there are fish such as Orange Roughy which only
reach the age of reproduction at 20 years!)

13. Can Slow Food be a voice of global
hunger?
• War
• Poverty
• Drought
• Mismanagement of
Soil
• Trade
• Lack of Sustainable
Agriculture
• Putting Food Last
Global
Hunger
1.1 billion
go to sleep
hungry due
to:

14. Should Slow Food become the voice of
the global crises of unhealthy food?
1.1 billion
go to sleep
malnourished
from too
much food

15. Red Fife wheat, Canada's first Presidium,
• Canada's first Presidium, seeks to bring
Red Fife wheat back into commercial
circulation for use in artisan bread
baking.
• Red Fife wheat is a heritage wheat of
notable flavour, the foundation of the
entire Canadian wheat industry, and the
genetic parent to virtually all bread
wheat grown in North America today.
Its near-extinction made it a successful
nominee to Canada’s Slow Food Ark of
Taste in 2003.
• The Presidium has petitioned the
Canadian Wheat Board for legal
recognition of the variety, a campaign
that could lead to more widespread
cultivation of Red Fife Wheat in the
Canadian Prairies.

16. Focus on Food
Field To Table Catering
FoodLink HotlineThe Good Food Box
Urban Agriculture
Community Gardens
Student Nutrition
Toronto Kitchen
Incubator
FoodShare’s Festival
FoodShare’s Programs
Healthy Babies Eat
Home Cooked Food

17. FoodShare
buys food
directly from
farmers and
sells it at
affordable,
wholesale
prices through
120
community
drop offs
Photocredit: http://www.foodshare.net/

18. Focus on Food
Field To Table Catering
FoodLink Hotline
The Good Food Box
Urban Agriculture
Community Gardens
Student Nutrition
Toronto Kitchen
Incubator
FoodShare’s Field To Table Festival & Campaign
FoodShare’s Programs
Healthy Babies Eat
Home Cooked Food
• Since 1992 FoodShare has sold produce at
wholesale prices to schools;
• In 2007 distributed to over 80 schools weekly.
• In 2010 FoodShare works with Toronto Public
Health and other community agencies to sponsor
the Toronto Partners for Student Nutrition,
which supports over 300 student nutrition
programs in Toronto, as well as helping new
programs to start up
• Photocredit: http://www.foodshare.net.

19. Successful Salad Bars in action
Photocredit: http://www.foodshare.net

20. Can slow food help us build the
social economy?
• Do slow food
businesses have more
of a social conscious?
• Can the social
economy movement
learn from the multi-
class food movement
that seems to unite
politics and profit?
Photocredit: http://www.foodshare.net

21. …and farmer’s
markets
also enhanced
farmer’s market
share …

22. The social economy
The social economy is a grass-roots
entrepreneurial, not-for-profit sector, based on
democratic values that seeks to enhance the
social, economic, and environmental conditions of
communities, often with a focus on their
disadvantaged members.
What could happen for the goals of the food
movement as Slow Food Canada increasingly
takes on these goals and works with the social
economy to build these goals?