Author hopes to inspire readers about sustainable food
By Heather Thorstensen
hthorstensen@agrinews.com
Date Modified: 05/27/2010 9:31 AM
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Temra Costa's life changed in 1998 when she walked into a food co-op in Madison, Wis. She wasn't used to the place's variety of food, organic products or featured local farmers.
She went on to earn a degree in agriculture at the University of Wisconsin, moved to California and led the state's campaign to get people to buy fresh, local food.
Through her work, she was surrounded by women promoting sustainable food, which is food grown in a way that doesn't compromise the ability of future generations to grow the same food. Costa noticed most of the leaders and employees of involved non-profit organizations were women, but women weren't often presented as keynote speakers of conferences or other headliners of the movement.
"I feel that women don't get as much recognition as they should for the role they play in our food system," Costa said, "from the mothers at home that do the shopping and the cooking to women in the field entering farming for the first time."
She put out a call for nominations, asking to meet women across the country who work with sustainable food, have made significant contributions in sustainable food or farming and have educated their community about it.
The 26 women Costa found —farmers, chefs, educators and activists —are profiled in her first book, "Farmer Jane: Women Changing the Way We Eat."
The chapters are filled with stories of how these women became interested in sustainable food and started creating change to promote it.The book also has submitted writing from other women in the industry.Sustainable agriculture has feminine characteristics, Costa said, such as putting a priority on building relationships and working for long-term success.
Costa hopes the book inspires more people to become involved in their food system.Each chapter ends with tips to help readers make changes in their lives.
"We make the choice every day," she said. People can choose between spending their food dollars on commercial, processed food or local, fresh food.
The sustainable food movement is starting to take off in pockets of areas across the country, almost faster than the traditional farm community can keep up with it, she said.
Larger or conventional farmers may feel pitted against it, but Costa said everyone needs to work together.
"We need traditional family farms that have been producing, unfortunately, monocultured crops to start transitioning to less commodity crops and more specialty crops," she said.
Costa knows this is a challenging task for many farmers to face and thinks the government should play a role in supporting the transition.
"We need to help them transition in some way. I feel the conventional food system is a losing system," she said, noting subsidies and chemicals farmers apply to their fields.
"We need them to grow our food," Costa said. "...We need our rural areas preserved for biodiversity, for soil, for climate change solutions. We need people to stay on their land and stay on their land farming."
All farmers should appreciate that the general public is starting to show an interest in agriculture again, she said.
"I feel they want to be more connected, they just don't know how," said Costa.
Open discussions are needed about how to help people connect with producers as well as how to keep food local, instead of raising food for export or being negatively impacted by imports, she said.
Costa lives in California and co-hosts a radio show, "The Queens of Green." She is also a speaker and consultant on food and communications.