CAGJ Monthly E-Newsletter | March 6, 2019
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CAGJ Monthly E-Newsletter | March 6, 2019
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March E-News:
April 9: Come to Salmon People Film Screening
CAGJ HAPPENINGS
TAKE ACTION
CAGJ NEWS & ANALYSIS
US Confirms WEMA Failure
COMMUNITY CALENDAR
Get Involved! Upcoming CAGJ Meetings:
Food Justice Project: 3rd Tues/month, 6:30 - 8:30; for more info email us.
AGRA Watch: time varies, for more info email us
Join us on Facebook Follow us on Twitter Blogs CAGJ's blog AGRA Watch's Blog Listservs Sign up here for Food Justice Project Listserv
Sign up here for AGRA Watch Listserv
Please support the food producers who support CAGJ & SLEE!
Alvarez Farm, Alter Eco, Beecher’s Handmade Cheese, City Fruit, Clean Greens Farm and Market, Eleven Winery, Equal Exchange, Georgetown Brewing Company, Growing Washington, Kamayan Farm, Kirsop Farm, Local Roots Farm, Loki Fish Co., Mac and Jacks, Madres Kitchen, Mair Farm-Tami, Martin Family Orchards, Metropolitan Grill, Nash’s Organic Produce, One Leaf Farm, Organically Grown Company, Pok Pok Som, River Run Farm, Rockridge Orchards and Cidery, Steel Wheel Farm, Tall Grass Bakery, That Brown Girl Cooks, Tonnemaker Hill Farm
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Come to CAGJ's Film Screening & Discussion!
 TUES APRIL 9th, 7-9PM Town Hall Seattle and CAGJ present
Salmon People: Northwest Native Opposition to Genetically Engineered Fish Location: Langston Hughes Performing Arts Institute, 104 17th Ave S. Tickets $5: Purchase online and at the door; No one turned away for lack of funds. Doors open at 6pm. Help spread the word! Share the Facebook Event.
What are the risks from genetically engineered fish to the people and environments of the Pacific Northwest? We tackled this question head-on with our short film Salmon People. Now Town Hall joins forces with CAGJ to screen this powerful new film and call together a panel of indigenous and advocacy perspectives—all key activists working on Northwest Native food sovereignty and justice in the Pacific Northwest. Sit in to hear from the voices across the Pacific Northwest who are speaking out about the risks of genetically engineered fish.
Valerie Segrest, Muckleshoot Food Sovereignty Project Fawn Sharp, President of the Quinault Indian Nation George Kimbrell, Legal Director, Center for Food Safety Alan Stay, Office of the Tribal Attorney, Muckleshoot Indian Tribe
Sponsored by Town Hall Seattle and Community Alliance for Global Justice. For more info contact CAGJ!
CAGJ HAPPENINGS CAGJ's 13th Annual SLEE Dinner is July 13, 2019 Welcome Maddie DeShazo! Seeking Interns, Sponsors, Table Captains CAGJ is pleased to welcome our 2019 SLEE Coordinator, Maddie DeShazo! Interns gain experience organizing a grassroots food justice fundraising event, while participating in political education with CAGJ staff and members. Sponsors receive exposure to 300 guests engaged in the food sovereignty movement while receiving benefits including tickets to the dinner, an ad in our program, and website logo placement. Table Captains are community builders who fill a table with 10 guests and donate critical seed funds to help organize the dinner! Contact Maddie to learn more and to get involved in organizing this year's dinner and community celebration.
6th Annual Farmworker Tribunal organized by Community to Community in Olympia
Hundreds of Farmworkers from across Washington State will present testimony to tribunal judges on working conditions, the impacts of H2A, farmworker-led solutions and more. Please join to bear witness to this important annual tribunal and show solidarity to the farmworker struggle. If you can attend, please register here so we can coordinate transportation and support roles! Location: Columbia Room Legislative Building, 416 Sid Snyder Ave SW, Olympia WA. Spread the word and stay tuned on the Facebook event.
Monthly Food Justice Project Meeting & Discussion: History of Farmworkers’ Exclusion from Labor Laws and Organizing for Justice in the Fields Location: OUR NEW OFFICE at Welcome Table Church on Beacon Hill: 1322 S Bayview St, Seattle 98144 (near Beacon Hill Lightrail Station) Click here to RSVP to the meeting!
With the introduction of Senate Bill 5438 and House Bill 1398, there is opportunity for stronger protections for guest worker farmworkers. We are monitoring the progress of this new legislation, and will take action in this meeting to call key WA state legislature members for their support. In order to contextualize the significance of these bills being introduced, we will learn and discuss the history of farmworkers in the US labor system. Some topics will include: the guestworker (H2-A) program and its connection to the poor working conditions that farmworkers face, including racism and discrimination within corporate farm management; the history of exclusion of farmworkers from important labor laws, like the Fair Labor Standards Act; and how Farmworkers have organized for justice and protection in the fields. We will learn more about the state legislative process in order to move these bills forward.
Participants are encouraged – but not required! – to read the following pieces to have some background:
FJP Meetings are a great way to get involved in CAGJ, and are held the 3rd Tuesday/month. New volunteers are invited to our orientation at 6pm: Please RSVP. POTLUCK: Please bring food or drink to share, if you are able. All are welcome! For more info, email the Food Justice Project.
Save the Date! 20th Anniversary of WTO Protests CAGJ is organizing a day-long event at Town Hall Seattle to mark the 20th anniversary of the people’s victory and shut-down of the 1999 World Trade Organization meetings in Seattle! Contact us to get involved in planning the event, where we aim to learn from our history and build today’s movements for global justice.
TAKE ACTION Action Alert from Community to Community (C2C)
C2C has been demanding increased oversight of the H2A guestworker visa program for years. This federal program has created ongoing exploitation and quasi slave labor conditions that led to the death of a farmworker in Whatcom County in 2017. Thanks to community based organizing efforts, we have convinced the WA State Employment Security Department (ESD) to introduce a bill this legislative session (HB 1398 / SB 5438) that would increase their funding for the establishment of an office of oversight for regulation and enforcement of H2A workers to guarantee health and safety for guest farmworkers in Washington State. Currently, the guestworker visa program is nominally funded by the federal government, but such funding is inadequate considering that the use of the H2A program has grown by 1,000% since 2010 in Washington State. According to Nick Streuli with the ESD, the Department of Labor provides around $300,000 per year to Washington State to run the H2A program, yet he estimates that the ESD requires an additional 1.7 million to 2 million dollars per year to effectively fund the oversight activities of the ESD in relation to the H2A program.
Take Action: Call your WA State Legislators Sample Message: Vote YES on House Bill 1398 / Senate Bill 5438 to support the Employment Security Department's funding to protect guest farmworkers, increase the hiring of domestic farmworkers, and build a just, local, organic food system. We are consumers and voters who respect the people that grow our food!"
Real Meals Campaign Call for Action: Join the Fight for Real Food! The three biggest cafeteria operators in North America - Aramark, Sodexo and Compass Group - purchase billions of dollars worth of food every year. Currently, the vast majority of that food comes from Big Food corporations that harm our communities. These Big Food corporations pay workers and producers less than they need to support themselves and their families; they often market food that is highly processed and nutritionally deficient, and they rely on practices that damage our health and the environment. We're calling on Aramark, Compass Group and Sodexo to do better.
Help reach goal of 100,000 signatures! It's time for Aramark, Compass Group, and Sodexo to fundamentally reorient their business model away from a system of exclusive relationships with Big Food companies and toward #RealMeals that support producers, communities, consumers and the planet. As a first step, we are asking each company to commit to the following in the higher education sector:
CAGJ is a proud member of the Community Coalition for Real Meals, a diverse coalition of organizations including: Northwest Atlantic Marine Alliance, Operation Spring Plant, Organization for Competitive Markets, Fair World Project, Public Justice, Real Food Challenge, Domestic Fair Trade Association, the HEAL Food Alliance, and Friends of the Earth. Your organization can endorse here. Apply for Campaign Coordinator job here.
CAGJ NEWS & ANALYSIS A Decisive Stance: Tanzania Discontinues Gates/Monsanto's GM Trials in the Country By African Centre for Biodiversity
In November 2018,Tanzania set a precedent for how genetic modification (GM) is approached in the country, passing an order for the cessation of all ongoing GM trials in the country which are under the supervision of the Water Efficient Maize for Africa (WEMA) Project. This includes Monsanto, the Gates Foundation, and national research centers. Read the AGRA Watch blog summary. US Confirms Failure of Monsanto's Drought Tolerant Maize Pushed on Africa By Sabrina Masinjila, African Centre for Biodiversity and Anne Maina, Kenya Biodiversity Coalition A recent United States Department of Agriculture (USDA) report confirms what independent biosafety scientists, and African civil society, have been stating all along: Monsanto’s drought tolerant (DT) maize (MON87460) does not work! The USDA report reveals that performance of corn (maize) varieties transformed with the genetically engineered (GE) trait claimed to be DT is poor in terms of both yields and adoption rates, as compared with non-GE (conventionally bred) DT corn. Read the full article, including findings of the USDA report.
COMMUNITY CALENDAR
FRI March 8, 6:30PM Brave Girl Rising Join us for a film produced by Girl Rising and the International Rescue Committee as one girl strives to get an education despite living in the Dadaab Refugee Camp in Kenya. Stay after the film for a conversation with the CEO of Girl Rising and the director of the IRC. Learn more here.
SUN March 17, 1PM 13th Annual Poverty Forum Join us for a dialogue around the systemic issues surrounding urban poverty and to unite a diverse community of care. Town Hall presents speakers from Northwest Immigrant Rights Project and Veterans For Peace, Puget Sound Chapter 92, focusing on the relationship between militarism abroad and militarism at the U.S. border. Learn more here.
THURS March 21, 7PM SAT March 23, 7PM SUN March 24, 7PM Astra Taylor, Film Screening, What is Democracy? Join us for a film featuring a diverse cast of celebrated theorists, trauma surgeons, activists, factory workers, asylum seekers, and former prime ministers that connects the past and the present, the emotional and the intellectual, the personal and the political. The film will be followed by a conversation with director Astra Taylor on the meaning of democracy and the process of filmmaking. Learn more here.
SAT March 30, 12-3PM Farm Share Fair with Tilth Alliance Meet local farmers and learn about Community Supported Agriculture boxes. A CSA share allows customers to enjoy the benefits of convenience and eating well while supporting local farms. CSA programs also let you skip the middle man and forgo busy box stores, all while ditching plastic packaging and creating less waste with food that was grown minutes from your dining room table. Learn more here.
SAT March 30, 7:30PM Mai'a Williams: This Is How We Survive Join us as Mai'a Williams reads from and discusses her new book This Is How We Survive: Revolutionary Mothering, War, and Exile in the 21st Century. This is a story about mothers who are doing the work of deep social transformation by creating the networks of care that sustain movements and revolutions. By centering mothers in our organizing work, we center those who have the skills and the experience of creating and sustaining life on this planet. Learn more here.
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