SLEE 2019 Gratitude!

THANK YOU everyone who came out to make our 13th SLEE a beautiful celebration of food sovereignty and community!

Many guests commented that Doria Robinson’s keynote, “For the Love of Soil: Dismantling the Extractive Economy with Justice and Food Sovereignty” was the best yet! Doria, Executive Director of Urban Tilth, centered culture shifting as critical to our struggle to make another world possible. “The food sovereignty movement is a model and a metaphor for everything we try to do. Let’s make this roadmap, and let’s remember that culture is at the core, and relationship is the vehicle.


Thanks to Ed Mays & Pirate TV for capturing Doria’s keynote and Simone Adler’s overview of CAGJ’s organizing –please share widely! And thanks to Susan Fried for capturing SLEE in photos – check out our Facebook albums!

There are so many people and organizations to thank! The many interns and volunteers who prepped SLEE for months in advance, the 75+ who showed up on Friday and Saturday to make SLEE happen; Our Table Captains and Solidarity Campaign partners; Dozens of Farms & other food producers who fed us, and local businesses who donated Silent Auction items and desserts; Our Sponsors who provided invaluable seed funds, and Community Partners who helped publicize; Doria, for coming all the way from California! And Mads DeShazo, our SLEE Coordinator! Finally, we are so grateful to everyone who attended the dinner, and enjoyed our program.

And the great news is that we raised close to $26,000, and when including our new and increased Monthly Sustainers, over $28,000! Thank you for making CAGJ’s organizing possible.

TAKE ACTION FOR FOOD SOVEREIGNTY
At SLEE we asked you to take action with us. Check out these ways to take action and get involved! We look forward to organizing with you!

Tell the Gates Foundation: Agroecology for Climate Action

Join AGRA Watch in supporting the Alliance for Food Sovereignty in Africa’s new campaign, Agroecology for Climate Action!

Share our banner drop action photo from SLEE!
AGRA Watch Facebook: @AGRAWatch
Sample post: Solidarity with Alliance for Food Sovereignty in Africa! Agroecology is the solution, not another green revolution #FoodSovereigntyNow! #AgroecologyforClimateAction

Organize an action at the Gates HQ with us! In October, we will do a public action in solidarity with our partners in the African food sovereignty movement to call attention to the Gates Foundation’s role in pushing corporatization, biotech, and seed privatization in African agriculture. To get plugged in and help plan, contact Simone.

Sign the petition for the Seattle Green New Deal

350 Seattle and Got Green launched a campaign demanding that the City of Seattle create its own Green New Deal to eliminate climate pollution by 2030, address historical injustices, and create thousands of good, green, well-paying, unionized jobs. Show your support for climate justice locally! Sign the petition for Seattle’s Green New Deal: www.seattlegnd.org. If you are part of a Seattle-based organization, business, faith or cultural institution, ask them to endorse at seattlegnd.org/endorsements

Demand King Fuji Ranch Treat Workers Fairly!

Farmworkers on H2A visas at King Fuji Ranch in Mattawa have been in contact with Familias Unidas por la Justicia union about unsafe working conditions and retaliation from their employer. King Fuji Ranch sent some of the H2A workers back to Mexico in retaliation for speaking out. On June 12, the workers went on strike for 3 days, resulting in some verbal commitments from the company that there will be no blacklisting or retaliations, but there is no signed agreement meeting the workers’ demands. Call King Fuji Ranch at 509-628-1619 and send your message in an email to [email protected] 

Sample script: “I am calling to reach King Fuji Ranch as a consumer concerned about the way those who grow my food are treated. I am aware that H2A Farmworkers at King Fuji in Mattawa have been facing abusive conditions and retaliation and are being forced to pick at quotas that are untenable. King Fuji must guarantee better working and humane living conditions for the H2A workers by signing a legally binding agreement with the workers and their representatives.”

GET INVOLVED: CAGJ 2019 CALENDAR

WED July 31, 12:45-1:45pm
Community & Political Grocery Store Delegations with UFCW 21
Location: U Village Safeway 3020 NE 45th St. & QFC 746 NE 45th St. Seattle
Join CAGJ as we support UFCW 21 member-led pickets by going into the stores and engaging with workers and management. Grocery Store Members of UFCW 21 are organizing informational pickets to demand an increase in wages that enable them to live in the city, receive the hours they need, know schedules in advance, access training, and have a safe work environment. Meet at the store and get trained on the delegation process. RSVP to Heather.

SUN August 4, 4:30am – 3pm
Annual Farmworker March for Dignity
Morning meeting place: 1431 Sunset Ave, Ferndale, WA 98248. Details in Facebook event.
Join farmworker leaders from Community to Community (C2C) and Familias Unidas por la Justicia (FUJ) in an historic march in rural Whatcom County. The march starts with a sunrise ceremony and mistica at Customs and Border Patrol facility in Ferndale, and will proceed past several worksites where H2A workers have been contracted. This will be a day long reflection on a day in the life of a farmworker; from the time they start work until their day ends. Walk with us on country roads past acres of raspberry and blueberry fields where the fresh berries that are stocked on your grocery shelves are harvested. See the key component of the local agricultural economy, view corporate and NON-organic mono-agriculture fields and reflect on climate change, a contracted captive labor force, our local food system, community building and labor issues in Whatcom County from a farmworker perspective. We will end around 3pm with our vision of a healthy food system, fair and good for workers and eaters, at C2C’s Jardîn de Agroecologica on Bakerview with a vigil, food and celebration, speakers, and music. See David Bacon’s photos from last year’s march. Email Simone to join CAGJ’s contingent and fill out this carpool spreadsheet!

TUES August 20, 6:30-8:300pm
WTO+20 Planning Meeting!
Location: CAGJ office (1322 S Bayview St)
Get involved in planning the day-long teach-in at Town Hall Seattle on Saturday Nov 30th, the 20th anniversary of the Shutdown of the WTO, where the seeds of CAGJ and many other efforts were planted! The Teach-In will be an opportunity to bring hundreds of people together through work-shops and a movement assembly style gathering to strategize on how We the People will continue to show the WTO and Global Corporations that This is What Democracy Looks Like! RSVP here.

SAT August 24, 10am-3pm
CAGJ Teach-Out with Clean Greens Farm & Market
Location: Clean Greens Farm, 20121 W Snoqualmie River Rd NE, Duvall, WA. Clean Greens Farm and Market is a nonprofit organization, owned and operated by residents of Seattle’s Central District. With the produce grown on its Duvall, Washington farm, Clean Greens meets food access needs in its community by providing healthy and nutritious food at affordable prices through its neighborhood farm stands, Community Supported Agriculture and Giveback Programs. Join us at Clean Greens Farm in August, to give Tom & Venice a hand in the fields, and learn about their food sovereignty work rooted in Seattle’s historically black neighborhood, the Central District. Register here.

TUES September 17, 6:30 – 8:30PM
Monthly Food Justice Project Meeting
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 ([email protected]).

SAT September 21, 9am-5pm
CAGJ Membership Gathering! Past, Present, Future: Assessing CAGJ
Location: Accessible location in Seattle TBD. We will feed you!
We invite CAGJ Members, Partners, & Supporters to join us for the first of three membership gatherings during our Strategic Assessment & Planning Process. We will look back at CAGJ’s story, assess how we’re doing now, and vision the organization and world we want in the future. Our consultant Scott Winn will guide us through conversations to assess CAGJ’s accomplishments and programs through a racial equity lens. Our goal is to reinvigorate CAGJ by engaging our members and solidarity partners in reflecting on our purpose in the food sovereignty movement and our role in the current political moment. We want our members and partners to lead in determining a vision for the future of CAGJ, our organizing strategies, and how we will transform the food system! Registration: tinyurl.com/CAGJsept21

WED October 30, 7-9pm
Eating Tomorrow: The Battle for the Future of Food in Africa
Location: Town Hall Seattle, 1119 8th Ave, Seattle
Join CAGJ/AGRA Watch in welcoming to Seattle Million Belay, Coordinator of the Alliance for Food Sovereignty in Africa, and Tim Wise, author of Eating Tomorrow: Agribusiness, Family Farmers, and the Battle for the Future of Food (New Press 2019). Belay and Wise will engage in a conversation on the themes of the book, which features stories of the victims of land-grabbing in Mozambique, Monsanto officials trying to push genetically modified corn into Mexico, and Malawian farmers trying to preserve and promote their nutritious native seeds. RSVP here & contact Simone to help organize.

 

Posted in Agra Watch Blog Posts, Food Justice Blog Posts, News, Slider, Trade Justice Blog Posts.

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