Episode 171: Chicago as a Food City
About the Podcast
Today, Clancy speaks with Erika Allen and Ruby Ferguson. Erika Allen is the CEO of Urban Growers Collective, while Ruby Ferguson is the Good Equity Policy Lead of the Greater Chicago Food Depository / City of Chicago Mayor’s Office. You won’t want to miss their discussion about the power of food, food dignity, and some generational problems associated with it.
About Erika Allen and Ruby Ferguson
Erika Allen is the CEO of Urban Growers Collective. Ruby Ferguson, MS, MEd, RD, LDN is the Senior Director of Strategic Relationships and Community Planning at the Greater Chicago Food Depository. She is also Chicago's first Food Equity Police Lead in the Mayor's Office.
Discussion Takeaways
- The food bank operates in a vacuum. It requires strong, meaningful partnerships to address the inequities in the food system.
- There is a need to rescript the food system, which impacts public health, quality of life, mental health, security issues, and the youth.
- What's beautiful about food is that it acts as a connector across the world. Food sovereignty is having the choice of the family meal, sharing with loved ones, opting out of preparing food, and being able to purchase what you are craving for that day.
- Food can be a powerful lever for change, but it can also become a destructive tool if weaponized against people.
- It is important to activate projects that counteract the entities doing destructive things.
- Some of the generational challenges are economic. The food system is based on child sex, slavery, and incarceration in systems that exploit people of color.
- Food dignity is about being human. It is about love and generosity.
#1 tip to improve access to healthy food
Balancing the urgent need to feed people now with building frameworks for a sustainable future is tough. We need both immediate action and visionary planning to create lasting change.
Each week on the Food Dignity® Podcast, the Food Dignity® Movement's Clancy Harrison hosts a wide variety of hunger experts and other people making changes on the frontlines. Join us as we dive deep into conversations that will change the way you think about food insecurity.
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