The Toronto food movement is one of the tastiest broths in the world, a mixture concocted from one part Toronto, one part food and one part movement. I’ve helped stir this dish for almost 20 years, both as chair of the Coalition for a Green Economy during the 1990s and as manager of the Toronto Food Policy Council since 2000, and am still amazed at how the recipe links the pleasures of good food and a happy table with environmental protection, public health, social justice, good jobs and all-round people power.
Today’s food movement grew up alongside the anti-globalization movements of the past 20 years, so thinking and acting locally are crucial to it. Food issues have helped many people rediscover their sense of place, and rethink how crucial place is – not just for the foods we eat, but for the people we become. So let me begin with the terroir that nourished the local food movement.
