The many costs of food on the wellbeing of humans, the economy and the environment will be the focus of an interactive panel discussion on Tuesday, October 20.
“The Cost of Food” panel discussion, which takes place as part of the University of Mississippi’s month-long Food Day observation, will begin at 5:30 p.m. in 209 Bryant Hall. It is free and open to the public.
“The figure on the price tag is not the only cost tied to the food we choose,” said Ellen Olack, AmeriCorps VISTA in the Office of Sustainability and moderator of the discussion. “The panel is intended to open the discussion of issues surrounding food justice. The food we choose has an environmental cost, a health cost, and even a human cost.”
The panel is comprised of individuals working in the realm of food, each with a different set of expertise. Panelists include Marshall Bartlett, co-founder of Home Place Pastures, who will speak from a farmer’s perspective; Ole Miss Dining Marketing Manager Richard Bradley, who will discuss institutional decisions that influence the food served on campus; Danna Madel, who will shed light on her work with migrant farm workers in the sweet potato fields of Vardaman, Mississippi; Catarina Passidomo, UM assistant professor of Southern Studies and anthropology whose research uses food as a lens to examine issues of race, class, gender, power, globalization and cultural change; and Sunny Young, director of EduFood Consulting LLC, a healthy food consulting firm for schools in the Southeastern United States. Young’s largest project is Good Food for Oxford Schools the first program of its kind in the state of Mississippi.
Audience members are encouraged to ask questions during the discussion, which will be followed by a reception.
“It’s so important to continue to have conversations about the cost of food,” said Young. “The more we listen to one another about the problems, the more likely we are to come up with sustainable solutions, together.”
To learn more about Food Day at the University of Mississippi, click here.
Story published October 12, 2015.