Blog

Slow Food Shifts Towards Social Activism

slow-food-2 Great, pertinent article on slow food in today's Oregonian, specifically related to how the mission of Slow Food International is changing to better meet the needs of its members and of its times). Here's an excerpt:

The change is led in part by Slow Food USA's new president, Josh Viertel, who's based in New York City. Under his guidance, the leaders of Slow Food's 200 American chapters voted to rewrite the organization's mission, emphasizing food policy and social justice, in connection with Slow Food Nation, a convergence of more than 60,000 people in San Francisco in August. Then in November, before 7,000 of the world's farmers, chefs and food advocates at the Terra Madre convention in Turin, Italy, Viertel drew on Petrini's "good, clean and fair" values, saying that we must consider those hurt most by our food system.

The article focuses on Portland's local Slow Food USA chapter, but my favorite part if the discussion about how this shifting focus has the potential to take the focus away from what the slow food people are all about:

... can the group go too far in the policy direction of good, clean, fair, quashing all love of food aesthetics and fun? An overemphasis on activism could detract from what Ann Shriver, Slow Food Corvallis founder, sees as the movement's raison d'etre: an unabashed defense of "the universal right to pleasure."