Food Inc.

Our final film of the 2009 season was the quite disconcerting but excellent and very important documentary Food Inc. It certainly provided much 'food for thought' on how corporations are negatively effecting our National Food Industry and challenges us to become more aware of the multi-layered impact of what we purchase to eat. We thank Karen Burson for visiting and providing our audience with information, literature and maps on the Eat Local program and providing an excellent Q&A after the first screening and intro to the second. 533 were in attendance at our two screenings and the proceeds were divided as follows: $500 to Hamilton Food Share, $500 to Juvenile Diabetes Foundation and $200 to Environment Hamilton as a thank you for Karen's visit. We intend to keep Environment Hamilton in mind for future donations as well to help in their very important conmmunity service. If you missed Food Inc. it has just been released to video and should now be available in your local video stores. With these donations we have just passed the $60 000 mark in donations in our six years of screening the best in Canadian and international films. Thank you very much for your support of the Ancaster Film Fest.

Information from Karen Burson (Eat Local Project Manager at Environment Hamilton, 1130 Barton Street East, Suite 207 Hamilton, ON L8H 7P9 (905) 549-0900)

Look Karen up on Facebook: ("friend" her if you like -- She's got lots of information to share about local food, local art, community events and more, with an emphasis on Downtown Hamilton and the James Street North area).

Groups to check out and perhaps join:

Hamilton Eat Local
Planning to Eat (news and links to more articles, documentaries and such)
Slow Food Hamilton
The Food We Need Now Margaret Webb
Friends of the Toronto Food Policy Council

LINKS

Hamilton Community Food Security Stakeholder Committee: an intro and Terms of Reference

Environment Hamilton, with link to Hamilton Eat Local Home Page

The No Nonsense Guide to World Food by Dr. Wayne Roberts of the Toronto Food Policy Council

Toronto Food Policy Council Home Page and links to studies and reports

Food activist and writer Margaret Webb, author of Apples to Oysters. Check out her amazing series of articles now appearing in The Toronto Star. I sent to her the link to A Farm for the Future and she liked it enough to post it on her home page ... high praise, indeed!

Slow Food Canada (promoting food that is good, clean and fair) find a page for Slow Food Hamilton, our local convivium.

London Food Strategy, what's being done abroad

VIDEO

An interview with Michael Pollan, author of The Omnivore's Dilemma and In Defense of Food: An Eater's Manifesto, both highly recommended reading

Learn about the Transition Town Movement and its approach to food security, while on their home page you'll find a link to the BBC Documentary by farmer/filmmaker Rebecca Hosking called A Farm for The Future


A quick video clip to share - only about 2 minutes long. Add this to your e-mail signature to share this brief but important look at our dependence on fossil fuels for our current food system


Julian D.