December, 30 2010, 12:33pm EDT
Student Food Co-op Revolution on Campus: Going National in 2011!
CoFed to Launch National Program Empowering Cooperative Student Access to Sustainable Food, on College Campuses Across the USA
BERKELEY, CA
Successful
university movement for "real food" is launching nationally in January
2011 with support from Michael Pollan, Bill McKibben, Slow Money,
and students everywhere.
WHAT: National
training for student cooperative food activists to be held January
10-20, 2011 in Sebastopol, CA, followed by launch of CoFed national
programming and membership drive.
BACKGROUND - Student
leaders from regions around the USA are gathering January 2011 in
California to receive training from the Cooperative Food Empowerment
Directive (CoFed) in how to create ethically-sourced, student-run
local storefronts and cafes on college campuses throughout their
regions.
On January 20th, as CoFed's freshly "inspiregized" and newly hired inaugural team of six regional directors
begins advancing the student cooperative food movement across the
West Coast, Southwest, and East Coast, CoFed will simultaneously
launch a national membership and publicity drive to support them.
The original catalyst for CoFed,
the Berkeley Student Food Collective, grew out of a successful
campaign to block the first fast food chain restaurant from opening
on the University of California's Berkeley campus. Instead, the
Berkeley student food co-op opened on Nov. 15, 2010 to sell "real
food" - local, sustainable, healthful, and ethical - at affordable
prices.
CoFed's Launch Committee
includes author Michael Pollan, 350.org founder Bill McKibben, Slow
Food USA President Josh Viertel, and the Northern California chapter
of Slow Money. Within the next few years, CoFed is projected to grow
exponentially, with dozens of new storefronts opening, in every
region of the US - reaching the mouths and minds of over 700,000
college students.
CoFed looks to be one of the most
dynamic and innovative forces in the new food cooperative movement
now sweeping the USA. By taking a training-the-trainers approach and
facilitating regional student networks, CoFed aims to maximize its
collective impact and empower students with a sense of local
creativity and autonomy over their projects. Already in 2010, CoFed
quickly grew to encompass 6 leadership teams starting student run cafes on West Coast college campuses, from Santa Barbara to Seattle.
YES! Magazine calls "cooperatives mak[ing] a comeback" one of the 10 most hopeful stories of 2010. (1) Good Food World
sees a "new food movement" in action, as hundreds of new co-ops are in
development across America. (2) With localized food and cooperative
enterprise growing in popularity more each year, plus rising student
interest in all things green, CoFed possesses real potential to
help lead a sustainable transformation of food culture on college
campuses throughout the USA.
To learn more about
CoFed, schedule an interview, or reserve space for your media
representative to attend a portion of our January 10th-20th national
training in Sebastopol, CA please contact:
Yonatan Landau, Founder & Director: (510) 207 3850 / yoni(at)cofed.org
OR Jeff Genauer, Media Coordinator: (856) 535 8547 / jeff.genauer(at)cofed.org
Quotes:
"CoFed not only taught us and
provided us with the resources to start a student run food
collective on our college campus, but created an inspirational
atmosphere that left everyone with the determination and empowerment
to make our vision a reality!" - Brooke, UCSB student.
"CoFed is powerful - it will
train a new generation of leaders with experience creating good,
clean, fair food businesses and a new generation of eaters who
believe in the power of community to create their own food choices
that nourish their bodies, their values, and their planet." - Josh
Viertel, President of Slow Food USA.
"Colleges around the country are
figuring out that they educate their students three times a day
about either good food or bad - about a world where local matters,
or where food is just a plate full of calories to get you through
class. CoFed has the potential to be a crucial part of that
process." - Bill McKibben, founder of 350.org.
Notes:
(1) Van Gelder, Sarah. 10 Most Hopeful Stories of 2010. YES! Magazine. December 22, 2010. www.yesmagazine.org.
(2) Nickel-Kailing, Gail. Food Co-ops Grow Up. Good Food World. December 9, 2010. www.goodfoodworld.com.
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