Encyclopedia > Slow food

Article Content

Slow Food

Redirected from Slow food

The Slow Food movement preserves an ecoregion's cuisine and the associated food plants and seeds, domestic animals, and farming methods of that region. It began in Italy as a resistance movement to fast food but has expanded globally to 50 countries and now has 70,000 members. It now describes itself as an eco-gastronomy faction within the ecology movement, and some consider it also the culinary wing of the anti-globalization movement.

Programs of the Slow Food movement include or have included:

seed banks to preserve native varieties, usually in cooperation with more local movements
an "ark of taste" for each ecoregion whose "tastes" are preserved
organizing small-scale processing, e.g. slaughtering, of short run products
organizing celebrations of local cuisine within the region of production, e.g. the Feast of Fields[?] held in some cities in Canada
educating consumers about the hidden risks of fast food
educating citizens about the hidden risks of agribusiness and factory farms[?]
educating citizens about the risks of monoculture and reliance on too few genomes or varieties
various political programs to preserve family farms
lobbying for agricultural policy changes to support organic farms[?]
lobbying against genetic modification of foodstuffs
lobbying against the use of pesticides
teaching gardening, especially to students and prisoners
moral purchasing of foodstuffs produced by locals using methods that are morally acceptable to the consumer

From time to time, Slow Food intervenes directly in market transactions, e.g. preserving four varieties of native American Turkey by ordering 4000 eggs of these and commissioning their raising and slaughtering and delivery to market.

Critics of the organization have charged it with being elitist, as it discourages nominally cheaper alternative methods of growing or preparing food. Slow Food responds by claiming to be working towards local production and consumption which will exploit "best practices" of science and professions worldwide but ultimately prove cheaper due to less reliance on transport and energy and chemical and technology intensive methods. These arguments parallel those of the anti-globalization movement, Greenpeace and green parties against global export of monocultured foodstuffs, especially GMOs.