Americans’ right to access fresh, healthy foods of their choice is under attack. Farmageddon tells the story of small, family farms that were providing safe, healthy foods to their communities and were forced to stop, sometimes through violent ac-tion, by agents of misguided government bureaucracies, and seeks to figure out why.

Filmmaker Kristin Canty’s quest to find healthy food for her four children turned into an educational journey to discover why access to these foods was being threatened. What she found were policies that favor agribusiness and factory farms over small family-operated farms selling fresh foods to their communities. Instead of focusing on the source of food safety problems — most often the industrial food chain — policymakers and regulators implement and enforce solutions that target and often drive out of business small farms that have proven themselves more than capable of producing safe, healthy food, but buckle under the crushing weight of government regulations and excessive enforcement actions.

Farmageddon highlights the urgency of food freedom, encouraging farmers and consumers alike to take action to preserve individuals’ rights to access food of their choice and farmers’ rights to produce these foods safely and free from unreasona-bly burdensome regulations. The film serves to put policymakers and regulators on notice that there is a growing movement of people aware that their freedom to choose the foods they want is in danger, a movement that is taking action with its dollars and its voting power to protect and preserve the dwindling number of family farms that are struggling to survive.

What you can do

You can make a difference!

Make a statement with your food dollars.
Where you shop and what you purchase is an excellent way to influence poli-cies that determine how our food is produced.

• Whenever possible, buy food from the source. The growth of farmstands, farmers markets, CSAs and buying clubs has made access to fresh produce, dairy products, meats and baked goods for everyone. http://www.localharvest.org/farmers-markets
  http://www.localharvest.org/csa/
  http://www.eatwellguide.org
• Ask your local grocers to carry products from local farms.
• Talk to restaurant owners and chefs about local foods, and encourage them to source their ingredients locally.
• Work with your town’s school lunch program to encourage them to purchase ingredients from local farms: http://www.farmtoschool.org
• Encourage local health care providers to teach their patients about the value of eating local, nutrient-dense foods.
• Get to know your local farmers, and encourage them to educate their consumers as well.

Educate yourself, your friends and your family.
There are many excellent sources of information about food freedom, local foods, and food policy.

• The Farm to Consumer Legal Defense Fund defends the rights and broadens the freedoms of family farms and protects consumer access to raw milk and nutrient dense foods.
• The Weston A Price Foundation is dedicated to restoring nutrient-dense foods to the human diet through education, research and activism.
• National Independent Consumers and Farmers Association promotes and preserves unregulated direct farmer-to-consumer trade that fosters availability of locally grown or home-produced food products.
• The Farm and Ranch Freedom Alliance works to save family farms and individuals from expensive and unnecessary government regulation.
• The Northeast Organic Farming Association (NOFA) is a membership organization of more than 5,000 farmers, gardeners and consumers working to promote health food, organic farming practices and a cleaner environment.
• The National Sustainable Agriculture Coalition (NSAC) is an alliance of grassroots organizations that advocates for federal policy reform to advance the sustainability of agriculture, food sys-tems, natural resources, and rural communities.

Let your federal, state and local representatives know that their positions on agriculture and food issues matter to you. Remind them that policies that support small family farms are good for the economy, the environment, and for everyone’s health.

• Contact your elected officials here.

Support the film-makers. Buy the DVD.

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