00;00;00;00 – 00;00;23;27
Renée D’Souza
You’re listening to Dignity and Joy, a podcast from FoodShare. On the pod, we confront the systems of oppression that impact who has access to food and the land it’s grown on and who doesn’t. Achieving something better will take hard work from all of us and can only be done if we listen closely to the people who are already leading change in the way we think about food.
00;00;23;27 – 00;00;43;25
Renée D’Souza
FoodShare’s Sheldomar Elliot delves into the connections between food and justice with folks
who have their fingers on the pulse and their hands in the soil. Together they dream in colour and consider what it would take to build a just and hopeful city, a city where everyone can feed themselves, their loved ones, and their community with dignity and with joy.
00;00;49;12 – 00;01;14;23
Sheldomar Elliot
Hi everybody, welcome to this episode of Dignity and Joy. This is a different sort of episode
from the ones that we usually do. And for folks who’ve been listening, often you’re familiar with a one on one interview. But I think this time we wanted the opportunity to bring you into some conversations that FoodShare hosted recently because we have such a vibrant and committed community so that we get to hear from at events, townhalls and panel discussions.
00;01;14;23 – 00;01;54;03
Sheldomar Elliot
And it never feels like a dull moment. However, I think this episode is extra fun as we’ll get to explore some more of these chats with the special guest. Our guest for today’s episode is Hansel Igbavboa and Hansel is a multidisciplinary artist, filmmaker, community organizer, advocate and researcher. His work is steeped in storytelling, community building, activism and social innovation, and explores the realms of the deliberative and transformative power of food and nature, the politics and socioeconomic change, deconstruction of colonial and racist powers and reconnection to indigenous knowledge, rituals, traditions and tools.
00;01;54;03 – 00;02;06;17
Sheldomar Elliot
Hansel is the Right to Food Campaign Coordinator of FoodShare, where he works to mobilize communities around our human right to food and push our rights to be respected, protected, and realized in the city of Toronto. Welcome, Hansel.
00;02;10;07 – 00;02;18;23
Hansel Igbavboa
Thank you! Hey, I’m Hansel Igbavboa, my pronouns are he/him, and I am excited to have this conversation today.
00;02;18;23 – 00;02;42;21
Sheldomar Elliot
Yes, I’m excited to have this conversation with you too. Thank you for bringing all that energy. We need it, always. And I think this is a fun one considering that folks may not know this, but Hansel and I’ve known each other for quite some time now, and we both met as students at Toronto Metropolitan University, and we just connected over a lot of our shared interests, but specifically around food justice and black food sovereignty.
00;02;42;21 – 00;03;05;18
Sheldomar Elliot
And in about 2017, 2018, we did some research that allowed us to connect with other black farmers, academics, scholars, just really incredible community across the city, which at least for me kind of helped me get on this journey to where I am today. So Hansel, it’s fun that, who would have thought we’d be doing what we’re doing at school?
00;03;05;18 – 00;03;32;03
Hansel Igbavboa
It’s been a while, but it wasn’t actually 2017 to 2018. It was actually end of 2018, 2019.
We did the research, but yeah, it’s been. Yeah, it’s been a long way. Yeah, that work exposed us to a lot of the work happening outside of campuses. And now we’re doing this every day. So, yes, we have!
00;03;32;03 – 00;04;02;03
Sheldomar Elliot
This work right? And outside of work Hansel and I are also involved with a few different community projects. One of them being the Brampton Youth Farming Collective, where I’m on the steering committee and Hansel does some coordination there. And we’ve also been
working on an art project. I don’t want to give too much away because it’s still ongoing, but sort of highlighting and emphasizing the journeys and stories of black youth and farming and their connection to land. But it’s definitely a labour of love, right?
00;04;02;03 – 00;04;12;03
Hansel Igbavboa
And it’s truly, really a labour of love. And it will come out at the right time, like you said, and we are all going to be happy about it.
00;04;12;03 – 00;04;44;19
Sheldomar Elliot
Yes, we will. Well, before we get into anything, I want to start by acknowledging
that I’m here in Toronto, Sacred Land that is the traditional territories of the Wendat, Haudenosaunee the Anishnabeg and the Mississauga’s of the credit, and that this territory is covered by the Dish With One Spoon Wampum Belt Covenants. At FoodShare, we think it’s important to start any conversation on this land by recognizing the many nations of indigenous peoples who presently live on this land, those who spent time here and the ancestors who have hunted and gathered on this land.
00;04;44;19 – 00;05;05;09
Sheldomar Elliot
I also want to acknowledge the many people of African descent who are not settlers but whose ancestors were forcibly displaced as part of the transatlantic slave trade, brought against their will and made to work on these lands. At FoodShare, we believe that advancing indigenous sovereignty is deeply and inextricably linked to black liberation. And we remain committed to advancing
both.
00;05;05;09 – 00;05;29;17
Sheldomar Elliot
So Hansel was also the M.C. at FoodShare’s recent annual general meeting, where we instead of having a keynote address by one person, we decided to have a roundtable which I hosted, which we called Manifesting the Toronto we Want. We had guests from across the city, different parts of community groups and organizations all sharing really important knowledge about the work that they’re undertaking and what the future can entail.
00;05;30;11 – 00;06;26;22
Hansel Igbavboa
Yeah, I would say this, having conversations like that I think one, it’s part of my everyday life, but having it be on a stage like that in a sense, I feel, always reinvigorates me and that’s something I want. I feel like those conversations are important to keep us going because the work we’re doing is not easy. The work that’s happening in community is not easy, and we will see the type of work the folks are doing from the conversation we’re going to have today. So it’s like people are doing a lot and it’s always important to acknowledge, to recognize, to talk about it,
not just for the sake of talking about it, but really for the supportiveness of it. And we’re going to hear from the folks on the supportive partnership platform that FoodShare has today. I’m excited!
00;06;26;22 – 00;07;26;09
Sheldomar Elliot
Definitely, definitely. And I’m really glad and humbled, honestly, by the fact that I got to sit
with these folks and the FoodShare Supportive Partnerships Platform is really a program
where we can support community led food initiatives and help them access different supports that they need to essentially move towards the goal of being self-sufficient and doing their own work. So some of the supports that we offer is providing mentorship, advice and guidance and problem solving, building capacity through strategic planning, anti-oppression training. A big bulk of the work is also offering financial management services and supports, so kind of tracking expenses and budgets and deadlines and timelines that these folks are on and ultimately just sharing resources. And we got to hear from really incredible folks, people from Birchmount Community Action Council, Gig Workers United, Thorncliffe Park Urban Farmers, and a few others that we’ll get into in this chat.
00;07;26;09 – 00;08;27;04
Sheldomar Elliot
And it’s nice, though, because oftentimes I’m working behind the scenes, you know, doing a lot of more admin sort of bookkeeping work. But I thought it was really important and special for us to take a time to highlight them and have a real conversation. So I’m thinking like, you know, as that panel happens, there is so much to unpack and really Manifesting the Toronto We Want was a response to the need for more conversations around actions underway to address the problems in our food system. And as I just alluded to, some of the guests that we had were Laura Hammond from the Birchmount Community Action Council, and some may already recognize her from one of the conversations we had earlier in the podcast where she shared a lot about her community work in Scarborough with Birchmount Community. And Laura, if anybody knows her, is an all around champion. Not only is she a mother of seven,
but she works tirelessly day in, day out as a community collaborator and is constantly on the front lines supporting her community and the people she loves and trusts.
00;08;27;04 – 00;08;44;02
Hansel Igbavboa
I just wanted to make a quick side plug to talk about the fact that, people are going to learn a little bit more about Laura as a person and the work she does in that project,
Sheldomar and I were referring to earlier in the podcast.
00;08;44;02 – 00;09;30;02
Sheldomar Elliot
I like that, a little shameless plug. I don’t want to take up too much time speaking about all the guests because we’ll dive into it later. But we had Liz from Vivimos Juntxs, Comemos Juntxs, which in Spanish translates to “we live together, we eat together,” and they’re a coordinator. One of the lead researchers on a project called Financial Resistance when undocumented. Which invited undocumented folks to speak about their experience in navigating employment in Ontario. We had Shabina from Seed, Soil and Spirit School, who is a community herbalist and working to uplift indigenous systems of medicine and land stewardship. Michelle, so thoughtful, from Thorncliffe Park Urban Farmers, who essentially brought her community
together in the Thorncliffe Park neighbourhood and is now running
two communal vegetable gardens.
00;09;30;02 – 00;10;11;18
Sheldomar Elliot
We also had Jennifer from Foodsters United, who is also so busy and does incredible work. But she’s a gig worker who’s delivering food by bicycle downtown. She’s also the president of Gig Workers United and a worker organizer for Foodsters, just working to organize around
labour protections and workers rights. So, a really stacked panel that we had
and before we even decided who was going to be talking on the panel, the impetus for that conversation, about manifesting the Toronto we want, was really around some of the work that you and your team, Hansel, has been doing
regarding right to food. Do you mind sharing a bit about that?
00;10;11;18 – 00;11;59;02
Hansel Igbavboa
So the Right to Food campaign launched in the fall of 2021 and the core of the campaign on the side of like pushing the city has been to renew our 21 year old 22 year old food charter that was passed. And when this food charter was passed years ago, it was seen as like something that would transform the landscape of food access and urban agriculture, not only in Toronto, but across Canada and across North America. And like cities would emulate this idea. It was supposed to, by the name of Food Charter, recognize our human right to food and address the issues that were impeding on that right. Well, it’s been how many years later? And while it was not supposed to be, which is a document framed on the wall, it turned out to be a document locked up in the bunkers of city hall, because when we were having conversations with councilors and some city staff, many, many people we met with didn’t know that the city of Toronto even had a food charter in the first place. And we were having conversations and saying, like this food charter, not only is this food charter not necessarily in use, it’s also inadequate to address the problems that we’ve always faced in Toronto and now have been exacerbated during this pandemic that we really are still going through. And that’s the start of the campaign. And we did a lot of public facing work to get people aware of the fact that we even have a food charter in the first place.
00;11;59;02 – 00;13;06;06
Hansel Igbavboa
And then like what next? Like updating the food charter has kind of been the central focus of our work on the city side, but we’ve also done a lot of community mobilization around the idea of our human right to food. One of the things we’ve done, the town hall, which I’m going to talk a little bit about, but we also recently did an art exhibit to engage the community. I will talk a little bit about that later, too.But we’ve done a lot of community mobilization. But starting with the campaign in the fall of 2021, we really wanted the campaign to center community voices, the folks who have always done this work, the folks who have come before us, the folks who continue to fight for the food rights of the community, the folks who continue to dream and work
towards food sovereignty. And we had a lot of amazing people, black and indigenous folks on the panel in a town hall style conversation and that was that was a great conversation that happened that really guided and led the direction of our work.
00;13;06;06 – 00;14;04;23
Hansel Igbavboa
And I guess some of the major wins we’ve had so far on the campaign is having a motion
been passed last year directing the city staff to work, basically work towards updating the food charter in consultation with the community. And it’s been, it’s been a year plus and it’s been a year plus and not much has happened, but we have been consistently pushing and pushing for more. And the work is a lot of back and forth, but in all that, I think the community aspect of it,
the mobilizing community around this idea and reminding us that it’s not even a reminder, but like creating avenues to reaffirm the fundamental rights that we have to food is important. So, yeah, I’m going to leave it at that.
00;14;04;23 – 00;14;49;05
Sheldomar Elliot
Absolutely. Thank you for sharing that and thank you for all the work that you’re doing. And I know you and your push is not going to stop. So the city is up against a lot. If they don’t listen. But I know that well, I will say for the audience, I think this is also another special episode because we have clips from some of these past events and from the AGM that we’d like to share with you so that you get a sense of some of the things that were talked about and I know Zakiya Tafari from Afri-Can FoodBasket is someone who’s leading really important food work in their community, in the Jane and Finch community for African, Caribbean and black folk, shared a bit about food sovereignty and his experience where you can hear that here:
00;14;49;05 – 00;17;07;01
Zakiya
So the FoodBasket is an organization that’s been around for 25 years championing food justice for the African Caribbean black community. It was founded by my parents and being very honest, you know, when they started this organization, I was very naive to the bigger community
Needs. You know, growing up in a family that did, you know, a garden in their backyard. We were connected to urban farms. We would go strawberry picking, corn picking. I thought these were things that everybody did. But definitely that I got into social work, I realized that not everybody has strong connections to food and really understanding the importance of championing food justice and having access to cultural food. More specifically around COVID,
we launched something called the Black Food Toronto Program because we knew that with all the lockdowns that were happening, the panic buying that was going on, members of our community were going to suffer. They were going to struggle to find food, they were going to struggle to access healthy food. And especially as the pandemic went on, you know, our seniors, our small families, we created a system through our website called Blacks Food Toronto, where folks sign up and access a fresh basket of healthy, culturally sensitive foods. We would incorporate things like avocados, sweet potatoes, ginger, mangoes when possible, giving people healthy food. We also connected with local farmers, so when corn was in season we were providing them with corn, we also run an urban farm up at the Jane and Steeles at the Black Creek Farm. And we were able to grow things like kale, callaloo, tomatoes, cucumbers and other things that we incorporated into our baskets. At the height of what we were doing, We were providing support to over 500 households a week through direct delivery drop offs,
as well as working with community partners such as CAFCAN and TAIBU Community Health Centre and a number of other Community partners to make sure people access to food. As I was able to go on some of these deliveries, You know, it was bittersweet to see people’s response to getting a basket that had this kind of healthy food in it, being so thankful and so grateful to be able to have access to food. And, you know, given the Toronto Food Charter, you would think that this would not be an issue, especially in a city like this during this day and age. But it is and it’s a constant, ongoing issue.
00;17;07;01 – 00;18;47;10
Sheldomar Elliot
Yes, it is – Preach, Zakiya! Wow. I can’t, lie I could go for an avocado right now! But I think I think
that speaks to the importance of healthy, culturally appropriate food, you know, and in his words, “sensitive food.” And I could imagine during the pandemic like that, like the need for that was just exacerbated tenfold. And also when I hear what he’s saying is like the importance of getting others involved in securing healthy food is also so essential to keeping this work alive. So I know, Hansel, at that townhall that you folks did, you asked people to share their thoughts
to a prompt, right? Around imagining a future where we can all access foods in the ways that we want to. What does it look like or is it feel like and I recall the responses were so rich and varied. I remember hearing things like, you know, folks saying reducing the miles that their food has to travel so people can grow their own food on a balcony, on a roof, or in a garden, or teaching people how to harness and collect rainwater, how to collect seeds. Seeds are life, community kitchens, gardens, food forests. Gatherings to eat together at all times of the day. I sign up for that one, 100 per cent. But these other ones here too, like having a loving relationship with culturally relevant food and our bodies. And last but not least, land back. And it really struck me in seeing and hearing these responses that what we’re working toward when it comes to achieving food justice is ultimately food sovereignty. And that’s nothing new. And yet there’s something about seeking these old ways of knowing and being of returning to the way that we’ve always been growing and preparing food that feels downright revolutionary. But what do you think about that?
00;18;47;10 – 00;21;43;03
Hansel Igbavboa
Yeah, before I say what I think about that, I wanted to pause and rewind a little bit back to what Zakiya had said about the work that is happening at Afri-Can FoodBasket And I think it’s important to recognize the scale of what was done. Like, I got one of those boxes every week and I was organizing like Afri-Can FoodBasket to provide those food boxes for black students in Toronto. It started off with providing food for students at TMU, but then we expanded it to like outside of TMU to our metro and to other students, they were delivering boxes every other day,
to so many people. I know that, even delivering boxes to just the number of people on the list of people that we provide the boxes to was already so much people, let alone how many, many different community organizations that we’re working alongside with to provide food boxes for folks during the pandemic. I think it is so important because when all else feels who is there? It’s the folks who’ve been in the community, in these organizations. It’s the organizing that has always been present in the community that shows up for for people. So I think it’s extremely important for us to recognize that and the scale of that and not diminish that, because it is it is big, it is important and it’s very relevant to talk about it. It is necessary. But the idea of returning – I think part of my life ethos is the idea of returning to indigenous knowledge, indigenous knowledge from around the world, I’m indigenous to somewhere, I’m from Benin. It’s return to the knowledge that my people have and return to the knowledge that is indigenous to this place returns to – I believe we can’t really make any progress if we don’t return to that because when you look at a lot of Indigenous teachings around the world, there is a deep connection, respect for the world around us the trees, the plants, the bugs, the little things and the big things, the water, the air. Everything that’s around us. And if we are not paying attention to that, if we’re not respecting that, where are we really going? So I think it’s important for us to get those opportunities for us to share the wisdom, to share the value of that idea of returning. Not just as an idea, but the practice of returning and the ways in which we can return in our everyday life.
00;21;43;10 – 00;22;20;12
Sheldomar Elliot
I, I agree wholeheartedly. And yeah, I think it’s an extra hurdle for some of us, a lot of us who are displaced peoples and returning to land might look different, but we need to start somewhere. And I know that’s some of the conversation that happened on the panel. I asked the panelist, what ways do they see that returning happening in their own lives? And a lot of the conversation was about how we share and value wisdom, sort of what you’re just talking about now, like how do we reclaim those knowings and those knowledges across generations and I think Shabina had something really important to say to that:
00;22;20;17 – 00;23;12;02
Shabina
The wisdom we hold is embedded into that and in a lot of ways seen as like auntie knowledge or like, you know, like grandma knowledge and I think sometimes undervalued in that sense. And, you know, I think there is this like returning and realizing that, you know, as systems, Western systems catch up to indigenous knowledge that there is so much value in it
and there’s so much depth to it. So for me that that is the returning the affirmation of, of our knowledge and knowledge systems. And it’s so beautiful to see, you know, we host a lot of, a lot of different students from backgrounds like primarily from black, indigenous and racialized communities. And just the process of affirmation is it’s an absolutely beautiful full circle experience for so many of our students. So that’s definitely how I see that.
00;23;12;02 – 00;23;41;19
Sheldomar Elliot
For folks who may not know, Shabina is a community herbalist and co-director of Seed, Soil Spirit, a grassroots organization run and operated primarily for black, indigenous and racialized communities, offering cross-cultural, self-determined and decolonial approaches to land based education. And I think what she says there is so poignant and it actually quite nicely links
with what Laura has to say about the value of intergenerational knowledge sharing:
00;23;41;19 – 00;25;38;18
Laura
Having our elders working hand in hand with our youth and, you know, just providing them with that context and knowledge. Because if you didn’t grow back, grow up in a back home, then, you know, there’s a lot of disconnect to what our food systems were. You may hear about it,
but what does it mean in practice? And, you know, just to hear some of the things that our young people are sharing about their gratefulness of the learnings that are being shared
with them, it’s really great. But most importantly, I would say, when it comes to this whole piece of land stewardship and not actually having access to land that you can pass down as a legacy, I feel like that’s a huge hinderance, right? That’s one thing to get things going. But when you’re looking at sustainability, you’re always still asking for permission without having that regard. So we’re really looking for a way for us to work collaboratively to ensure that we can hone in on what that means for legacy building, for sustainability. Because for me, I come from a household where I still hear the stories of the ackee tree in the front yard and all of the loveliness of having the food right at your fingertips, although in the back of their mind, they also thought that they were living somewhat of an impoverished life and that, you know, the golden light would be migrating to Canada. And now coming into the knowledge and the time that, you know, health as well I think it’s really important for us to secure spaces where not just community can own, but culturally specific, relevant collaborations to ensure that our types of foods are grown to nourish our bodies.
00;25;38;18 – 00;25;41;18
Sheldomar Elliot
Man, I want an ackee tree!
00;25;41;23 – 00;27;04;04
Hansel Igbavboa
I really oh, this really warms my heart. And it reminds me of the fact that a mutual friend that we have and they’re interviewed for the documentary that we’re working on future farmers. I was going to say that having conversation, I remember the first summer growing food and how they talked about connecting with a lot of like elderly black folks on the internet, on Facebook groups, and just how loving the space was and how they were so willing to share with them. And like people were just sharing the food and it was like an intergenerational space. And people who had knowledge from growing were teaching other people and it was just such a beautiful thing. And it reminds me of me also starting to grow my balcony and I’m having all this conversations with my mom and then learning that my mom, knows so much about like growing food and farming and whatnot. And I just think it’s so beautiful. It makes me – I’m cheesing, right now, I’m smiling. So happy it warms my heart to to see that, because we don’t get enough of that intergenerational spaces in the work we do. Yeah, I love it.
00;27;04;04 – 00;28;25;08
Sheldomar Elliot
I couldn’t agree more, again, Laura is holding her seventh baby and is just preaching facts and knowledge and I can’t get enough of that. But I think to what you’re saying, there too, Hansel, for me to relate. I, I also have gotten to grow food a few years ago and funny enough, I spent a lot of time with my grandmother when I was a child in her garden. And it’s funny how it sort of jumped a generation like my mom was never really interested in growing but is like a wicked cook, like top notch. But once I started to get into growing, now she’s learning from me and it’s almost like a full circle effect of like, you know, this intergenerational knowledge sharing. And it could go both ways. That’s a really exciting thing, too. It’s not always like top down or top up, whatever you want to call it, but it really comes from a place of love and community and spirit and all of these things that we love to talk about. So yeah, I love that. And just even talking
about intergenerational opportunities, it brings us right back to what Zakiya was saying earlier, around inheriting leadership of Afri-Can FoodBasket from his parents. Or me, hearing from Jessie, one of the community market coordinators FoodShare works with. Who spoke recently at the International Public Markets Conference on the way she’s seeing youth showing up for elders at the weekly produce market she organizes in Scarborough:
00;28;25;08 – 00;29;56;07
Jessie
If we could reach out to those centres, or to those institutions that are around us, be it churches, schools, community centres and get those able bodies in our buildings, and once you to engage with them, then they fall in love with you and they look forward to seeing you. So it’s just that initial hurdle of then facing the reality, I can’t do it anymore. So I started, you know, I did my film thing about fruits. I also started in my building saying, Oh, look for Bill, he’s the old guy with the ball cap. And then everybody’s like, Bill, the ball cap. The old guy, well, we’re all old guys! This is an acceptance, a beginning of an acceptance that we have our limitations. And if we can get them to accept that in a nice way, then now I know my people are really open for getting people
helping them. Where for the first few markets, “No, I can carry it. I can carry it.” And you’d see them struggle, still up an elevator, right? Because now it was even less of a distance. So they wanted to prove themselves. Seniors always have to prove themselves to everybody, right, to their families, because we’re all – young people are so much more confident than we are. So we’re trying to show them that we are confident, too. But, you know, you approach it in a different manner. I think that we could find solutions. I think it’s local. It’s very local. It needs to come from the students and the people around us because that is our community. Those people.
00;29;56;07 – 00;30;14;11
Sheldomar Elliot
It’s beautiful to see young people at a market like this who are not really interested in food
or groceries or whatnot, still come up and support elders who are shopping from the market, just bringing up their groceries or picking out their selection. It’s real, wholesome and speaks
to what we’re talking about.
00;30;14;11 – 00;30;37;23
Hansel Igbavboa
For sure, I think there’s always magic when the younger folks and the older folks meet. There’s always, there’s always magic, because there’s an exchange that happens. And to what you said earlier, the exchange doesn’t go one way. It doesn’t go from the older to the younger, but it goes both ways. And and the bonds and the relationships that are formed from that are so important.
00;30;37;23 – 00;31;12;05
Sheldomar Elliot
Honestly, hearing stories like this can be so heartening, but I feel like it also makes you realize that it feels special because it feels rare. It’s almost like we’ve lost a lot of this interconnected this, or a sense of like, we all depend on each other and we really don’t have to look far to see who’s doing the hardest work. Paid, but also unpaid, of growing food feeding communities and addressing food insecurity. And whether that’s happening in community or elsewhere. I think Liz brought up a really important point in terms of what that work really looks like:
00;31;12;05 – 00;33;17;26
Liz
It should also be said, which land is being used for cultivation, where the land was taken, where it was stolen often, but also to talk about who are the bodies that are working those farms, Right? Who are the migrant workers who are growing your food and feeding farmers? Because I know that the Weston family is not out in the fields with the bad air quality out there. They’re not the ones who are labouring. It’s migrant workers, it’s racialized folks who are doing the really hard work and I think that talking about those topics and bringing them to the discourse or a mainstream discourse or talks with your family as in saying it’s not Canadian farmers, it’s people who are being taken advantage of, who often become undocumented, who are in risk of deportation, because if their employer doesn’t like the way that they’re fighting for basic human rights, they could be sent back to their home countries, which is really, really sad. But I also wanted to share this idea that Vivimos Juntx Comemos Juntx passed, is that we’re not going to ask the government to do things for us. We are going to organize and create safe spaces for us
because we know, we know what we need. We know the kind of spaces we need. And to have those connections with not only undocumented folks, but with other migrant led groups,
with other grassroots organizations, with other indigenous folks who are from this territory or from other territories around the world is so meaningful because this method of knowledge sharing is what is going to get us through – is what is going to be revolutionary. Building relationships with the land and with the folks that you’re living with is revolutionary in itself because it brings you out of isolation and it tells you that you belong, you know, and migratory status should not be based on a document, but in the relationships that you have with the people who you live with. So I think, that’s my thoughts on that.
00;33;17;26 – 00;33;45;27
Sheldomar Elliot
Thank you for those thoughts, Liz. The Weston family is not out there, and for folks who are not
familiar with the Weston family, Galen Weston Junior is the president of Loblaws. And we all know how much money Loblaws made during the pandemic as we are all struggling with inflation and rising costs of food. So yeah, get him out there. He’s probably not struggling with inflation.
00;33;45;27 – 00;35;23;24
Hansel Igbavboa
It’s true though. They’re not out in the fields. And I think to put context to what Liz is saying a little bit more around migrant workers, it’s like, you know, it’s not called the Seasonal Agricultural Workers program. And it was actually started in 1966, and it was between the government of Canada and Jamaica bringing black folks to work in the fields, in terrible working conditions, asterix, terrible working conditions, and equally terrible pay. And the culture of that has just continued till today. The name has changed, like, I don’t know, maybe twice since 1966, and they’re still doing the same thing and they’ve just expanded it to other parts of the Caribbean, Mexico and like I think parts of East Asia, specifically the Philippines. And it is really like a lot of people refer to it and people who are migrant workers themselves, as modern slavery because folks are working on the field, they’re using sprayers, pesticides and whatnot without protective gear. You’re being exposed to so much harm. They’re getting sick. People are dying and there’s no care there at all. So it’s, I think, is so important to pull that into the conversation when we talk about food because like Liz said, who is picking the food? Canadian farmers, or the Canadian farmers on the farm, picking the food. Who really is doing the growing I think is important, and that collectivism of having a collective knowledge around the conditions that surround our food
system is so important.
00;35;23;24 – 00;37;11;04
Sheldomar Elliot
Absolutely and I think it just continues to shine a light on how exploitative this entire food system
really is from every point of view. And thank you for adding that context, Hansel. I will throw out a resource for folks who are listening, and you may want to learn more. There’s a really important documentary called Migrant Dreams, that was directed by Min Sook Lee and speaks all about a lot of these folks who are coming over from Jamaica, Mexico and the Philippines and sort of following them in their journey and their experience here, specifically in Leamington, Ontario, because it’s still ongoing and the government needs to do more about it. But yeah, there are really great groups and supports trying to assisting groups as they try to make their way, you know, really and truly Hansel, this, it really makes me think about how we’re getting farther and farther away from our food and quite frankly, our humanity. You know, we’ve traded so much in exchange for convenience, capitalism, and it feels to me like the main thing that we’re really losing is connection. And I feel like in any conversation about the ways things need to change, we need to center the folks who have been most marginalized, but I continue to go between optimism and pessimism about our ability to revalue the knowledge and the labour of our food workers from all systems, you know, whether they are migrant farmers to delivery folks,
to cooks. All of these folks are having different experiences at different parts of the food system. And in many ways, I feel like we’ve collectively lost a lot of our humanity. And, you know, it’s funny, there was a video that I watched on YouTube which sort of acted like the catalyst for the theme of the AGM. And I’ll paraphrase the clip a little bit just so we don’t have to spend too much time on it. But there’s this random tech bro –
00;37;11;06 – 00;37;12;24
Hansel Igbavboa
Generic random tech bro.
00;37;12;27 – 00;38;21;02
Sheldomar Elliot
Very generic random tech bro. He was talking about his entrepreneurship and his coffee company and all these things. And in his talk about branding and marketing, he said something along the lines of humans are loyal to convenience. And it’s strange to me, honestly, because I, I watched the whole video and regardless of whatever else I watched, that point stuck with me for so long. And it’s like my brain was stuck on him saying humans are loyal to convenience just because of the conviction and his voice as if it’s something that he knew to be true and it kind of sparked something unsettling in my mind. You know, despite, again, what the conversation was actually about. And that’s sort of what came about for the theme this year, you know, manifesting the Toronto we want, around convenience. So, you know, we see this today. Like you can get your fridge fully stocked without seeing a face like that kind of freaks me out. I know you can get food delivered to your door, but there’s services that they will come in, fill up your fridge, all of that kind of stuff.
00;38;21;02 – 00;38;22;09
Hansel Igbavboa
And you don’t see them?
00;38;22;10 – 00;38;24;26
Sheldomar Elliot
You don’t see them! They’ll just come running to your door.
00;38;24;26 – 00;38;27;14
Hansel Igbavboa
So a lot of ghost, ghost deliveries?
00;38;30;18 – 00;39;14;24
Sheldomar Elliot
You must have some real, real trust if you’re keeping your door unlocked for just anybody to come in. And honestly, I don’t know, I would never do this because I know what my fridge looks like and I need it to be organized. But some people are comfortable with this. And I think, again,
this speaks to this idea that, like, we don’t need to be interacting with people these days to get the needs that we we want or the food or whatever it is, which is really scary. And, you know, as we’re prioritizing convenience and ignoring long held knowledge of connection and spirit and land and all these things, where does this take us? And like, what are we really moving away from? I feel like Jennifer on the panel spoke to this idea of collective power really well:
00;39;14;24 – 00;41;17;04
Jennifer
Trying to make enough money on an app, you know, is is very isolating and a big part of the narrative that apps have sold both to customers, to workers, to members of government, is that nobody really needs to be connected with anyone. We don’t really need each other. If you order food, don’t think about the people who make the food. Don’t think about the people who brought you the food. You just order it on an app and you know, here in Toronto, our people are organizing to unionize and pushing back against one of the biggest international corporations in the world, trying to lobby the government for aggressive labour reform. But we’re also envisioning a future that looks different than the way things look now, and the way they looked in the past. A future where we, the people who do the work, own the means of our labour through a worker-cooperative business where we have the ability to you know, this industry I think is meaningful and provides value to many people in our community. It is also techno feudalism and we have the ability to challenge, to undermine and insert ourselves as the workers in that industry and begin to change the terms of how it functions. And all of that exists because we come together with each other, we build community, we organize, we talk with each other, and we challenge long held beliefs and trade them for understanding and embracing ideas like collective power and supermajority support from the people who do the work or the the people who experience the thing which must change. And so that’s, I see us coming to each other, which I think is really necessary.
00;41;17;04 – 00;41;18;26
Sheldomar Elliot
Yeah, she said that so well.
00;41;18;29 – 00;41;19;25
Hansel Igbavboa
Yeah.
00;41;19;29 – 00;41;22;29
Sheldomar Elliot
This techno feudalism is something I’ve got to learn more about.
00;41;23;08 – 00;42;56;00
Hansel Igbavboa
I feel like one of, I think this is important to say very often, because many people find it difficult to think outside of the construct of white supremacy and capitalism. The society that’s been created from those foundations, which is what we’re living in globally, honestly speaking to different degrees in different parts of the world. But many people find it difficult to think outside of that. And we need to start having more conversations of like, how can we assert ourselves? How can we assert indigenous knowledge of being and knowing of what’s around us and creation and all of that? How can we reassert ourselves? How can we reassert this knowledge centers us, and not profits and not money? She made a mention to a cooperative business model where the workers are the owners and the work is done for the benefit of the collective
and not profits for a few. I think really highlighting things like that is so important because a lot of us need something to help us go along in imagining of ways that we can exist outside of what we already exist in. We don’t have to be workers working for the profit, to line the pockets of a few people when we could be working for ourselves, You know? Why are we working for ourselves, right?
00;42;56;02 – 00;43;45;06
Sheldomar Elliot
Right! And it’s like a deep, deep conditioning that takes a lot of work to, I think unlearn is a nice way to put it. Like we really, there’s a lot of work to really tease out all of those ways of learning that we’ve been conditioned to understand. Unlearn is an understatement. Honestly! It is, It really is. Because like, yeah, you can try to remove yourself from the value of materialism and wealth, etc. But how do you reconnect, as you were saying, to like ourselves, our inner world, our spirit? I keep saying spirit but land and community, like that’s where, that’s where the real work happens. And they don’t make it easy. They definitely don’t make it easy.
00;43;45;06 – 00;43;45;22
Hansel Igbavboa
They don’t.
00;43;45;22 – 00;43;47;16
Sheldomar Elliot
I think Jennifer put that so well. But, you know, Michelle also brings up a really good point about newcomers coming into a city like Toronto who are feeling lonely, isolated, and a sense of despair:
00;43;57;08 – 00;45;41;09
Michelle
Like a lot of people in my neighborhood, I also feel that sense of hopelessness. You know, a lot of us economically, we’re just struggling. And again, like our society has created this system for individualism and you quite often hear, you know, especially newcomers are very lonely. You know, there’s a lot of isolation. And when there’s such despair between our society, it’s really hard to find ways to change and to feel connected to each other, right? And then when we have a government that feels – that is not connected to us, you feel like, where are you going to go? So on a larger scale, like, the reality is it is super challenging to create large scale change from the bottom up. And then on the other flip side we have a generation of farmers. We have more farmers that are over the age of 65 that are retiring compared to farmers under the age of 45. So it’s in a way, it’s a dying industry. And, you know, we have, developers wanting to grow onto their, you know, on their farmland. And these farmers are also inheriting like massive acres of land that they can’t manage. So we’re at a point where, like realistically A.I. is going to be farming for our commercial farmers, you know. So I think it’s very difficult to create change. And, you know, you mentioned our terrible election, but the problem is like leadership is essential.
00;45;41;26 – 00;45;54;25
Sheldomar Elliot
Yes, it is. And I think that’s such a timely thing to say. While Toronto is dealing with the real refugee crisis in terms of displacement and housing.
00;45;54;25 – 00;46;08;02
Hansel Igbavboa
Yeah, the federal government literally has black people who are seeking asylum on the streets of Toronto. Like, let that sit.
00;46;08;02 – 00;46;09;21
Sheldomar Elliot
Let that sit, please.
00;46;09;25 – 00;47;54;01
Hansel Igbavboa
It’s like and oftentimes like this is a conversation that is had a lot. Canada probably has the best PR [public relations] of all the Western countries, like the PR is top notch. Because this country’s always seen as progressive and everyone is welcome, we take care of newcomers and whatnot. But here we are going through the same things. And I think what’s happening right now with refugees being on the street is so important to recognize because that same Canada and I think it’s important and ties into what Michelle said is like there’s an aging population dying out, the people that are dying out. And Canada is dependent on immigration to fuel its economy. You do all these things to attract people. I mean, one, you’re stealing from them. There’s so much to talk about. Canadian mining companies on the African continent. You’re you’re doing all this to – there’s people coming here seeking asylum. And you have a hand in why they’re here. A huge hand in so many different aspects. And this is how they get treated when they get here. And it just goes to again, like even going back to how migrant workers are treated, how black and indigenous folks are treated in this country. Like, it shows. It shows. So anytime we talk about government, let’s always remember that they ain’t sh*t.
00;47;54;01 – 00;48;38;27
Sheldomar Elliot
The tea’s hot over here, folks! The tea’s hot! This is real, right? Like, this is so real. You know, even before we had asylum seekers coming here, black indigenous folks are experiencing disproportionate rates of food insecurity, housing insecurity, job insecurity, etc. and the Canadian government is to blame for all of this. And it’s part of this fragmented, sort of fractured society that we live in that is, again, foundation is colonial white supremacy, capitalism and trying to make a living and surviving in this country. It ain’t easy to say the least. And I think, Laurie, from the townhallthat you had, Hansel, has something to say about this:
00;48;38;27 – 00;50;52;19
Laurie
I think it comes down to what does reconciliation look like when it comes to food sovereignty and food security? You know, reconciliation is a big word right now. It’s a bit of a buzzword, I think that we’re seeing across Canada, in cities and towns and how people can do it. And it isn’t just about wearing an orange shirt, it’s not about going out and making sure your kids all have orange shirts on, orange shirt day. It isn’t about making sure that, you know, you’re just saying
that you’re thinking about reconciliation. There’s ways that is really is impactful. And I think one of the big things to think about with indigenous people and food sovereignty is that us being able to control our own nutrition and our own, you know, just our own access to food and our own access to wellness in our community allows us to continue that role that we have as stewards of the land. And making sure that the land is taken care of and that it’s all interconnected. So, you know, I think one of the things is that we’re seeing is that in our community, we have a lot of focus on wellness from social service agencies and, you know, support networks and that. But what we also see is a pretty fragmented and at times like piecemeal system of how to access food. A lot of different organizations offer food bank and food support. But it really is coming from a lot of places like Second Harvest and, you know, Daily Bread and donations and it often can be that dented, can approach, you know, out of the kindness of my heart, we’re donating this and it’s expired food and it isn’t really allowing for that opportunity to be on the land
and grow the food and understand where the food comes from. Like we have opportunities to have gardens that exist. And we definitely do have some really interesting indigenous garden projects that are happening in Toronto and, you know, food being grown and sourced that way and some land based stuff. But I think it’s that collective approach as a community together and within Dashmaawaan, like what we’ve done is we’ve done a lot of harvesting and a lot of foraging on the land and brought that back to the, you know, elders and heard their wonderful stories.
00;50;52;19 – 00;52;03;14
Laurie
We had an opportunity where we made lilac cake and harvested lilacs right from the trees. And the elders talked about it being something that they remembered as eating when they were children in the residential schools because they didn’t have access to sweet stuff. And they would, you know, just suck on the lilacs to get that essence and that fruit that sweet flavor. So we made cake for them with lilacs baked into it and you know, it really was a nice memory that they shared during a time of immense sadness. I think the other thing is that we’re dealing with so many different issues within our community that nutrition is the center of right, like we’ve had to deal with poor nutrition, from lack of access to good land to grow things on. We’ve had, you know, issues with residential schools, Indian hospitals, nutrition has been used and food has been a weapon that’s been used against us. And I think the city, you know, in their big movement to look at reconciliation often ignores the idea of what does food and food security look like in the middle of all that and how do we address that in a larger way than just putting a word like reconciliation in something like a food charter or a food plan?
00;52;03;19 – 00;52;54;01
Sheldomar Elliot
It’s wild, honestly. Like I’m thinking, first of if if I mean, you should know already that food is political future, if you’ve gotten this far to the episode and you’re still wondering food is absolutely political, but it’s really just again, sinking into this idea of like connection, connection to everything is really what is missing. And as we dream of a new future and going back to the theme for the AGM manifesting in Toronto that we want, we have to figure that out. We got to explore that. And I know Toronto has a new mayor, shout out to Olivia Chow. She won that and I know there’s a lot of folks feeling a renewed sense of hope. But you know, after this, back to you, Hansel. Are you hopeful? You take the word!
00;52;56;10 – 00;53;40;12
Hansel Igbavboa
I’m hopeful in the ways of my connection to my ancestors and to all the fighters that have come before me and all the people who have done the type of work that I do and I want to do. I’m hopeful in that sense, because you can never take that away from me. Am I hopeful for what
the government can do? You want to answer to that question? Blank! You can fill in the space. Yeah. I don’t know. There’s my answer.
00;53;40;24 – 00;53;57;24
Sheldomar Elliot
It’s like a madlibs game, I’ve got a few words. I’m trying to fill in the blank. I guess thinking about your Right to Food work. And do you feel like any of that will change with a new mayor or are you hopeful for more openness in that sense?
00;53;57;24 – 00;55;32;03
Hansel Igbavboa
Okay, kind of to continue what I just said earlier, community work will always happen. Community work will always exist. And I love that. Like a lot of people have made mention to this on the panel that happened in the AGM and also the town hall. And while Laurie is talking about the work that you do, community will always fend for yourself and build. And it’s a little connected to the idea of like when we start talking about dreaming, like we’re not dreaming of like a distant future. We’re dreaming of things are already happening. These things are not out of reach. These things are very much connected to ancestral knowledge, these things are connected to. The possibilities already happening within community like these are not far Fetched. They’re right beside us. They’re around us. They’re like screaming at us. They’re calling on to us. So it’s like I’m forever hopeful for that. I’m forever hopeful that, like,
we will continue to move. We will continue to resist. We’ll continue to move. We’ll continue to create. And that’s where my hope lies. That’s where my heart lies. And that’s where my work lies and the rest of the people can – we’re still going to push, you know, and in relation to my work here at FoodShare As the Right to Food Campaign Coordinator, it’s like we will still continue to let’s it’s my job, so I have to do it, I guess!
00;55;32;03 – 00;56;19;28
Hansel Igbavboa
We will continue to push the city because if we’re being forced to live within this like construct, constructed government that was constructed again on those foundations of white supremacy, capitalism, anti-blackness, anti-indigeneity, if we’re being coerced, which we are, to live under these conditions, then you bet we’re going to continue to to cause a ruckus like we’re not going
to stop talking about it. We’re not going to stop asking you
to do better. We’re not going to stop disrupting. We’re not going to stop non-conforming – we’re not going to conform to what you believe is right or how things should be.
So that’s that’s really that’s that’s the answer to that question.
00;56;19;28 – 00;57;06;17
Sheldomar Elliot
That’s a great answer. Thank you. The movers and shakers, really, I appreciate that, because I can understand where folks are coming from with seeing a new mayor and hoping for more progressive approaches to policy legislation. But ultimately, the system and I think keeping the center on community, as you just said, is really the focus here. And by supporting community, who knows what needs to be done for them. That’s how the real work happens. And I know, Hansel, in a lot of the work that you’re doing with Right to Food and the advocacy team, there is a role of creativity in arts. And there’s this new term that I’ve heard
you say recently of “Art-ivism.” Can you maybe just share a little bit about that, like how that’s showing up in your advocacy?
00;57;06;17 – 00;58;37;10
Hansel Igbavboa
So artivism is not a new term, but for me, it’s not it’s not popular. Yeah, it’s just referring to the role of art in activism work and how art has been used in many liberation movements and fights. And it’s especially as a black person and in a lot of black movements, art been an integral part of how we organize, how we move, how we push, how we move, like art is just fundamentally part of that. And I think art is also certainly accessible way for folks who are usually not part of conversations that we have around like food access, food sovereignty, like usually it’s only in like people who are in the media organizing space or in like political spaces or academic spaces that are usually engaged in this conversation. And we oftentimes use all the lingo and the jargon and whatnot. But art is just art. It’s it’s it is what it is. And like, people can engage with, the people can be a part of that conversation without being an artist, without having to know all the lingo and the jargons that come with sentence spaces. So, yeah, like That’s, that’s a stuff.
00;58;37;10 – 00;58;55;17
Sheldomar Elliot
Oh, I love that. And you know, to me, yeah, art in my mind has always been a way to, to like imagine alternative futures. And to just dream, essentially, of what is possible. What we don’t see and I know you folks did an exhibit called Realised, Re-imagine?
00;58;55;17 – 00;58;58;00
Hansel Igbavboa
Yes. So last year my coworker and I will organize the Realised, Re-imagined and of course, other team members in the comms team and everybody that work too. And it was – we commissioned three artists in the city of Toronto to create original works around the prompt of if we achieved a city where our rights are being respected and whatnot, what would it look like for
you as an individual or for your family, for your friends, loved ones, your community and those artists created each one original work around that and we exhibited that at Flemo Farm alongside photos that have been taken by photographer of different some of the growing programs that FoodShare is involved in around the city. And it was really a beautiful thing
because we had a couple of people registered through Eventbrite, but like most people who attended that event, were just walking by. It was a lot of people in the community who saw the work on the fence and were like, Oh my God, what’s that? Some of them were coming to give you their organic compost for the organic compost program that happens there. And they’re like, Oh, this is beautiful. People are just walking by, people driving by and they come in and that’s, that’s the people who are present at the event. So art is such a beautiful way. And also we had like a canvas on the floor actually multiple and the kids present too where like they were really going all out there and painting and drawing and it’s such a beautiful way to engage everybody, elders, younger folks, youth, adults, everybody in that conversation of what are we collectively dreaming about. And something we had was a response board where we had the prompts
on on those boards and people could write on sticky notes and then paste that on, I think things like that are beautiful because we can then see like what the collective dream of the community is. We often times think that we’re alone in our thoughts and dreams and aspirations for what our world should look like. But the honest truth is that like if you’re thinking it, many people are and how do we get that collected? Art is a beautiful way to bring that together.
01;01;23;12 – 01;02;08;12
Sheldomar Elliot
Yeah, thank you for that. I actually really, really love that project and I wish I was there to see it. But as you’re explaining it to me, I’m taking in that like that event alone touched on a lot of the things that we’ve been talking about throughout this conversation. Like you had art, which allowed folks to dream and like imagine that connection piece with community of people of all ages and backgrounds, whomever. But I think also the solidarity pieceof like understanding that communities working together and like black, indigenous, racialized, whomever coming together for a collective dream that works for all of us. And as we’re starting to wrap up this conversation, I think Shabina touched on this really quite beautifully during the panel:
01;02;08;12 – 01;03;08;16
Shabina
I grew up in the restaurant industry. My family came over as refugees and that’s kind of where everybody landed, right? And, you know, there’s always this dynamic of all the racialized folks who are actually making the food in the back and hiring white waitresses for the front because nobody wants to interact with us, right? You know, and I think for me, that informed my of a lot of the world. This is not necessarily what you’re doing or how much you know, it’s how you present
and how people recognize how you say it. And that’s the world we live in that’s determined by so many things, white supremacy, even academia at this point. Right. I mean, I remember being asked to speak at a conference where people were asking academics to speak about migrant workers. And when we had suggested actually workers who are organizing to come and speak,
the answer was no.
01;03;08;16 – 01;04;33;14
Shabina
And that’s that’s that’s just the reality. And to me, you know, I think in our work at the school, what I’ve learned is that for a lot of us this is times of prophecy, right? We’re told this is the moment where people from across the world are coming together and our sacred responsibility
is to be able to figure it out. And to me, I can try to beg people to care about people who are brutalized by this system. But the reality is that feels a lot like wasting time to me, the responsibility that I have. And I think a lot of people in our courses can relate, is about building a common understanding and a respect with one another. You know, there’s so much push in terms of being accepted a lot of the time, which I understand. But at the same time, the reality is there’s a lot of disdain between our communities for a lot of real reasons. So figuring out how to work with each other and to see where we overlap and you know, how to build that solidarity is really the important thing for me.
01;04;33;14 – 01;05;22;27
Shabina
And I think to me it’s a lot about humbling and listening and being uncomfortable, but that that’s how we build a foundation and yeah, to me that’s, you know, we’re building a course right now on, you know, ethical forging practices and so much of that. So most of these conversations
are within that, around stewardship. Who has the right to steward? Of course we all do. But where the hub, the conversation to meet that happen amongst different community leaders
that have historically been pitted against one another to survive. Right. And to me, that’s how we build, right, like we have so much in common. And that’s, you know we need to build from that.
01;05;22;27 – 01;05;48;13
Sheldomar Elliot
That was so beautifully put, we’ve got to work together. There’s no one leader, one person that’s going to save us all from systems that are deeply entrenched in our society. But we can dream. We can collectively dream, but we don’t want to see your dream or hear your dream if it’s not centering black and indigenous peoples first. And I think that’s a really important
takeaway.
01;05;48;13 – 01;05;49;18
Hansel Igbavboa
Snap, snap, snap! And like you said, we can dream all we want. But if anti-blackness and anti-indigeneity, and outside of the context of Canada there are many indigenous black folks. So it’s also recognizing that. And even within Canada too. And those are not mutually exclusive for the sake of like lingo, anti-blackness and anti-indigeneity, as long as they continue to exist in our midst, all the dreaming will just end up falling flat.
01;06;23;04 – 01;06;30;21
Sheldomar Elliot
We need good dreams, yo. Yes, we need collective dreams. Well thank you, Hansel, so much for being here today.
01;06;30;21 – 01;06;32;01
Hansel Igbavboa
Thank you for having me. This is a fun conversation! We’ve got to do this more often! Throw some shade –
01;06;43;00 – 01;07;25;10
Sheldomar Elliot
A little bit of tea, a little bit of politics. A little food, I love it. This is what it’s all about. Thank you for taking the time. So that’s it for this episode. Dignity and Joy is a podcast from FoodShare Toronto. We’re a food justice organization advocating for the right to food and working to challenge the systemic barriers that keep people from accessing the food they need to thrive. You can learn more about our work at FoodShare dot net. If you have feedback on the pod,
we’d love to hear from you. You can send us an email to info@FoodShare.net, or on our social media. We’re @FoodShareTO on Twitter, Facebook, LinkedIn and on Instagram. Hansel, if folks want to learn more about you or see what’s up, where can they find you?
01;07;25;10 – 01;07;47;22
Hansel Igbavboa
Well, you can find me in person and randomly. I’m on Instagram. My first and last name Hansel Igbavboa, but I don’t be posting so just find me on other people’s Instagram. I would say that, but you can follow me. And when I finally start posting then, you’ll see, you’ll see what I’m up to.
01;07;47;22 – 01;07;51;06
Sheldomar Elliot
It’s a rare occasion, but you can find him if you can find them. But listeners can also check out the virtual art exhibition around the right of food at realised-reimagined.net and you can watch the full conversations. We also pulled clips from on our YouTube channel so you can just search for FoodShare Toronto.
01;08;05;19 – 01;08;18;27
Hansel Igbavboa
Big ups to all the speakers, all the people whose clips we used. Laurie, Zakiya, Shabina, everybody. Laura on the podcast, I think all amazing, powerful conversations.
01;08;18;27 – 01;08;21;22
Sheldomar Elliot
Absolutely. I couldn’t have said that even better. You know, these are the folks who aren’t waiting around for government or anyone else to address the harm that’s being done by our food system. They’re leading the work right now. So tap into what they’re doing. You can find most of their links on FoodShare’s websites if you out the Supportive Partnerships
Platform tab, we have a lot more information about these folks and their groups. Dignity and Joy is produced in collaboration with Lead Podcasting. with sound engineering and editing by Michael Allen. The production team at FoodShare is Renée D’Souza and Andrea Thompson. Thank you so much for listening.