Fred Bahnson
Fred Bahnson is a writer, permaculture gardener, and pioneer in church-supported agriculture.
Fresh Ideas 2010
Ideas carry such significance because they provide inspiration and focus action. And innovation, a necessity for future economic growth and creating a better world, almost always starts with an idea. Five years from now, some of these Fresh Ideas might appear to have been too idealistic, while others might become accepted doctrine. But the importance of taking the time to stretch our thinking and reflect on better paths for achieving our goals is always of value.
Let’s change our food system first by ridding ourselves of the word system. Food is a sacred gift; it should not be saddled with the language of industrialization. A system is impossible to love, even one that’s organic or local. I have no alternative labels. I do have stories. As a writer, I tell stories of farmers and communities who recognize that the act of eating implies moral and ecological limits. From a church-supported community garden planting peace among neighbors, to Trappist monks growing oyster mushrooms for the glory of God, to a Kansas geneticist whose perennial wheat will one day revolutionize agriculture, I tell the stories of those whose work resists labels but whose lives embody a more holistic way to eat and live. I seek stories that provide glimpses of what the biblical writers called shalom, that graced state of being that results from a right relationship between land and people, made whole through food.
