2020 Summit - Lightning Talks - Alita Kelly

The future of food is food sovereignty. Food sovereignty can't be realized until we empower diversity in the practice of farming not only through supporting black farmers but through providing financial and educational support to aspiring farmers of color. "There were only 45,500 Black farmers — roughly 1.3% of all US farmers — in the United States in 2017 according to the most recent USDA Census of Agriculture." Food justice means the most marginalized groups of our society have the opportunity to be represented in our agricultural landscape, therefore we must begin to unpack why land acquisition is so difficult for these groups and provide some solutions to the barriers these individuals face.