Episode 20: Cultivating Their Own Sustainable Food Systems: Indigenous and Black Communities (SF Bay Area and Detroit, MI)

Everyday Climate Champions

In this double-length episode, we speak with folks doing similar work in both the San Francisco Bay Area and Detroit, Michigan. Our two guests – Joshua Hoyt from the Cultural Conservancy’s Native Foodways Program and Shakara Tyler from the Detroit Black Community Food Sovereignty Network – are reclaiming the right to feed themselves and own their communities' ecologically sustainable food systems. They are nourishing their communities by restoring cultural and spiritual ties with the Earth, building their local economies, and healing historical traumas. We all learned a lot about how their work is taking shape in different cultural contexts, with strong overlap.

Great Guest Quote: “If we don't actually address the ways that we relate to the environment and our place in it, then we will just continue to make the same mistakes over and over again.” - Joshua Hoyt, Native Foodways Program

Guests: Joshua Hoyt, from the Cultural Conservancy's Native Foodways program (San Francisco Bay Area’s Sonoma County); Shakara Tyler from the Detroit Black Community Food Sovereignty Network

Keywords: #climatecrisis,#climateaction,#climatejustice,#foodsovereignty;#nativeamericanjustice,#blackfarmers;#indigenousfarmers;#nativefood

Co-Hosts: Dalya Massachi and Kevin McClendon (Proximate media platform: https://www.proximate.press)

Transcript: https://docs.google.com/document/d/15BYaXimbGtwxg-Os86fqYBoEgijXMmDJ1656l-vs9rQ/edit?usp=sharing

This episode’s recap blog post: coming soon

Related Action Resources:

Cultural Conservancy’s Native Foodways Program: https://www.nativeland.org/native-foodways and their podcast, the Native Seed Pod: https://www.nativeseedpod.org

National Library of Medicine article on Native American food insecurity and poor health outcomes: https://pmc.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/articles/PMC5422031/

Detroit Black Community Food Sovereignty Network: https://www.dbcfsn.org/

Story of the Detroit Black Farmer Land Fund: Decolonization and Abolition in Practice (video): https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Z5IrZcWklWM

Twin Cities Public TV: Article on a new generation of Black farmers and faith leaders cultivating the future of food sovereignty: https://www.tptoriginals.org/whats-happening-on-the-front-lines-of-food-justice/

Related Everyday Climate Champions Episodes :

• “The Black Church’s Inspiring Work in Environmental Justice”: https://open.spotify.com/episode/1L0RBmzhUUCFWYyYtvTcQt
• "Indigenous-Led Climate Justice": https://open.spotify.com/episode/4EhJRVjxQL5fcFSkivSGT1?si=uBwMSn-VSFe796PBDkE25Q

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Podcast Production Team: Executive Producer/Editor: Dalya Massachi; Sound Designers/Engineer: Martin Sanchez; Co-Hosts/Researchers: Ellisa Feinstein, Isabella Genereaux, Sean Mendelson, Hasini Parepalli, Logo Designer: Gabriela Vargas