Spam Spam Spam Spam - Wonderful Spam by Gia Machlin, September 22 2010, 0 Comments

...or How Big Cities Will Transform the Way We Eat

I'm not talking about the kind of spam you get in your inboxes, I'm actually talking about the canned meat of Monty Python fame. Why? Well, I don't know exactly, but my topic today is sustainable food, so somehow I associate spam with... non-sustainable food? Anyway, I remember when I first conceived of EcoPlum back in 2007, and I had a team of students from NJIT's Capstone Project working on a prototype website. We were programming the "EcoTipz" section of the site and were looking for some tips to start off with. One of the students wrote "Eat Less Meat." Well I was SO uninformed at the time, that I actually thought this was a joke. I thought the student was just populating EcoTipz with random phrases to test it. Turns out, the student knew a lot more about sustainability at the time than I did. (Horrified? Read more about my green evolution throughout this blog). It wasn't until I started to educate myself in preparation for our beta site launch in October 2008 that I began to learn about how eating meat affects the environment. We then published several articles on the topic, and I learned more.

Fast forward to September 2010. Last night I was at a House Party where Manhattan Borough President Scott Stringer came to talk about his sustainable food initiatives in NYC. I was thrilled to hear more about his Go Green East Harlem program and how it is now expanding to other parts of the city. Celebrity Chef Mario Batali has joined the cause by adopting Meatless Mondays in his restaurants. Chef Jamie Oliver and First Lady Michelle Obama are raising awareness and starting a school food revolution. Something really big is happening here and in other cities: urban farming, green roofs, curbside composting, healthy school food. I realize that for many of you in more rural areas (and some cities on the West Coast), this has been a way of life for a long long time. But this is different - I mean, who ever heard of growing cucumbers in the South Bronx? To get a good feeling of the kind of stuff about which I am ranting, check out this great video:

I hope you enjoyed it. Not only is this transformation fantastic for our personal health, but it's also going to have a huge impact on the environment. I mean, we all have to eat, so this is something that touches each and every one of us, every day. How will you revolutionize your food?