Farm to Plate is looking for 17 people who are active in the Farm to Plate Network to serve as Vermont delegates to the New England Food Summit, organized by Food Solutions New England.  This year it will take place on June 11-12 in Boston (this is the 5th such summit).  This year’s summit will include a focus on fair price, urban and metropolitan food system issues, and the central place of food justice and racial equity in food system sustainability. In particular, delegates should be prepared to engage in questions of race, equity, and food justice in the food system.

Each of the 6 New England states sends 12 delegates who come from a wide range of connection points in the food system to represent their state — and also sends an Emerging Leaders delegation of 19-29 year olds (3 per state), a funders delegation (2 per state), and this year, a food chain workers delegation (2 per state).

You can nominate yourself or nominate someone you know. We do this in an effort to encourage a diverse group to attend. It’s a great event each year and would help you to get a good grounding in the regional food system development work going on around us.  If you’d like to learn more about FSNE and about the Summit, go here: https://www.foodsolutionsne.org/2014-summit [note: the URL has not been change but the info on this page is for the 2015 Summit]. All the information you need to know – cost, timing, accommodations, etc. can be found on this web page.  If the cost of attending would be prohibitive, please apply anyways and indicate on the nomination form that you would like to discuss the possibility of receiving some financial support, so that you can attend the summit, in the event that you are selected for the delegation.

The deadline for sending in nomination forms to our office will be March 30 — please return nominations forms to Stephanie Smith (Stephanie@vsjf.org<mailto:Stephanie@vsjf.org>). The nomination form is here: https://www.foodsolutionsne.org/sites/default/files/FSNE%20Delegation%20Nomination%20Form%202015.pdf   The F2P Steering Committee will be reviewing all submitted applications and will make a decision by late April about who will be asked to represent Vermont at this year’s Summit.

Please feel free to contact Ellen Kahler if you’d like to talk over your nomination or if you have ideas about others they should be reaching out to.  In particular, they could use some assistance in identifying some food chain workers who might be interested in attending.  If you know people who work at food coops or in grocery stores, or are farm workers, tell them about the Summit and contact Ellen Kahler!

Thank you for considering this invitation to attend the 2015 New England Food Summit.

Courtesy of Ellen Kahler, Executive Director, Vermont Sustainable Jobs Fund, 3 Pitkin Court, Suite 301e, Montpelier, VT 05602, 802-828-5320, www.vsjf.org