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I work for Oxfam Australia as the “Food Justice Community Engagement Coordinator”. This basically means that I coordinate programs to support people to make fair and sustainable food choices in their everyday lives – and know that they are making a real difference to the world. The project I am currently working on is called the GROW Challenges.

This has come about from research that Oxfam has conducted in response to the fact that 870 people go to bed hungry each night. As individuals in Australia, this is a daunting fact and one that leaves many people asking “so what can I do?”.The GROW Challenges are all about supporting people to make changes in their everyday lives in support of food justice, as well as to take other actions such as telling politicians and companies to stop undermining people’s right to food.

The Six GROW Challenge principles are:

1. Growing and eating sustainably – Reducing chemicals and restoring the health of our lands and water systems.
2. Reducing food waste – So we’re making the most of the precious resources that go into making food.
3. Supporting small farmers – Choose products that ensure small farmers get a fair deal.
4. Cooking smart – To cut down on wasted water and energy.
5. Buying food that’s in season – Cutting down on greenhouse gas emissions.
6. Eating less meat and dairy – To reduce both greenhouse gas emissions and water use.

The fact that one in eight people are hungry in the world, and over three million children die each year because of poor nutrition plagues my mind at night. This is really hard to take, especially when there is more than enough food produced globally, and simple and effective solutions are well known: such as supporting small-scale farmers (especially women); investing in food security infrastructure; and employing appropriate agricultural principles (known as agroecology).

The United Nations World Food Program calculates that only US$3.2 billion is needed each year to feed all 66 million hungry school-age children. To put this figure in perspective, Foodwise estimates that Australians throw away $8 billion worth of food a year!

Australians are the third largest meat eaters in the world. Only Luxembourg and the USA are bigger animal consumers than Aussies. My one wish for our Australian food future is that we learn to harness the protein, nutrients and overall environmental benefits of plant-based proteins to replace the massive amount of unnecessary meat eaten in this country (and globally).

Livestock production accounts for 70% of all agricultural land around the world. This could be better used creating high protein food that could be eaten by humans rather than animals.

Not really proud in the sense of it being an achievement (because it’s just “normal” for me), but being a vegan for 18 years feels very good (but also really easy). My success with growing Rainbow Chard is also right up there!

Avocados. Lots of them with lemon, salt, pepper and NZ organic Kaitaia hot sauce please.

Oxfam Australia’s GROW Challenges take six sustainable and fair eating principles, and provide support, information and inspiration. To sign up, please just go to: https://www.oxfam.org.au/my/act/take-the-grow-challenge/.