Spring is Here! Are You Ready to Occupy Big Food?

Occupy Big Food was on Heritage Radio Network last week with Chef Erica Wides click here to listen to Lets Get Real.

Here’s what host Chef Erica Wides wrote about the show:

In tonight’s episode — Big Foodiness Gets Occupied — I get real about how to snatch food back from the jaws of corporate foodiness with Occupy Big Food co-founder Kristin Wartman; why the McDonalds and Applebee’s crowd or the garden burger and protein bar crowd should care about how their chicken fingers or their Tofu Chik’n Fingers are produced; Wartman’s theory that the Sarah Palin chocolate chip cookie defenders identify with their corporate food kidnappers a la the Stockholm Syndrome; and whether the Occupy Big Food message can realistically get out to the mainstream in time to save food for the future or if real food is going to be permanently replaced by foodiness like Facebook has replaced friends and reality shows have replaced talent.

And this afternoon Occupy Big Food talked with Richard Hill of the Organic Farm Report live on WPKN, which you can listen to here.

Remember this? It’s a picture from our rally at the end of last year in Liberty Park. We are working on new ideas and actions now and will have updates soon. Thanks for tuning in and get ready to Occupy Big Food. Real change is brewing, can’t you feel it?

URGENT ACTION: TOMORROW: PROTEST CFO OF MONSANTO IN NYC TIMES SQUARE

PROTEST MONSANTO CFO IN TIMES SQUARE TOMORROW 12/7 @ 10:45AM

PLEASE RSVP ON FACEBOOK: https://www.facebook.com/events/186225294804080/

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE

New York — 12/6/2011 Occupy Big Food is organizing a protest this Wednesday when Monsanto CFO Pierre Corduroux, will address top banking executives and investors at The Crowne Plaza Hotel in Times Square for the Bank of America Merrill Lynch 2011 Industrials conference at 11:45 am. We will gather on the corner of 42^nd Street and 6^th Avenue near Byrant Park at 10:45 and march to the hotel together before his scheduled appearance at 11:45. The Crowne Plaza Hotel is located at 1605 Broadway near 49^th Street.

Because of the policies and practices of companies like Monsanto, 75 percent of Americans are obese or overweight and many are chronically ill with diet-related diseases. Americans are largely dependent on an increasingly unhealthful and contaminated food supply that is heavily controlled by corporate interests. Upending corporate control of the food supply is a fundamental change that must occur if the “99 percent” are to have access to real food and be healthy participants in a true democracy. Monsanto is the prime example of a corporate monopoly over the American food supply. It controls 93 percent of all soy and 80 percent of all corn grown in our country. Its GMO-contaminated corn and soy are in nearly every packaged and processed industrial food product sold in the United States.

Occupy Wall Street understands that Monsanto and corporations like it—whose driving force is profit not the health of the people, the country, or the environment—cannot be allowed to continue to control our political systems and unduly influence our elected officials. Occupy Big Food works to expose the ways in which corporations control the food supply resulting in an unsafe and unregulated food supply with virtually no oversight and a population in the midst of a dire health crisis.

Occupy Big Food’s goal is to expose the corporate take over of the American food supply. A few companies control the vast majority of food production in the United States and those unhealthy foods are making Americans sick. We urge Americans to boycott corporate foods and support local food and local farmers to take back our food and take back our health.

Contact:          Kristin Wartman

Occupy Big Food

occupybigfood.wordpress.com

949-370-7877

kristin.wartman@gmail.com

Occupy Big Food on BBC Worldwide

Illustration by Brian Lawless*

After our amazing and inspiring rally yesterday, the BBC called and asked me to come on the program Up All Night to talk about my article on the Huffington Post, “Congress Declares Pizza A Vegetable?” and Occupy Big Food. The program’s host, Dotun, is really funny — especially when he says, “Kristin, let’s be honest, Americans don’t know what a vegetable is.” Please take a listen!

Thank you to all who came out and supported the movement yesterday! This is only the very beginning of a growing and deeply needed movement. We are already planning our second rally which will feature some exciting performers. We look forward to building and growing this movement with all of you.

Click the play button below to hear my segment

*For more of Brian’s artwork and sounds visit Wasteland Lotus

Saturday’s Rally Audio Clips

Here are the audio clips from our rally on Saturday. Thanks to Jack Inslee of Heritage Radio Network for recording and putting this together. You’ll hear from Anna Lappe, Marion Nestle, and others active in the food movement. You’ll also hear thundersnow! The storm was intense but we still managed to express our frustration and concern with our food supply. We’ll post an update soon for when we will hold our next rally!

Saturday’s Rally Audio Clips

Heritage Radio Newtork Interview

Erika and I were on Heritage Radio Network this afternoon with Katy Keiffer to discuss the motivation behind Occupy Big Food, our first rally, and what our next steps will be. Please take a listen and leave your comments and thoughts! Special thanks to Jack Inslee of Heritage Radio for covering the rally — we will be posting more audio clips from the rally soon.
Straight, No Chaser – Episode 3 – Occupy Against Big Food

First Aired – 10/30/2011 01:00PM

Hosted By

On this week’s edition of Straight, No Chaser, Katy Keiffer is joined by food activists Erika Lade and Kristin Wartman to discuss yesterday’s Occupy Against Big Food Rally. Tune in and find out more about the growing movement to change our food system in this country. Can things be fixed by venture capitalists and corporations or do we have to take things into our own hands? Tune in and get inspired!