Free Write- My Personal Experience

How does local, especially local food systems, correlate with my degree in Public Service and Public Policies (Sustainability)?

First off, through my journey here at Arizona State University, I have specifically become interested in sustainability through food. I started off by realizing how backwards our food systems are (this is a completely separate topic, so I don't want to go off on a passionate tangent). Then I realized how much energy, such as fossil fuels, go into production of agriculture and meat. I really changed a lot of my own habits through these realizations. When I came across Local First Arizona's local food systems internship, I felt it was the missing piece to my puzzle.

My internship helped me piece together the fact that a sustainable, and healthy, food system, is predominately local. It has been such a great experience to learn about local food  systems hands on, with the community. Like I have mentioned so many times before, Farmer's Markets are truly a great place to experience these concepts. 

With all that said, local and sustainable foods fall into Public service, because helping the public provide themselves with healthy and local foods is a service. With that, helping to develop policies towards the promotion of local and healthy foods, as opposed to the easy entry of the market of fast food chains vs. grocery stores and markets, is something I would love to be a part of in the future. I have learned to work with the community, again falling into place of public service, and understanding how to make a change for the public through service and policies. 

Most importantly, I realized that you have to inspire and motivate the population to want to make a change, such as a sustainable movement. It is important to understand the population will continue to grow, so policies and service will have to be innovative and adapt. Starting with a social movement is truly the key component.