Fresh, affordable and locally produced food is essential to our well-being. Our food system puts at risk our health, farm animals, the rural economy and the whole planet. Supermarkets exploit farmers and increase the distance food travels from farm to table, increasing air pollution and global warming. Oil shortages, price rises or global conflicts could make food scarce within weeks. We must plan for such a possibility. We need a different approach to producing food that places more value on viable family farms, sustainably produced food and the landscape.

In Sheffield

Affordable, sustainably produced, fresh and locally grown food is beyond the reach of most people in Sheffield. Fairly traded food and local food initiatives are often swamped by the corporate food industry. Supermarkets have an effective monopoly over the food market.

Jamie Oliver's school meal ideas have raised awareness of the dire state of our diets. Obesity levels and poor nutrition continue to grow. Junk food
advertising and health-damaging vending machines are in many public
places and buildings. Schools and local community centres are losing their
facilities to cook decent meals.

Sheffield Farmers’ Market is struggling to survive and the rural economy is in crisis. Allotment holders are hampered by a lack of fresh thinking. No-one wants Genetically Modified food, yet commercial pressures are forcing it into our diet.

The Green Party has:

• Supported the push for Fair Trade status for Sheffield.
• Campaigned for Sheffield Farmers Market to be in the Ci ty Centre and operate regularly on a Saturday.

Our local Green Party members will:

• Contribute to local food strategy for Sheffield.

Our Green Councillors have:

• Supported local retailers and tried to curb the power of supermarkets.
• Promoted gardening and allotments.

Our Green Councillors will:

• Support the Soil Association's "Food for Life Targets” to get fresh, seasonal,local and organic ingredients into school meals and extend this into hospitals, care homes, council facilities and prisons.
• Work to highlight the continuing problems faced by independent family farms though the campaign group Farm and the Peak District Rural Deprivation Forum.