Game Over: Ending Corporate Agriculture’s Game of Monopoly
Wednesday, October 23, 7-8:30PM ET
Click here to register!
For decades, agribusiness giants and multinational corporations have treated our food and farm system as a twisted game of Monopoly. Join the National Family Farm Coalition (NFFC) and Iowa Citizens for Community Improvement (Iowa CCI) for a compelling free webinar that exposes the monopolization of agriculture by these corporate titans.
Austin Frerick, author of Barons: Money, Power and the Corruption of America’s Food Industry, will pull back the curtain to reveal how a handful of companies, led by massively powerful modern-day “Robber Barons,” have managed to seize control of the food we eat—at the expense of independent farmers, consumers, and the environment. Then, hear from farmers who are actively taking control of their own livelihoods and empowering themselves and others to challenge the status-quo.
With upcoming elections and a new Farm Bill on the horizon, we’ll also explore promising federal policy efforts that could reshape our food system—and how you can take action to support a more just, equitable future.
About our speakers:
Austin Frerick is an expert on agricultural and antitrust policy. He worked at the Open Markets Institute, the U.S. Department of Treasury, and the Congressional Research Service before becoming a Fellow at Yale University. He is a 7th generation Iowan and 1st generation college graduate, with degrees from Grinnell College and the University of Wisconsin, Madison.
Barb Kalbach is a fourth-generation family farmer, retired registered nurse, and board president of Iowa Citizens for Community Improvement. She first became active in politics and the family farm movement during the 1980’s Farm Crisis. Keeping the family legacy alive, Barb and her husband raised three children on their family farm. In 2002, Barb organized with her community to fight back against a proposed factory farm, with the support of Iowa CCI, and became active within the organization. She believes firmly in the power of people standing together in rural areas to advocate for solutions to shared challenges.
Duron Chavis is the founder of Happily Natural Day; a grassroots nonprofit dedicated to holistic health, culture and social change. For over a decade, Chavis has utilized urban agriculture as a strategy for building community agency and ownership in marginalized communities. As co-founder of the Central Virginia Agrarian Commons; a BIPOC led community land trust that received 85 acres of farm land as an act of reparative justice – Chavis works to redistribute land to Black and Brown farmers across Central Virginia. Whether the transformation of vacant lots or the revitalization of unused municipal buildings; Chavis uses local food as a tool to build racial equity, climate & food justice and community resiliency. As long time collaborator with the Agrarian Trust, Chavis works with the National Family Farm Coalition and the American Farmland Trust to advocate on a national level for equitable policy reform for rural and urban farmers especially around access to land and credit
Kenya Abraham is a Fayette County, KY farmer and co-founder of the micro-dairy Slak Market Farm LLC. Her farm specializes in producing signature raw milk products, halal meat and pastured eggs. Kenya is strongly dedicated to utilizing the farm as a place for serving the well-being of both her family and community. She also operates Stack A Story Bookshop, a nonprofit bringing kids into agriculture through Writing Workshops, Family Farm Stays and Barnyard Expos. Kenya is a trained certified organic inspector for crop and livestock production through the International Organic Inspectors Organization (IOIA), and she worked as a farmer liaison for Equity in Agriculture, building relationships and working to push beyond the issues and limitations of systematic racism and bottlenecks affecting small family farmers. In 2020, Kenya was awarded the Small Farmer of the Year Award from Kentucky State University and the Emerging Leader Award from the Community Farm Alliance. In her role at the Organic Association of Kentucky (OAK), Kenya manages a new Mentor/Mentee program for organic farmers across Kentucky and delivers one-on-one organic certification technical assistance to Kentucky farmers.