We are BETTER TOGETHER: 2023 Alaska Food and Farm Festival Recap

For the 2023 Alaska Food and Farm Festival, we collaborated with the Alaska Farm Bureau and Western Sustainable Agriculture Research and Education (SARE). From November 10-12, in Anchorage as well as online, over 500 people from all sectors of Alaska’s food system came together to learn, share knowledge and ideas, and connect. The sessions and gatherings were packed with food policy experts, farmers, food service professionals, distributors, educators, mental health workers, funders, Tribal entities, and more. The diversity of ideas and experiences gave us a unique moment to cross-pollinate solutions and strategies, aimed at collectively building a better food system for all Alaskans.

And that’s exactly what we wanted from this collaboration. More people talking and igniting conversations to discover the wealth of resources at their disposal, inspiring a shared vision for a robust and sustainable food network that can comprehensively support every facet of our local food systems in Alaska.

““I think we as a country and even within communities are in a moment that feels pretty divided right now. But food is at the core of all of our health and well-being. This event brought people together who may normally not share the same views on every issue, but can come together to work on developing food systems that work for everyone from small-scale farmers to large-scale purchasers and everyone in between. Food security is a priority for everyone because food is a core human need, and because of that we can come together to overcome the hurdles and build something that works with and for all of us .””

— Robbi Mixon, Executive Director, Alaska Food Policy Council.

Day 1:

The Day started with a beautiful opening ceremony that included a landing acknowledgment and grounding exercise by Jessica Ross. Governor Dunleavy, US Representative Mary Peltola, and US Senator Dan Sullivan each sent in video speeches in support of our farmers and foodways. The day was packed with informative sessions including:

“Alaska Food Strategy Task Force: Report One Listening Session” with Senator Shelley Hughes,
Plenary session with keynote speakers Tikaan Galbreath and Meda Dewitt on “Navigating Modern Landscapes with Traditional Plants”,
“Disaster Preparedness for Food System Partners” with guest speaker Cara Mae Wooledge,
and so many more sessions touching on food security issues and opportunities from the Aleutian Pribilof Islands Region to Prince of Wales and across the state.

Also, AFPC joined our Hawaii Good Food Alliance and Intertribal Agriculture Council partners onstage to share the exciting opportunities on the horizon with our Regional Food Business Centers (more to come from us on that!).

We ended the evening with a delightful Mix and Mingle social event that included a book signing by renowned food systems researcher and 2023 Keynote Speaker, Ken Meter. We also had the opportunity to honor our three newest Food Hero recipients: Tanana Valley Farmers Market & Brad St.Pierre, Alutiiq Grown (a program of Kodiak Archipelago Leadership Institute) & Robbie Townsend Vennel, and Calypso Farm & Ecology Center.

Day 2:

Through the hard work of the festival partners and the Egan Center, local food wholesaler Arctic Harvest Deliveries became an official vendor of the venue, which will enable local food producers to sell to future events. This partnership began with our festival’s “breakfast for lunch” where both US Senator Lisa Murkowski and AK Representative Genevive Mina gave impassioned in-person speeches sharing their commitments to supporting improved accessibility and sustainability in Alaska’s food system. They were followed by Keynote Speaker Mariah Gladstone, founder of Indigikitchen, who provided a cooking demonstration while weaving together the history of traditional foods and their significance to all of our communities. Again we had a very full day of sessions that started with the Alaska Farm Bureau's Annual meeting at 8 am. Sessions ran the gamut of topics from traditional foods to funding resources and technological innovations. Just to mention a few:

“Unlocking the Mysteries of Organic Certification in Alaska: Listening Session and Workshop,” with our partners at Oregon TILTH and the Northwest Transition to Organic Production Program
“Youth Loan Opportunities with FSA”
“Agrivoltaics: Launching a new project looking at the feasibility of combining agricultural and solar production in Alaska”
A walkthrough of the new report “Food Security and Sovereignty in Alaska Native Communities: Recommendations for Improving Language and Inclusivity in Food and Agriculture Programming”
and so many more.

The evening ended with a rowdy banquet and live auction hosted by the Alaska Farm Bureau where they presented Kevin Fochs with the Agriculture Appreciation Award for his years of work with Future Farmers of America, and AK Representative Shelley Hughes with the Legislator of the Year Award, for her work chairing the AK Food Strategy Task Force.

Day 3:

Our final day was still packed with nearly 50 vendors and a huge lineup of workshops and sessions. As multiple participants walked from session to session with beautiful bouquets from our Floriculture workshops, sessions moved forward focusing on a multitude of core issues and opportunities. Sessions included:

“Variety Trials for Alaska: Aiding in Research-Based Decision-Making for Which Vegetables to Grow”
“Community Connects: Gardening as a Force for Social Change”
“Seeds of Resilience: Farm Stress and Mental Health in Agriculture”
And the Keynote speech from Ken Meter: “Forty Years Promoting Alaska Grown”

“It’s very exciting to see the collaborations that are forming with a lot of spirit and genuine interest in each other. Forty years ago when I first came here, people were not talking to each other. They didn’t recognize each other and to see them really laughing together, joking with each other and also really saying, ‘we are on the same trajectory’ is really wonderful.”

— - Ken Meter, Food Systems Analyst and Keynote Speaker

Many of the sessions spoke to the challenges of growing and distributing food in Alaska but the community that we were building at this festival felt like hope. We are scrappy in Alaska and we understand the connections needed to survive. We hope that the conversations started in these three days will help us all do more than survive, we thrive because we are BETTER TOGETHER.