Easy Guide to Community Food Coops
Hi I’m Amie and I run slow fashion business, community food coops, and I’m launching a social enterprise that educates all on the social, economical and most vehemently the environmental impacts we have as humans upon this earth we call home. I don’t just tell you and inform about this green way of life. No I truly live it everyday. Some days more than others. We are taking this journey together as one. We need to help, serve and educate one another.
We are so proud of what we have achieved in such a short space of time and equally happy to announce the start of saving food waste and feeding the people of North Lincolnshire and the Humber region in the best way we know possible. We have searched for reason and rhyme within the realm of playing our part for the climate emergency, whilst also raising awareness and alongside to help others. We found this in such a way that we never thought possible.
It seemed too far of a stretch really, but funnily enough when other people hear and respond in a way that is engaging you know you must be on to something, to see people with genuine grave concern, feeling the same way as you do and wanting to play their part you know you have found something that can have an impact. That will change perspectives, which could transform the way people live their lives.
We are so unbelievably grateful today that our Community Food Coop’s are flourishing and growing exponentially and proving to be the right way to reach out and lend a hand and take a role in the climate emergency, that which everyone can and will understand. We are reacting to the needs of local people. Responding to a powerful need of saving that waste. Ensuring that those who want to take part are taken seriously and that we meet those needs and develop and change our approach based on our members.
Are you up for it?
So it may be a good point to reflect and start at the very beginning of this…
It takes only a small second to realise a true ‘path’ but it takes years of preparation to be in that space at the right time and be willing to accept and step up to that when it arrives. We understand that for some this may seem far fetched and not true to life but for us it is the reality that we live in. Knowing that you have a purpose but yet to find it, weighs heavy on the heart and shoulders. Knowing that you could be doing more but don’t feel in a position to do so, is and could be a mixture of a lack of confidence. It could be that you truly don’t have the faith within yourself to make those judgements. Who am I to think that I have a greater purpose? Who am I to think that lowly old I would be here to play an exceptional role in this life?
Those of that pre-disposition know that and others may never fully understand the calling. We spend most of our lives waiting and wondering when it will become. We hope that it comes sooner when we are full of life, healthy and able to carry out such enormous tasks. It has weighed heavy on my soul for too many years to remember, but what I realise now is that was everything being set in order, that was everything getting ready for the time when it would happen, and for me that time seems like it is now.
There is not a day, nor moment that goes by when I don’t read something, listen out for sounds, wait for a sign and this has proven to me that is how I respond to the world around me, with what I have read, looked at and enquired about. It is so easy to look at something and dismiss it, to read a story in the papers and be concerned but then soon after forget its relevance. This is a regular occurrence. The irregular occurrence’s are the ones that don’t fade to the background. The ones that stick in your memory. The ones that even if you try to, they stick in the memory, in the mind and they will not budge no matter how hard you try.
This truly comes into force when I take note of something, the spark of imagination sets off and an idea can be born. A link is magnetised and we then feel ready and confident to take a step forward. This happened when I read a local newspaper in March of 2021. A little nod to myself, a little reading out loud to confirm, a little wry smile to myself. Ah this is it…
In some way I have always felt the deafening cry of climate change and our human reaction to it. Let’s say it is inbuilt in me to respond and react that way. Always feeling like I could do more, should do more and will do more. Feeling a limitedness but yet limitless opinion on how that could happen. Being open to your minds eye and being able to interpret those signs has been key to figuring out the way to do this. Allowing yourself to feel the anger, the pain, the cause for concern and allowing that negativity to form in to something of positive use once you realise the way you can help. The enormity of it is too weighty for one person but when you realise it is a shared entity you can realise your overriding power to some good use!!
I came across the food coop as a concept and was immediately struck by the power of that as ‘food for thought/food for change’ quite literally! Once I entered that world, there was no going back. Within this last few months we have changed, grown and shown that as a collective we can do amazing things and we can make a difference. We can see a strength in the movement and it continues to grow with each and every day and moment that we breathe the fight. We are saving food waste, we are feeding local people, those of the older generation, families, living alone, those that need social interaction, those that have dietary needs that can’t be met by the standard way we shop. We are fighting a fight that feels impossible to make a dent in but one that must be done. We have joined forces across the region to build a better community and network. One that is resilient, one that is raising awareness, one that is sharing the unheard voices and one that won’t go quiet.
We are working as one community to save food waste from landfill, to recycle where necessary and to make use of surplus that would ordinarily fill our earth. We are taking this and filling our heart and bellies instead. Filling our minds with the wonder of what could be done, what can and will be done and why it should be something that every community does without question. We truly are coming together as one, working collectively, cooperatively and without any prejudice. With love, care and kindness we strive to reach out across this nation and beyond to engage and enthuse, to feed and nourish, to bring hope and unity.
We started as one, we grew to two and who knows what next. Our community food coops are a sanctuary, an awareness raising platform, a place to interact, a place to network, a place to meet, a place to find common ground within this environmental struggle. We can do our little bit. We can make needed changes to our local structure and we can help shift the way people think.
We run The Low Villages Pantry as Cooperation Brigg from Bonby Village Hall plus our new sister food coop Cooperation Humber based in Baysgarth Wellbing Hub Training Kitchen in Barton-Upon-Humber. If you would like any more information please visit the community food coop page on the Slow Circular Earth website.
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