Virginia Food Security Summit

The Virginia Food Security Summit is held in Charlottesville as an initiative of the University of Virginia Department of Urban and Environmental Planning; UVA Institute for Environmental Negotiation; and Virginia Tech Department of Food Science and Technology. The summit is held when there is a specific need to bring Virginians together to discuss a specific proposal or action plan.

The 1st Virginia Food Security Summit was held on May 11th, 2007. The participants, including speakers, represented a wide array of interests – farming, farmers markets, food security, food retail, community gardening, non-profit environmental and planning organizations, academia, and federal, state, and regional agencies. The Summit seeks to pursue the following goals:

• To raise awareness and understanding in the Commonwealth of the need to improve Virginia's food security.
• To help people in different professions make connections and discuss possibilities for new policies,research, pilot projects, or other actions to improve Virginia's food security; and
• To explore the need for a stakeholder “roundtable” or state-level Food Policy Council to develop an integrated food security strategy for Virginia.

Participants were encouraged to think about and discuss all aspects of our food system-agriculture, economics, policy and regulations, nutrition, health, and environmental trends. Throughout the Summit, participants were offered opportunities to jointly envision ways to achieve a sustainable future for Virginia’s food system.