On Congress’s the first day back to work after the November 2018 election, hundreds of young people with the Sunrise Movement  lined up outside the office of House Democratic leader Nancy Pelosi.

They were there to demand a Green New Deal. 

The protesters carried envelopes stuffed full of thousands of letters from other young people. One by one, they filed into Pelosi’s office. Some gave short speeches as they delivered their demands. The 51 of them who sat down in Pelosi’s office and refused to leave were arrested.

When it was her turn to speak, Sophia Zaia from Philadelphia said:

“Back in Nancy Pelosi’s home state, 42 people were just burned alive by wildfires, that are described as fire tsunamis, that we literally do not know how to fight. And she’s come to that crisis with a water gun, saying that she’s going to revive a committee to talk about evidence of climate change? That maybe would have been helpful back in 1968, when Exxon first learned about climate change. But that, today, is so, so far from what we need.”

TAKE ACTION: Ask your members of Congress to support the Sunrise Movement’s Green New Deal!

The regenerative food and farming movement didn’t get everything we wanted out of the 2018 elections—either in terms of candidates or, as Greg Palast documented, in terms of fair elections. Clearly, our democracy is far from perfect.

But thankfully, that hasn’t stopped the movement for health, justice and regeneration.

On November 6, the country elected several inspiring new leaders, some of whom are already getting to work at the local, state and federal level. On the ballot initiative front, voters in Portland, Oregon, passed a progressive initiative that will, among other things, direct funds to regenerative agriculture projects that sequester greenhouse gases and support local food production.

Today is World Food Day. 

It’s also a day when millions of people are cleaning up after yet another weather-related disaster, this time in Florida. And millions more around the globe are experiencing devastating droughts and crippling storms that are leaving them unable to grow food and feed their families.

We often think that we, as individuals, have little or no power to solve problems as complex and overwhelming as global warming and world hunger.

And yet, we do. The personal choices we make when it comes to our food, and the demands we make of our local, state and federal politicians to adopt climate change-reversing food, farming and and land-use policies give us the power to do something, everyday, to reverse our dangerous course.

TAKE ACTION: Today, on World Food Day, please ask your state leaders to follow the example of California and Hawaii by adopting food- and agriculture-focused strategies to address climate change.