Nearly everyone is concerned nowadays about healthy food for themselves and their families. The recent surge in demand for organic food, natural health supplements, and home-cooking during the pandemic, are certainly not partisan trends. Increasing numbers of Republicans and Democrats, as well as Independents, are becoming organic consumers, that is if they can afford to buy organics, given the increasing high costs of living (housing, transportation, health care, education, taxes) in the U.S. In this regard, putting more money in ordinary people’s pockets, fighting for economic justice and supporting working class struggles are one way that we can make organic food more affordable for everyone, not just the middle-class.

Another populist issue that can unite us as a nation is to stop allowing the government to use our tax dollars to subsidize corporate agribusiness and Big Food. Instead we need to unite a critical mass to make organic and healthy food, produced by family farmers, ranchers, and small businesses available for everyone, including lower-income/working class communities and students at school.

OCA believes that the overwhelming majority of Americans can come together to transform our food and farming system in a way that not only improves our health and the health of the environment, but also unites us politically, urban and rural, farmer and consumer.

But one thing people need to be reminded of, over and over again, is that Corporate America’s government-subsidized, processed food, which makes up 60% or more of the average American diet, and most of the food served up in restaurants and institutional cafeterias, is killing us.

Learn more: The Outsized Role Processed Food Plays in Our Health and Environment