The people who produce food are facing a crisis unlike any they have ever seen, encountering new threats sparked by COVID-19 while they endure a multi-year slump in prices for their goods, volatile trade disputes, frequent natural disasters, and climate disruption. Many of these fishing and farming businesses want to continue feeding their communities, but they are worried that many in their communities have lost their jobs and may not be able to afford food due to lack of income.
Jason Jarvis, a commercial fisherman from Westerly, Rhode Island, and Board President of the Northwest Atlantic Marine Alliance (NAMA), offers this perspective:
Today, we’re faced with even greater obstacles. Our communities need food and we, local producers, have been shut down. The current COVID-19 pandemic has amplified people’s need for affordable and healthy food, which we could provide if our boats weren’t tied to the docks. Many of us would have begun clamming over a week ago, but in less than two weeks we’ve been completely shut down. Dealers are no longer knocking on our doors because of recent restaurant closures and a lack of business demand. COVID -19 has already begun to shut down the majority of community based fishing industries and unfortunately, even those who haven’t been shut down, are well on the way if Congress does not act now.
Sadly, we did not arrive here by sheer chance. The system itself has long been flawed and exploitative. Our system is set up to support the global economies of scale, not community-based fishing operations and food systems. Fish dealers are dependent on large scale landings to keep their doors open, but we are dependent on the fish dealer because in Rhode Island like many other fishing communities, it is not yet legal for small scale fisheries to sell directly to the public. On top of that, our work and commitment has been consistently dismissed, intensified not only by this State’s supposed concern with saving the environment but also the corporate extraction sucking our lifeblood.
What we have always known and what the COVID-19 virus is now teaching all of us, is that we should focus on feeding our communities.
The COVID-19 crisis is opening more eyes to these problems. NAMA has partnered with the National Family Farm Coalition (NFFC), Farm Aid, HEAL Food Alliance, Institute for Agriculture and Trade Policy (IATP), and WhyHunger to develop a set of policy demands that the US Congress must heed as it develops the next stimulus package. People were already living paycheck to paycheck before the COVID-19 crisis and soon, if nothing is done, they may be living on the streets. We need to act now because we are just starting to see the impact of this health disaster.
Northwest Atlantic Marine Alliance 19952020