ABSTRACT. Scattered throughout the city of Toronto are more than no community gardens, sites of place‐based politics connected to the community food‐security movement. The gardens, spaces where passions for plants and food are shared, reflect the city's shifting cultural landscape and represent an everyday activity that is imbued with multiple meanings. Toronto's community food‐security movement uses gardens as one strategy to regenerate the local food system and provide access to healthy, affordable food. Three garden case studies expand on the complexities of “food citizenship,” illustrating the importance of that concept to notions of food security. The gardens reveal the role gardeners play in transforming urban spaces, the complex network of organizations working cooperatively and in partnership to implement these projects, and the way in which social and cultural pluralism are shaping the urban landscape.
The concept of scale is useful in analyzing both the strengths and limitations of community food security programs that attempt to link issues of ecological sustainability with social justice. One scalar issue that is particularly important but under-theorized is the scale of social reproduction, which is often neglected in production-focused studies of globalization. FoodShare Toronto's good food box (GFB) program, engages people in the politics of their everyday lives, empowering them to make connections between consumption patterns and broader political-economic, cultural, and political-ecological issues. Community food security (CFS) projects such as the GFB are currently limited in their scope and reach and have been criticized for their inability to deliver food to a larger segment of marginalized, hungry people. A central dilemma for CFS projects is how to engage the majority of urban consumers who still eat ''inside the box'' of the industrial food system. We argue that the concept of scale helps clarify how CFS projects must ''scale out'' to other localities, as well as ''scale up'' to address structural concerns like state capacity, industrial agriculture, and unequal distribution of wealth. This requires the state and the third sector to recognize the importance of multi-scaled food politics as well as a long-term pedagogical project promoting ecological sustainability, social responsibility, and the pleasures of eating locally.
This book explains how True Cost Accounting is an effective tool that we can use to address the pervasive imbalance in our food system.Calls are coming from all quarters that the food system is broken and needs a radical transformation. A system that feeds many yet continues to create both extreme hunger and diet-related diseases, and one that has significant environmental impacts, is not serving the world adequately. This volume argues that True Cost Accounting in our food system can create a framework for a systemic shift. What sounds on the surface like a practice relegated to accountants is ultimately a call for a new lens on the valuation of food and a new relationship with the food that we eat, starting with the reform of a system out of balance. From the true cost of corn, and water, to incentives for soil health, the chapters economically compare conventional and regenerative, more equitable farming practices in food system structures, including taking an unflinching look at the true cost of cheap labour. Overall, this volume points towards the potential for our food system to be more human-centred than profit-centered and one that has a more respectful relationship to the planet. It sets forth a path forward based on True Cost Accounting for food. This path seeks to fix our current food metrics, in policy and in practice, by applying a holistic lens that evaluates the actual costs and benefits of different food systems, and the impacts and dependencies between natural systems, human systems, and agriculture and food systems.This volume is essential reading for professionals and policymakers involved in developing and reforming the food system, as well as students and scholars working on food policy, food systems, and sustainability.
Objective. To evaluate confidence, knowledge, and competence after a simulation-based curriculum on maternal cardiac arrest in an Obstetrics & Gynecologic (OBGYN) residency program. Methods. Four simulations with structured debriefing focusing on high yield causes and management of maternal cardiac arrest were executed. Pre- and post-individual knowledge tests (KT) and confidence surveys (CS) were collected along with group scores of critical performance steps evaluated by content experts for the first and final simulations. Results. Significant differences were noted in individual KT scores (pre: 58.9 ± 8.9 versus post: 72.8 ± 6.1, p = 0.01) and CS total scores (pre: 22.2 ± 6.4 versus post: 29.9 ± 3.4, p = 0.007). Significant differences were noted in airway management, p = 0.008; appropriate cycles of drug/shock-CPR, p = 0.008; left uterine displacement, p = 0.008; and identifying causes of cardiac arrest, p = 0.008. Nonsignificant differences were noted for administration of appropriate drugs/doses, p = 0.074; chest compressions, p = 0.074; bag-mask ventilation before intubation, p = 0.074; and return of spontaneous circulation identification, p = 0.074. Groups remained noncompetent in team leader tasks and considering therapeutic hypothermia. Conclusion. This study demonstrated improved OBGYN resident knowledge, confidence, and competence in the management of third trimester maternal cardiac arrest. Several skills, however, will likely require more longitudinal curricular exposure and training to develop and maintain proficiency.
Urban agriculture in Toronto largely focuses on self-provisioning, but it could be scaled up significantly. Our findings in an earlier paper indicate that the supply of land is not an insurmountable barrier. Rather, other more subtle impediments exist, including taxation systems and structures that assume agriculture is a strictly rural activity; inadequate sharing of knowledge among urban producers; limited access to soil, water, and seeds; and the lack of incentives to attract landowners and foundations to provide financial or in-kind support.
Municipal governments across the Global North are increasingly becoming key actors in shaping urban food and agriculture policy. In the City of Toronto, recent aspirational policies, such as the provincial Local Food Act and the municipal Toronto Agricultural Program, created new opportunities to shape a healthier food system. We sought municipal perspectives on the question of "How might urban agriculture policy and programs be better supported to promote equity and health?" Analysis of findings from semistructured key
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