New local food activities in the Sacramento region described in the press release below:

SACRAMENTO, Calif.—Local food is about to become more palatable with a $50,000 pledge from the Board of Supervisors to address barriers faced by local farmers trying to sell food through local supermarkets, restaurants, and direct markets in Sacramento County.

“The end result is to get a distribution system in place so fresh, wholesome products, produced locally, are consumed locally,” said Charlotte Mitchell executive director of the Sacramento County Farm Bureau and coordinator for the Grow & Buy Local Committee.

To get a program and distribution system in place, the Grow & Buy Local Committee is aware of the barriers associated with the current global market, population trends, and land development pressures. The committee includes the University of California cooperative extension, agricultural commissioner, rural home owners associations, farmers and ranchers, and local officials.

The popular California Assembly Bill 32 Global Warming Solutions Act, written by California Assembly speaker Fabian Nunez and Assembly Member Fran Pavley, has stirred up much interest for policy makers and community leaders throughout California. AB 32 requires that the state’s global warming emissions be reduced to 1990 levels by 2020, which will be implemented through an enforceable statewide cap on global warming emissions that will be phased in starting in 2012 (AB32 Fact Sheet of the Union of Concerned Scientists). Economists have predicted that reducing global warming emissions is expected to create jobs and wealth for the state’s economy, and the state’s top energy modelers found that 83,000 jobs and 4 billion dollars in income could be generated in California by meeting the state’s goals by 2020.

The UC Davis Center for the Study of Regional Change brings together faculty, students, and communities to collaborate on innovative research to create just, sustainable, and healthy regional change in California’s Central Valley and the Sierra Nevada.

The UC Davis Center for the Study of Regional Change…

• connects university research with planners, land managers, non-profits, environmentalists, communities and social service providers.
• links university knowledge with state and local governments to develop policies that effect regional change.
• works across boundaries, leverages resources, builds unity and creates programs to meet the needs that no one else is meeting.

This blog is a forum for faculty, students, and community partners…

• to be able to share ideas
• to foster discussion, learning, and engagement.