[Stanford Social Innovation Review] Borrowing from the renewable energy sector, we can create a better food system by organizing regional governments to create markets for smaller producers and establishing coordinated networks that can amplify best practices.

Thousands of organizations seeking food system change have pointed out the negative environmental and societal consequences of our current system, which many say is propped up on “too big to fail,” hyper-efficient production. The often quoted, Nixon-era agricultural mandate of “get big or get out”—a widely attributed pivot point in American agriculture from a diverse family farming system to the current corporate business form—mirrored the business zeitgeist of the time, building on the mid-20th-century ideal of industrialization and globalization.

Other systems, including our energy, water, and transportation systems, also fell in line with that ethos; but unlike the food system, these sectors are undertaking 21st-century upgrades that comport better with our modern norms and realities by creating more decentralized systems that are better adapted to local geography and sociology. Food system change agents stand to learn from the public policy trajectory of renewable energy in particular. The renewable energy industry currently employs 6.5 million worldwide with $329 billion in investments in 2015, and a number of its effective strategies would adapt well to food system reform...(Continue reading).