The CLIMAVORE Assembly, organised by CLIMAVORE x Jameel at RCA, convenes on 28-29 October 2023 in Rome, to examine the role of culture in creating more ecologically-just food systems.
Excerpt
On Saturday and Sunday, October 28–29, 2023, the CLIMAVORE Assembly addresses the role culture can play in a transition towards food justice rooted in ecologically-driven action. Through a range of presentations, meals, debates and workshops the international gathering explores cultural and artistic tactics to operate in the space of food policy. The Assembly brings together farmers, artists, chefs, growers, cooperatives, hospitality businesses, researchers, cultural thinkers, environmentalists, civic leaders, seed keepers and policy-makers to reimagine the role museums and cultural institutions have as agents of transformation within the climate crisis. It takes place at Museo delle Civiltà and Campidoglio—the seat of Rome City Council. Key speakers include: Sepake Angiama, Casa delle Agriculture, Cooperativa Karadrà, Tommaso Fattori, Anne Immonen, Instroom Academy, Parviz Koohafkan, Frances Morris, Qanat Collective, Sakiya, and SERIT Seeds.
For more than a century industrial agriculture has created intensive systems reliant on agrochemicals to boost yields at any cost, claiming to feed the world’s population while disrupting ancestral ways of living within and above the ground. A metabolic rift has separated the soil from what it means to culture it, to grow food, to nourish the ground and human bodies. The CLIMAVORE Assembly addresses the broken food system created by intensive agriculture and the globalised supply chain, asking how to reconnect appetite with fields; and metabolism with the underground.
Climate struggles cannot be separated from cultural shifts, and cultural shifts require new forms of action. Initiated by Cooking Sections in 2015, CLIMAVORE is a research platform that questions how to eat as humans change the climate. As seasons creep, we recognise that eating less industrial meat protein, more locally grown produce or plant-based dishes is crucial—but perhaps not enough. CLIMAVORE moves beyond a carnivore, omnivore, locavore, vegetarian or vegan diet into a way of eating according to a season of drought, polluted seas or infertile soil.