Keynote Speech: “Slow Food: Good for You, Good for the Environment”

By: Tinna Chung

Monique Lee Hawthorne Esq. graced us as the Keynote speaker for the NATWA Annual Conference. She spoke on a growing phenomenon that in my opinion could create a great and important change in the world. The idea of slow food is not a widely touted idea yet but should quickly become a household topic.

Monique eloquently began with the history of how the slow food movement began in Italy when Rome tried to prevent a McDonald’s from opening near the Spanish Steps. She then educated us all with the long process in which most of our food must go through before becoming “shelf ready.” It was especially shocking to learn that even our produce had to go through such extensive processing such as flash freezing, freight shipping and multiple check points before being able to be sold in markets. It was also shocking to learn how much waste and pollution is currently being generated because of these extensive processes in order to get food into the markets to be sold. The highlight of her speech was when she took the idea of slow food and further applied to other areas of our lives and showed us how it all ties together and can improve our way of living remarkably. She also incorporated suggestions; easy things we can all do to promote the slow food movement. She mentioned buying produce at your nearby farmer's market to support your local farms, starting your own garden, and making your own compost which in turn helps twofolds because you could use a lot of your own waste to contribute to your compost for growing your own garden. These simple changes can cut down a lot of costs and pollution while developing a healthy way of living. I was also inspired to make changes to my own way of living when Monique mentioned how supporting local farms can help preserve different varieties of produce. It was astounding learn that there are thousands of varieties of potatoes and over 100 varieties of strawberries existing. It made me sad that these varieties will be unavailable over time due to the apathy of the general population. Most people only know what they see sold in markets without a clue that they only see one or two types of strawberries or grapes because those are the only types that make it through the rigorous processing and most likely have the lowest nutritional content.

What also shined brightly throughout Monique's speech were her hilarious anecdotes about her family. Her use of her parents' reluctance to make changes and exaggerated ideas not being able to make a difference helped us all relate to the general apathy of society. However, Monique cleverly used these little stories as examples of how we should reevaluate ourselves and not just point fingers at others. All the NATWA ladies were thoroughly entertained and learned a lot through Monique's amazing speech.