Ƶ consortium leverages academic interests to examine local food systems
The Food Justice Working Group emerged in response to the pandemic, revealing a multidisciplinary interest in addressing food justice and sustainability
Following the COVID-19 pandemic, food insecurity became a pressing issue in Broome County. In response, several members of the Ƶ community established the (COVID-19) Food Justice Working Group (FJWG), a multidisciplinary campus collaboration aimed at researching and addressing challenges in the food system. During the same period, the (BCFC), a consortium of local organizations, emerged as a key resource for food access and distribution throughout the county.
Working together, they demonstrate the potential of academic institutions and local communities, leveraging University resources and educational expertise as collaborative partners, to address social issues in the communities surrounding university centers.
“Partnering with BCFC was a logical step for the FJWG, a group formed from a desire to generate knowledge and social action around food insecurity,” said Monica Adams, assistant professor of social work and BCFC member.
In a , former and current members of the FJWG explain their applied anthropological approach to understanding imbalances in the food system. While the pandemic provided the impetus to the group’s formation, there was already interest among University faculty in issues around food security, nutrition and sustainability. The FJWG members bring unique contributions based on professional histories and interests, and career goals.
FJWG members and paper authors include Adams; Aidan Gajewski ’24, MBA ’25, an environmental studies and economics student at Binghamton; Valerie Imbruce, director of the Center for Environment and Society and research associate professor at Washington College in Maryland; and Barrett Brenton, affiliated faculty and senior research scholar in the Anthropology Department and the Center for Civic Engagement’s faculty engagement coordinator, who co-led the formation of COVID-19 FJWG and currently sits on the steering committee of the BCFC.
“Holding membership at different levels of the Council complements the work of FJWG by allowing us to actively engage in promoting food justice through community-driven teaching and research,” said Brenton. “This type of research enables us to learn from the community concerning the most pressing challenges and the best ways to address them from the perspective of those embedded in the community doing the work.”
In 2022, the FJWG organized a workshop for about a dozen organizations involved in community gardening, emergency food services, school meals and agricultural extension. The goal was to identify issues within the region’s food systems. One important takeaway was the need for a centralized council to reduce redundancies, enhance information sharing and support broader county-wide initiatives. To facilitate this, a coordinator was hired with funding obtained by the Food Bank of the Southern Tier.
The following year, a survey was distributed across Broome County to evaluate the availability of resources, challenges related to food insecurity and issues affecting underserved communities. The results were analyzed and mapped by Melissa Haller, the undergraduate director of Digital and Data Studies, along with several of her students as part of a community-engaged learning capstone project course. One of Adams’ social work students was employed to enter data from the hard-copy surveys.
The analysis resulted in a visual representation of the availability of food-related resources throughout Broome County, as well as other critical demographic information, including transportation and service availability that impact access to food.
Feedback from the analysis led to the creation of the Broome County Food Access Plan in 2024. The plan features five strategic initiatives designed to enhance food access in several underserved communities within the county, including Whitney Point and the City of Binghamton. Additionally, it focuses on increasing nutrition resources in early childcare programs and community education. Each initiative has a two-year developmental plan.
“The goal of the FJWG is to support, observe and engage with existing structures and organizations, rather than to take the lead or initiate new projects,” said Brenton.
Four years later, the group remains focused on grant writing, public outreach events, participation in local and national conferences and advancing academic scholarship.
Future research projects will focus on evaluating the success of food councils using models from across New York state to inform the development of a state-wide food systems network. The group will continue to promote community-engaged learning and research opportunities for Binghamton students across multiple disciplines.
Current members of the FJWG group include Imbruce, Adams, Brenton, and the recent addition of Belinda Ramírez, an assistant professor of sociology whose interdisciplinary research focuses on food, climate and environmental justice.
“Our emphasis on community-identified challenges involves community members actively in the research, from designing the project to interpreting the results, aiming to develop practical solutions and social change rather than just academic findings,” said Adams. “This mutually beneficial and reciprocal applied partnership supports the sustainability of local community initiatives.”
Research was supported by a grant from Ƶ Sustainable Communities TAE, the Human Rights Institute, and the External Scholarships and Undergraduate Research Center (ESURC).