Local Sustainability Savant Receives National Accolade from SELF Magazine

The crew at Tierra Miguel (Levendoski at the top)

When Beth Ann Levendoski was selected out of thousands of nominees to receive SELF Magazine’s Women Doing Good award, her decades of dedication to sustainability drew a national audience to her working farm in northeastern San Diego County and to the merits of healthy living through clean eating.

Levendoski, founder of Tierra Miguel Farm, was one of three recipients honored at a ceremony hosted by Today Show correspondent Hoda Kotb on June 2 at the Museum of Modern Art, New York City, where she received recognition for her work and a $10,000 check to perpetuate her mission towards a sustainable future. (See Levendoski's Today Show interview at the bottom of this article.)

“She can truly change one’s perspective on eating,” said Yung Moon, associate publisher of creative services for SELF Magazine. “She…shows you the ability of how just one woman can do so much. While we all say it takes a village, it also takes one person and passion to start a movement.”

Levendoski, a fourth generation farmer, co-founded the Tierra Miguel Foundation in 1999 in Pauma Valley to raise awareness about sustainable practices and to strengthen the connection between people and food sources. The 85-acre organic, Biodynamic farm produces, on average, over 25 different vegetable, fruit and herb varietals each season.

“Having a national recognition of your work is an important thing; it helps to bring national awareness to what you’re doing,” Beth said. “What [SELF] is trying to do is identify that dedication and compassion and drive in your area are things that need to be celebrated,” she said.

According to the San Diego Farm Bureau, San Diego County has more small farms (under 10 acres) than any county in the United States – between 5,000 and 6,000 in fact, said Kathy Rathbun, Program Coordinator for the Bureau. The 2007 Crop Report, a biennial account of the county’s agricultural production compiled by the county’s Department of Agriculture, Weights & Measures, shows that San Diego leads the nation in production of avocados and nursery crops as well as in the number of part-time farmers it employs, and it ranks second in the production of guavas, pomegranates, limes, macadamia nuts and, interestingly, in the number of farms with women as principle owner. Counted among them, Levendoski is a leader in raising awareness of the importance of local farms, with support from widely recognized organizations like Kashi, a primary sponsor of the foundation, and The Kellogg Foundation, which supports one of the farm’s initiatives.

“The reason we began doing this work is because we understood that the nutritional value of produce and the biochemical background – the seed quality – was degenerating, and…we were interested in [bringing] awareness that there are practices to increase soil vitality…to increase the value of food,” Levendoski said. “[Early on], really, nobody cared [about the] quality and nutritional value [of food]. We observed that people were disconnected to food – unconcerned.”

While change is slow, over the last ten years Tierra Miguel’s programs may have contributed to the public’s interest in eating organic and locally sourced foods.
 
“We have been running programs to reconnect, particularly children, to their food, because we thought that children would be the most likely population to take it in,” she said. “Children are the best group as open books and vehicles for information.”

Children are also good barometers of quality. If they don’t like the taste of something, they won’t eat it, and fruits and vegetables grown in unhealthy soil are essentially bland. One of Tierra Miguel’s educational programs teaches children about the full cycle of food from seed to table. They learn about worm composting, planting seeds, caring for crops and they pick their produce, wash it and eat it fresh from the farm.
 
“What we discovered is when children had that experience of the full cycle, they had a different connection to food and would actually ask for food they had at the farm, [including] broccoli, carrots and cherry tomatoes,” Levendoski said. “If they didn’t see these in the salad bar at school, they would ask [for them].”

According to Levendoski, the nation’s obesity epidemic can be attributed, in part, to the fact that many adults and children are not exposed to wholesome, flavorful fruits and vegetables, which come from healthy soil. The overuse of chemical fertilizers without the practice of increasing organic material is one perpetrator in tasteless foods. Much of the produce sold in supermarkets is sourced from the arid San Joaquin Valley, one of the largest agricultural regions in the state, which Levendoski says a person need only drive through to detect the soil’s unhealthiness.

By strengthening the connection between people and their food sources, it is Levendoski’s hope that food will take on a new meaning in people’s lives, as it once did when they grew there own and gathered with their families for supper.

“Forcing people to eat food that doesn’t taste good is counterintuitive,” she said. “You don’t have the taste of your grandparents’ backyard tomatoes when you grow with pesticides and chemicals.”

It’s important to note that many local farms do not have organic certification because of the associated costs, but they should not be discounted as suppliers of healthy food. As Levendoski states, most local farms have local relationships steeped in honesty, fairness, integrity and respect.

How to do our part

1.    Eat local. While it may seem pricier, be aware that many of the costs of production get externalized to other aspects of society and do exploit natural and human resources. Eating local helps eliminate the middlemen of agriculture. It helps prevent carbon emissions associated with transportation. The food we eat travels, on average, 1,500 miles to its point of purchase. While this practice doesn’t save tons of money, it has ecological savings which are much more important to this shift in consciousness we’re experiencing. Locally grown produce stays fresher longer. From farmers markets to local supermarkets who support local farms, the associated farmers will be able to have a better cost benefit for their produce and produce better and more for our community. According to Levendoski, some statistics show that local food economies gain about $3 for each dollar lost when food shoppers choose to buy from local farmers.

2.    Learn. Reconnect with the Earth by connecting with local farms on a personal level, yielding a deeper understanding of our dependency on the Earth. Form personal relationships with your local CSA (Community Supported Agriculture) program and your local farmers. Understand these relationships. Eating local helps rebuild our priorities. We begin to understand what has been degrading our food, ecological and societal systems. Building relationships, healing the Earth and understanding the benefits of sustainable practices have the capacity to initiate a new sustainable American food system.

3.    Analyze. When shopping at farmers markets, assess the quality of the foods your local farmers offer. Discover whether you think there’s a need to protect farmland for future generations. Will you pay more for higher quality? Does the locally grown food you purchase have an additional benefit to your family? If you believe that healthy soil yields healthy food yields healthy humans, the value is in the cost of healthcare, which is mitigated through eating sustainably.

On October 24, Tierra Miguel will celebrate its tenth anniversary by kicking off a yearlong celebration of food and culture. Visit their website regularly for details as they become available.

Levendoski's Today Show Interview:

For more info.
Tierra Miguel offers a CSA program and also sells directly to the public at the farm. On the first Saturday of each month, they host an open house where visitors can tour the farm and learn about its programs. Beginning in September, the farm will host additional programs. Visit Tierra Miguel's website for up-to-date information.