Awakening a Food Revolution Around the World

On May 19, 2012, the Jamie Oliver’s Food Revolution cause launched “Food Revolution Day” – a global campaign to “stand up for real food.” Cause leader Jo Creed chatted with us last week about JOFR and their work on Causes.com. Jo explained that food education is an important, global conversation that everyone should be having. Since the inaugural Food Revolution Day, the JOFR cause has inspired 8,500 people to join their movement and 6,000 members have pledged to support better food in schools.

JOFR is based all around the world, but their headquarters are located in the U.K. I asked why they are looking at their U.S. audience. It’s simple, Jo said. “The U.S. leads the world in food awareness and we’re only a few years behind in the U.K. We are facing a lot of the same problems, so if you change things in the U.S. then you know the world will follow.” Education about food nutrition in schools is critical to Food Revolution’s awareness campaigns because young people in this generation are facing frightening health challenges.

From JOFR’s cause: “For the first time in a long time, updated nutrition standards for school meals in the U.S. will start this fall. These improved standards will go a long way to remedy nutritional shortfalls and will address some key concerns about the childhood obesity epidemic. However, we still have a long way to go and everyone can play a role in helping schools to meet these new standards. We’ve got a great opportunity to change the school food system as we know it! Take the pledge today to help support these changes to improve school food.”

One way Jamie Oliver’s Food Revolution is inspiring food lovers is through an ambassador volunteer program they created in August of 2012. Jo said, “The community of ambassadors [or volunteers] are involved in the food revolution and are present in 350 cities and 56 countries. We have a community manager who works with those ambassadors to teach them about the food revolution.” Jo says these ambassadors are the driving force for food education wherever it is they live. Coupled with the new Food Revolution cause, Jo believes greater awareness will spread throughout the world.

In the coming months, JOFR will post new actions for members to propel future discussions about food education, including important conversations about new food menus in schools across the U.S. Jo hopes these tools will attract more members for next year’s Food Revolution Day. “We want to continue raising awareness for real food. Last year, 64 cities in 16 countries participated in Food Revolution Day.” The 2013 event will take place May 17 and the JOFR team believes even more communities will participate. Stay tuned to Jamie Oliver’s Food Revolution cause to learn more about their future campaigns.