This story is featured in the Spring 2016 issue of Showcase: The Champions of Change Issue. View the complete publication 

Change: it’s a reoccurring theme when Dr. Haroon Akram-Lodhi speaks about his research and teaching. 

“The world is changed by people,” says the professor of International Development Studies at Trent University.  “My goal is to facilitate the capacity in my students to recognize that they are the authors of their own future and that through the choices that they make and the actions that they take, they can make the world a better and more just place for everyone.”

Professor Akram-Lodhi’s research has long been focused on understanding processes of rural change in poor countries, examining access to land and water, labour regimes, incomes and food, and non-food crop production. Upon landing at Trent University in 2006, he realized that his work and fascination around food justice was something that he could bring into the classroom, passing along his knowledge and passion for the subject to his students.

“Teaching students about food connects them to the lives of farmers in both developing countries and in the Peterborough area because food is something that is both universal and central to the human experience,” explains Prof. Akram-Lodhi.

Solving the problems of our time

Prof. Akram-Lodhi believes that understanding food in today’s world, and what’s wrong with the food system both locally and globally, is connected to much larger issues that our world faces today.

“Global human inequality and climate change are the two defining social issues of our time. Both are connected to food,” he explains. “Food-based social exclusion is found in Peterborough, Pretoria and Phnom Penh, and is a key manifestation of human inequality because it denies people a basic right to sufficient, nutritious, culturally-appropriate food. Additionally, the industrial model of agricultural production that supplies many of us with the bulk of our food is a significant contributor to climate change. Understanding the social implications of our food production helps us to understand how to address global human inequality and climate change.”

Food activism from the ground up

Where does your food come from? What’s in it? How is your food produced? Why do you get access to certain food when others don’t? These are just a few of the many questions Prof. Akram- Lodhi poses to challenge his students.

“It amazes me how many of my students not only want to be, but also have become, farmers,” says Prof. Akram-Lodhi. “More than that, though, my students have become much more conscious that their food choices are intensely political. Understanding these questions is not only a way of expressing their global citizenship, but also becomes the basis by which students can actively push, individually and collectively, for changes to the food system.”

Prof. Akram-Lodhi believes that we can all be food activists. And at Trent, those activists are fostered in the classroom and beyond.  From students enrolled in the Sustainable Agriculture program to students working at the Seasoned Spoon, a non-profit, vegetarian, cooperative café located in Champlain College, and students working in the University's gardens, student food activists abound at Trent. For other students wanting to make a difference, Prof. Akram-Lodhi says there are small changes we can all make to become food activists in our daily lives. “It’s simple,” he says. “Eat less meat, start cooking, eat with others, and most importantly, learn about the food you’re eating.”