Powering Food Justice through Statewide Organizing

January 25th 2024

Ending hunger requires the insight and leadership of those who have experienced hunger firsthand. Through advocacy and organizing for food justice across Oregon and Southwest Washington, we collaboratively address the root causes of hunger, led by the valuable perspectives of those who have been directly impacted by these issues.

Power comes from people, people organized to take action together.

—Moira Bowman, Director of Advocacy, Oregon Food Bank

Alongside the leadership of Moira Bowman (Oregon Food Bank Director of Advocacy) and Cristina Marquez Guerrero (Associate Director of Advocacy), we are building a new approach to the work we do. While food distribution remains a crucial part of our work, our intentional focus on organizing and advocacy recognizes the need to address the root causes of hunger. Distributing enough food today will not end hunger tomorrow. We must tackle the reasons people experience food insecurity, not just give out food, to create lasting change.

Organizing is a part of advocacy and political change that involves bringing people together, planning and taking action to influence positive transformations in policies and systems. Statewide collaboration between farmers, organizations, families, schools, neighbors and Oregon Food Bank’s Policy Leadership Council informs our organizing and advocacy goals. Fostering partnerships and mobilizing support across our region ensures that our approach to ending hunger is effective for communities across the state.

Ending hunger is a big job; we do not embark on this journey alone. Oregon Food Bank collaborates with communities across the region and our network of 21 regional food banks and 1,400 food assistance sites. Adelante Mujeres is just one of our partners in this collective effort. The mission of Adelante Mujeres is to provide holistic education and empowerment opportunities to low income Latina women and their families to ensure full participation and active leadership in the community. As leaders in our community, they advocate for equity and were strong proponents of Food for All Oregonians (read more about this at the link here!).

When we were reading about what are some of the campaigns that we wanted to work with, what are the campaigns that we feel very passionate about, what are the campaigns that are addressing the needs of our community members; there was… no doubt that Food for All [Oregonians] was going to be one of them.

—Petrona Dominguez Francisco, Leadership and Advocacy Program Manager, Adelante Mujeres

We are motivated by dedicated leaders across the region in our pursuit of food justice, and Adelante Mujeres is a particularly inspiring example! We invite you to join us in supporting the impactful work of Adelante Mujeres. You can also get involved by signing up for action alerts! Let us embark on this journey, with the help of our communities, to power food justice and end hunger.