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By Richard Rodrigues
“How will we eat if the barge no come?” a young woman named Courtney from Moloka?i asked in a Hoea Ea conference breakout session. “I heard this happened before."
Ninety percent of the food consumed in Hawai`i is imported from elsewhere. This dependency costs the people of Hawai`i $4 billion annually. And if these continuous imports are interrupted, Hawai`i?s grocery store shelves could be empty in just one week! What are we to do here in Hawai`i Nei, the most isolated archipelago on the planet, when current politics point to the possibility that Hawai`i could be cut off from food imports?
At Hoea Ea, people young and old came together around these very issues. What is food sovereignty, we asked? How was it that 1,000,000 pre-contact Hawaiians could successfully rely upon the land and ocean for their food? What happened to make Hawai`i dependent on outside resources? And how can people without access to land for growing food and ponds for raising fish produce enough to feed themselves? At Hoea Ea, people came together from across the islands – and some even from the U.S.– to address the root causes of these challenges.
The `ohe hano ihu (nose flute) in the pre-dawn air at the Lihikai Hawaiian Cultural Learning Center awakened us from sleep in the Keaukaha neighborhood of South Hilo. In the darkness people moved, preparing for hi`uwai, a purifying ocean dip that would formally open the conference for about 160 youth and a similar number of adults. With the ocean ritual complete, we shared breakfast, all of which we had pulled out of the imu a day earlier.
The day?s program at Lihikai was supported in part by a Hawai`i People?s Fund grant to He Ola Hou O Ke Kumu Niu. Preparing to malama the `aina, youth pulled on tabis and gloves. Equipped with buckets and trash bags this rainy June day, folks cleared rubbish and glass and reclaimed a section of ground, soon to be cultivated like the others. People young and old began to stack pohaku, stones of lava. Kalo was planted in the two new gardens we created that morning, where before had been rubbish. While that crew toiled in the mud for hours, others used a chainsaw and machete to cut the overgrown hau tree in the fishpond. Some cut overgrown grass and beat back smaller bushes to begin restoring the fishpond. Several worked in the open-air kitchen to prepare lunch.
On this, the first day of Hoea Ea, which means “A Return to Food Sovereignty,” the ?aina was being restored and youth recipients of scholarships from a Hawai?i People?s Fund grant experienced a restoration of spirits that had been downtrodden by decades, generations even, of disconnect from the natural world of their na kupuna.
After two days of learning by thinking and talking and practicing, we were dispersed across Hawai`i Island like clusters of extended family working alongside one another in our neighboring districts, a huaka`i hele. Sustainable food production projects from Waimea to Kalapana, Hilo to Kealakekua, and Puala`a to Waipi`o, drew us back to the soil. Collaborating on twelve different projects, hundreds of people celebrated growing skills and insights as we enjoyed new friendships.
Hoea Ea was a call to rise up, to be erect in the face of challenge, to breathe independence and life into our respective roles in life, our kuleana, our responsibility, authority, interest and concerns for food sovereignty in Hawai`i Nei. Mahalo to those who helped make Hoea Ea a success.
Kauai’s Waipa Foundation hosted Ho`oulu Aina, a food sovereignty conference, in 2008. During summer 2009, organizations on three islands will host sustainability and food sovereignty conferences, mainly drawing attendance from the youth of Hawaii Nei. More details about Ho‘oulu Aina can be accessed from the Waipa Foundation, WaipaFoundation.Org. Stay tuned on the Malama Kaua`i Calendar (MalamaKauai.Org) for updates on these conferences.
Richard Rodrigues is the Grantmaking Program Coordinator for Hawai‘i People's Fund, a publicly supported community fund established in 1972 to provide grants to progressive grassroots social change organizations working in Hawai‘i. HPF is a unique partnership of donors, activist grantmakers and grantees committed to positive social change and a more equitable distribution of wealth, resources and power.
(a longer version of this essay can be read at http://www.maoorganicfarms.org/images/uploads/A_Commitment_To_Kuleana_final.pdf) |
