Growing Food Connections is pleased to announce the creation of Translating Research for Policy, a new series of policy briefs that brings original and published research on food systems planning to the attention of a broad audience of food system practitioners, local governments, planners and policy makers.  The first brief, How Food Policy Emerges, is now available.  This brief shares the work found in the journal article Rustbelt Radicalism: A decade of food systems planning in Buffalo, New York, originally published in the Journal of Agriculture, Food Systems, and Community Development.

How Food Policy Emerges documents how community activists, coined Rustbelt Radicals, use community-led practice to shape local government policy in Buffalo, New York. Their incremental yet collective transformation of the food system in a limited-resource community offers a paradigm of change for other post-industrial cities.  The brief features seven factors that bring food to the public policy table, offering a blueprint for communities looking to shift from food-blind plans and policies to introducing food as a public issue in their community.