Philosophy Department to host Food Symposium

PLU’s Philosophy Department will host a two-day Food Symposium on Feb. 20 and 21.

On Monday, Feb. 20, there will be closed sessions for invited participants only, but on Tuesday, Feb. 21, PLU students, staff, and faculty, as well as the greater community, are invited to attend the sessions which cover a variety of topics on food and food ethics.

The second day of the symposium features more than a dozen speakers, including keynote speaker Paul B. Thompson, Ph.D., of Michigan State University.

Thompson, who holds the W.K. Kellogg Chair in Agricultural Food and Community Ethics at Michigan State University and published several works on the environmental and social significance of agriculture, will discuss three key problems in food ethics: the ethics of global hunger; the ethics of food consumption as it relates to personal and public health; and the ethical underpinnings of “the food movement” and its attraction to local and ethically motivated supply chains.

Thompson will conclude the day’s events with his speech at 7 p.m. in the University Center’s Regency Room, but there will be eight other sessions throughout the day starting at 11 a.m. in University Center, Room 133.

Other speakers include Holly Foster, owner of Zestful Gardens, who will talk about a life in organic farming, Joe Markholt, a partner at Salmon Creek Meat, who will discuss the importance of putting a face on your food, and Carrie Little, farm manager at Mother Earth Farm, who will talk about the importance of buying and eating locally.

The second day of the symposium is free to attend and open to the public.