Beating the Global Food System
January 9 and 16, 2014
Can you beat the system? Our participants did.
Over the last few weeks, global studies participants learned about the unfairness of the global food system through an interactive role playing game from Oxfam Education.
Can your pupils beat the system? Playing this game will help them understand the global food system, and the impact it has on millions of small scale farmers who struggle as a result of its unfairness.
Working in teams they will learn more about the role of the global food market, multinational companies, food and cash crops, and experience the challenges small scale farmers face first hand. Pupils will also learn how the actions of governments, multinational companies and farmers themselves can make the system work better for everyone.
Faced with land grabbing, drought, price increases, and limited resources, our small farmers banded together to create a cooperative where they shared resources and workload. They were not as vulnerable to the decisions of the large companies and the government, and they felt victorious.
Its not often as a facilitator that I expect the participants to come running into class weeks in a row eager to learn about something as abstract as the global food system. This activity was definitely an instant favorite. A huge thanks to Oxfam for creating and offering this engaging and incredibly informative content!
