by Kristen Wile

The Carolina Farm Trust Women’s Committee brings together women who want to make change in their communities. Photo courtesy

When it comes to issues of food supply and food insecurity, Carolina Farm Trust’s Jordan Weber believes a starting point to progress is awareness. So the nonprofit’s Director of Marketing helped kick off a Women’s Committee, an exclusive, membership-based group that meets monthly, in hopes of curating a group of women who will take awareness and turn it into action.

“The Women’s Committee is something that we are breaking out and really targeting, holding a space for women in the community and cultivating that conversation around what our households need,” Weber says. “Women make the world go around. We are the powerhouses of our homes. We are the powerhouses of our community. And if you want something done, just put it in the hands of a woman.”

Carolina Farm Trust’s goal is to advocate for more sustainable foodways in the Carolinas, primarily through aiding small agriculture. The group supports farmers throughout the region, as well as creates opportunity for farming through its Urban Farm program, including one at East Charlotte retirement community Aldersgate. While the group is already having significant impact in that area, there are other food sustainability issues they’d like to address, but can’t necessarily commit resources to doing so. Weber hopes that members of the committee — women who are invested in their local communities — will have ideas and networks to take up the cause on their own.

“[We’re] educating them and showing them that what we’ve all been kind of paddled into is not how it was intended to be,” she says. “It’s not how it should be. Look at all that we’re isolating by doing it this way. Look at the communities we’re isolating. Look at the farmers who are struggling. Look at the fact that all of our eggs come from one particular place. Look at all these different methods.”

Monthly events for the committee members — brunches that feature guests from speakers to private chefs hosting demos — are intended to leave attendees with information that can help them make a change, whether it’s awareness of the fact that there are no healthy food options in a certain community or the fact that they can purchase products from local farmers any day of the week. For an annual members seat, women who apply must gift $1,000 to $5,000 to Carolina Farm Trust. Seats are limited, so applicants must apply and be accepted in order to attend the committee’s monthly events. The committee also hosts public-facing events, such as a recent Women’s Showcase at Petra’s in Plaza Midwood, an event meant to highlight deserving female artists and engage conversation about the work of Carolina Farm Trust.

Those interested in joining the Women’s Committee can reach out to Jordan Weber via email.

“We really want to grow our reach and just to touch as many communities as possible, letting them know about the food disparity and the food deserts definitely within Charlotte, then within North Carolina and South Carolina,” Weber says. “This women’s committee, we’re making it in a way exclusive, where these women that we’re cultivating and creating a community around are truly interested in impacting the world.”