September 17th & 18th, 2025 Colfax, NC
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AGENDA AT A GLANCE
Local Welcome
The Piedmont Triad Regional Food Council (PTRFC) is proud to welcome you to the 2025 Community Food Gathering. Stretching across twelve vibrant counties, the Piedmont Triad is a region shaped by rural heritage and urban innovation. The economy has historically been tied to textiles, furniture, and tobacco, but it is now home to growing industries from food entrepreneurship and agricultural technology to advanced manufacturing, biomedical research, and aerospace.
With over 9,000 farms in the Piedmont Triad Region and more than one million acres being farmed, the Piedmont Triad remains connected to the land. This is a place where food tells stories of culture, struggle, creativity, and care.
We hope your time at the Gathering inspires new partnerships, bold thinking, and the deep sense of belonging that can only grow from shared purpose.
Welcome to the Piedmont Triad. We’re glad you’re here.
-Piedmont Triad Regional Food Council
Keynote Panel Day 1 Transformational Community: Finding Our Strength in Each Other
The keynote panel will kick off the Statewide Gathering with three North Carolinian food leaders who will share their stories on what Transformational Community means to them and how we can lean into each other at such a time as this. We believe that each panelist offers a unique perspective on shifting our food system towards justice in authentic community. The panel will kick off our 2 days together with passion and vision for a way forward.
Workshops
We’ll have a keynote speaker, workshops, and panel discussions. Workshop sessions will weave in themes of resistance, reform, reimagination, and recreation while focused on topics about grassroots-led strategies, working within systems to influence policy, exploring alternative economic models, and deepening our relational practices so that we can transform our food systems towards equity and justice.
Then the first night kicks into high gear with a futuristic ’90s-themed afterparty! Get ready to dance under fun lights, sip on creative mocktails, wine, or beer, play jumbo lawn games and vibe out to a mix of classic 90s jams and fun beats. If lower energy activities are more your vibe, we’ll also have areas for quieter spaces. The night will be the perfect way to unwind, connect, and continue the celebration of community and creative collaboration.
Track 1
Elevating Community Wisdom & Accountability
This track highlights grassroots-led strategies, just recovery, mutual aid, and how communities can lead with accountability from and by community. This track centers resistance and reimagining outside of traditional structures, while emphasizing community-led transformation.
1. Cultivating Equity Building Inclusive Food Systems
Cultivating Equity Building Inclusive Food Systems invites participants to examine the roots of exclusion within our food systems and discover pathways toward equity through community-led agriculture. Grounded in lived experience, it explores the systemic barriers Black and BIPOC farmers face and offers a framework for inclusive food futures built on land access, cultural memory, and regenerative practices. Attendees will leave with concrete strategies for dismantling inequity while honoring ancestral knowledge and building collective power.
2. Collective Access for Land, Food, and Community
This session will highlight models for community and collective access to land and food. It will discuss alternate structures that value collaborative, shared decision-making and mutual responsibility for the collective management of resources such as property, associated businesses, and other assets that can be used for the benefit of the community
Speakers
3. Art as Method
Art as Method is an interdisciplinary exploration of how creative expression can fuel the change we envision for our food systems and communities. Launched in 2023, it is a community-informed research project and model that demonstrates how art can open new possibilities for sharing food system experiences, building connection, and shifting institutional culture. Through art, we transcend social barriers and uplift practices rooted in equity.
In this interactive session, we invite you into the world of Art as Method—where art, justice, and equity come together to inspire transformation.
Speakers
4. Measuring What Matters: Building Confidence, Competence, and Courage with Numbers
In a time of shrinking support and rising need, community-based organizations, individual advocates, coalitions, and more must sharpen their ability to show impact. This session offers a practical, reflective space to rethink your relationship with data. We will explore how systemic barriers and internal dynamics affect data use, and learn how to create simple, values-aligned tools that reflect the real work happening on the ground. Whether you are overwhelmed by metrics or unsure what to track, this workshop will help you measure what truly matters and use data to strengthen storytelling, strategy, and systems change.
Track 2
Policy & Power: Transforming Institutions from Within
This track focuses on working within systems (government, schools, nonprofits) to influence policy, protect resources, and embed justice in institutional practices. This track centers reform approaches, focusing on transforming systems through sustained advocacy and strategic collaboration.
1. Cross-Sector Partnerships to Implement Farm to Early Care and Education
This interactive workshop will explore how the Farm to Early Care & Education (F2ECE) initiative offers tools for communities to integrate policy, procurement, and programmatic change within existing institutional systems like childcare, Cooperative Extension, and local food networks. Drawing on the experience of the Center for Environmental Farming Systems’ NC Farm to ECE Collaborative, we will present strategies for building cross-sector partnerships, navigating budgetary and logistical barriers for local food procurement, and offering impactful programming for young children. Participants will gain practical insights and resources for leveraging existing resources, defining partner roles, and fostering community-driven food systems change from within their own organizational structures.
Speakers
2. Pinball policy. Lessons learned and advice for the NC General Assembly
A bill is not as simple as its title. In this session, we’ll walk through the moves the NC legislature takes to pass legislation. We learned a lot by closely tracking the North Carolina Farm Act of 2025 this year, which included many regulatory changes. One section outlined a change that would significantly impact the ability to hold pesticide companies accountable for the harms their products cause. Even if pesticide issues aren’t your focus within the food system, we’ll share lessons learned, tools, and tricks to watch out for in advocacy to make sure people are defended in our state.
Speakers
3. What Just Happened? Demystifying State and Federal Budget Connections following HR1
This session will share the latest analysis of Congressional funding choices in HR1, or the “One Big Beautiful Bill,” and the harmful impacts it will have on our state budget and food security in NC. Participants will be able to map how cuts to food assistance will affect their communities and learn about the choices key budget writers must make to preserve state revenue to survive the looming federal cuts.
Speakers
4. The Power of Comprehensive Planning: Schools, Communities, and the Future of Food
What do you have? What do you want? What do you need to move between where you are and where you want to be? Join us to learn about powerful planning tools that can help sustainably transform school food systems; discuss collectively how to bring comprehensive planning to your local school district; and participate in a hands-on activity to understand the challenges, and rewards, of engaging in comprehensive school planning for sustainable regional food system transformation.
Track 3
Building Solidarity Economies & Democratic Food Futures
This track explores alternative economic models based upon value-driven practices, like co-ops, collective governance, or livable wages, that contribute to creating an ecosystem for equitable food futures. This track is about reimagining and recreating economies and systems for equity, resilience, and shared power.
1. Charity Reimagined
What if food wasn’t just a tool for relief but a driver of lasting, community-rooted change? This session will challenge traditional charity mindsets and invite participants to reimagine food as a social enterprise—place-based and people-focused. We’ll explore how food can support local economies, create jobs, improve health outcomes, and restore dignity—without relying on handouts. Grounded in the lived experience of Main Street Marketplace & Meeting Place, this workshop offers a fresh framework and real-world insights for those ready to think differently about hunger, equity, and transformational change.
Speakers
2. Grounded in Dignity: Standing with Farmworkers
In this session we will lift up the experiences of farmworkers with a panel discussion on challenges farmworkers are navigating, who in the state is working to provide support, and how we can act in solidarity with farmworkers in our state. Toxic Free NC is joined by panelists from El Futuro Es Nuestro/It’s Our Future and NC Field.
Speakers
3. Southern Agricultural Cooperatives: History, Impact, and Possibility
This session will explore the history of Southern Black agricultural cooperatives as models of community self-determination and economic resilience. Participants will learn how cooperatives can be used to build local control over food systems in both rural and urban contexts. Through interactive discussion, real-world examples, and a reflective activity, attendees will explore how cooperative economics can be a tool for advancing equitable, community-owned food systems. Participants will leave with a deeper understanding of agricultural cooperatives and practical ideas for incorporating cooperative practices into their own food and economic justice work.
Speakers
4. Growing Together: Building Healthy Relationships to Revitalize Communities and Local Food Systems
Discover a detailed blueprint on how to build a functioning and profitable network that strengthens food systems through creating authentic, profitable and supportive relationships between essential organizations. This informative and interactive workshop will explore how to strengthen local food economies by fostering meaningful relationships between farms, schools, nonprofits, local government, businesses, corporations, churches, and other essential community organizations by including steps, ideas, resources, testimonies, and measurable feedback that can be used to design an alternative blueprint for one’s own local community.
Track 4
Culture of Care: Connection as a Tool for Change
This track deepens our relational practices – storytelling, care, conflict mediation, and authentic collaboration as core strategies in food justice work. This track is essential to both resist fragmentation and rebuild connection and trust.
1. “Picture This: Using Photovoice to Uplift Community Voices in Food Systems”
This interactive workshop shares the story of Guilford County’s Framing the Future Photovoice exhibit—a powerful project that used community photography and storytelling to spotlight food insecurity and inspire local change. Participants will hear firsthand how this project was developed, curated, and shared with the public, and why centering lived experience is critical to advancing food justice. Attendees will also engage in a mini Photovoice activity and leave with practical tools, ethical considerations, and step-by-step guidance to launch a similar initiative in their own communities. Whether you’re a community organizer, educator, or policymaker, this session will equip you to uplift local voices through visual storytelling and spark meaningful dialogue around food access.
Speakers
2. Recipe for Change: How One Kitchen is Redefining Reentry with Love
What happens when a kitchen becomes a space for healing, not just cooking?This workshop introduces Recipe for Change, a soulful culinary reentry program born from lived experience. Through stories, reflection, and community-rooted tools, we’ll explore how food, faith, and second chances can reshape what reentry really looks like. This is a session for anyone who believes in transformation, equity, and the power of showing up with love; one plate, one person at a time.
Speakers
3. More than a Seat: An Emerging NC Food Is Medicine Coalition for Collective Power and Culture
It has never been more important to organize together for healthy food and community power, and we need you involved. This will be an interactive session to support the planning and building of a North Carolina Food Is Medicine Coalition, which we intend to launch in 2016. For two years a cohort of community-based food is medicine organizations has been planting seeds of cohesion and vision for a larger statewide network for advocacy and shared learning. Now we’re ready to start engaging more key partners from diverse aspects of the food and health systems. Participants will be asked their experiences (good, bad, and ugly) with coalitions, as well as specifics on goals and membership ideas for this FIM coalition, to help us co-design it so it really works. Participants will have the opportunity to sign up to stay involved.
Speakers
4. Unearthing Stories, Cultivating Change: Community-Based Participatory Research for Food Justice Advocacy
This session explores how storytelling can shift power and influence policy within food justice movements. Participants will learn how community-based participatory research (CBPR) supports equitable, collaborative approaches to change, with a focus on real-world examples from across North Carolina. Through story-sharing and reflective practice, the session invites participants to bear witness to community narratives and consider how personal and collective stories can be powerful tools for advocacy. Attendees will leave with a richer understanding of how policy, power, and narrative intersect in the pursuit of more just food systems.
Speakers
adrienne maree brown
(she/they)
Keynote Conversation Day 2 Writing Ourselves Into The Future
adrienne maree brown (she/they) is growing a garden of healing ideas. Informed by decades of movement facilitation, somatics, science fiction scholarship, and doula work, brown has nurtured Emergent Strategy, Pleasure Activism, Radical Imagination, and Loving Correction as ideas and practices for transformation. brown is the New York Times–bestselling author/editor of several published texts, a ritual singer-songwriter, co-generator of the Lineages of Change Tarot Deck, and co-creator/host of the How to Survive the End of the World podcast with Autumn Brown. Their latest book Loving Corrections is now available from AK Press.
Community Food Strategies is excited to host adrienne maree brown, in conversation, as the culminating event at the Statewide Gathering of Food Coalitions in North Carolina. In a time of deep transformation, as our movement grapples with significant change, we see amb as a voice to help remind us of our community connections and humanity. She is a voice for imagination, reckoning, creativity, and can inspire us to tap into and embody the best of ourselves, individually, and collectively. We hope you’ll join us to light a flame of abundance and possibility, in face of challenges, as we close our time together at the 2025 Statewide Gathering.
Copyright adrienne maree brown, all rights reserved, https://adriennemareebrown.net/
*The keynote speaker requests that everyone mask for this event. Masks will be provided.
Tickets
General (July 8th - Aug 31st)
$150
Grants entry to both conference days with access to standard amenities and activities.
Late (Sept 1st - 9th)
$175
Grants entry to both conference days with access to standard amenities and activities.
Keynote Address Closing Date (July 8th - Sept 9th)
$45
Grants entry to the keynote address on the afternoon of Thursday 9/18 only.
Tier 1 CLOSED Pay-it-forward
$250
Grants entry to both conference days with access to standard amenities and activities PLUS additional funds to support 1 full scholarship.
Tier 2 CLOSED Pay-it-forward
$200
Grants entry to both conference days with access to standard amenities and activities PLUS additional funds to support half of one scholarship.
Tier 3 CLOSED Pay-it-forward
$150
Full Conference Registration plus additional funds to support a portion of one scholarship.