Program Overview

The IATP Food and Society Fellows Program provides fellowships to professionals in food and agriculture from across North America, enabling them to use mass media channels to inform and shape the public agenda. The goal of the program is to create sustainable food systems that promote good health, vibrant communities, environmental stewardship, worker justice and accessibility for all. Fellows come from many disciplines—chefs, farmers, nutritionists, activists, public health professionals, fishers, policy experts and academics. Together they form an interdisciplinary team that works to:

• Use communication to influence the issues that reach the public agenda, thereby creating policy changes at the personal, organizational and public policy levels that advance sustainable food and farming systems;
• Increase the mass media communications on issues around sustainable food and farming systems that produce healthy, green, fair and affordable foods;
• Raise the profile of the fellows as food system experts among media and policymakers; and
• Build capacity, leadership, and cohesiveness in a group of experts who collaborate and communicate using mass media channels to bring sustainable food system issues to the public agenda.

The first fellowship class started September 2001. Classes have ranged in size from 8 to 12 fellows, with a total of 72 fellows having been selected. The most recent class, Class VII, started January 2009 and will continue through December 2010. At this time, it is yet to be determined whether there will be future classes.

Fellowships are part-time over two years. Fellows receive communications training and support to enhance their skills in using a variety of communication and media outlets. Each fellow formulates a communications plan, which creatively uses frames to impact cultural shifts realizing sustainability challenges and opportunities within our food and agriculture systems. Fellows also receive policy training and support to work on shifting policies to promote sustainable food and farming systems.