Terra Madre Day is being celebrated worldwide from Angola to China, from Poland to Venezuela

Each year, on Slow Food’s anniversary, December 10, the global Slow Food network celebrates Terra Madre Day – a day to promote local eating, agricultural biodiversity and sustainable food production.

Carlo Petrini, Slow Food President: “In every corner of the world, we celebrate biodiversity and the extraordinary work that Terra Madre communities carry forward on every continent. Work that cares for the weak and needy, work that defends our agricultural heritage. Work that has grown through the years thanks to the extraordinary efforts of the Terra Madre network. Terra Madre Day is a celebration of diversity, and it’s a celebration of our philosophy, of good, clean and fair food.”

This year’s Terra Madre Day calls special attention to Slow Food’s first international fundraising campaign Love the Earth, Defend the Future, recently launched to help collect funds for Slow Food. “The Love the Earth, Defend the Future campaign is our method of self-financing. It’s what will allow us to be free, to have our own ideas, to uphold them and spread them around the world,” affirms Carlo Petrini.

 Many communities shared photos and stories of their events on Facebook. Below is a short description of a few highlights of this year’s celebrations worldwide:

Angola

Slow Food Namibe, in collaboration with the Italian Embassy in Luanda organized a community lunch in a school for 160 children with soups and local vegetables.

Australia

Slow Food Sydney held a dinner to celebrate    the importance of loving the earth and the soil, with a dinner dedicated to pizza with dough fermented for 30 hours before being cooked in a wood fire oven.

China

Slow Food Hong Kong is organizing an Italian lunch in an Osteria, reflecting the birthplace of Slow Food. Among the attendants will be Adele Wong, who recently published a book on the history and heritage of Hong Kong’s fascinating food culture (Hong Kong Food & Culture: From Dim Sum to Dried Abalone).

Costa Rica

Slow Food Costa Rica is organizing a carnival: Slow Food Earth Market and other local fairs will meet in the Inder Agricultural Development Institute (Inder) to prepare a big lunch and carry out a laboratory of experiences with the delegates who attended Terra Madre Salone del Gusto 2016.

Croatia

Slow Food Zagreb Agram is organizing a pop-up dinner on December 9 bringing together top culinary talent and the Pelješac Varenik Presidium to prepare varenik with the best locally-sourced products. On December 12 an Earth Market will present local producers to the public, paired with food tastings prepared by one American and two Croatian chefs.

Indonesia

Slow Food Jakarta is celebrating Terra Madre Day with a Feast in the Forest with people foraging for wild herbs, organizing jam sessions and a community lunch.

Italy

Here celebrations take shape with several events in many regions, to name but one, there is a big market to support producers affected by the earthquake in Lazio.

Lebanon

Slow Food Beirut is organizing a Terra Madre lunch using Ark of Taste products to showcase Lebanese culinary heritage.

Nigeria

Terra Madre Day is going to be celebrated with a lot of events in Nigeria. At the Essence private school in Oluwo pupils will harvest crops from the school garden and use them for a cooking competition. Slow Food Egbeda is providing food recipes to the vulnerable through food waste collected from farmers. The Slow Food Youth Network is also warming up for fun times at the Amala Food Fiesta at Transamusement Park in Ibadan, in partnership with the Ministry of Agriculture and the Ministry of Culture. There will be an exhibition of local fish varieties.

Poland

Five Slow Food groups in Poland – Slow Food Dolny Śląsk, Slow Food Kujawsko-Pomorskie, Slow Food Malopolska, Slow Food Warszawa and Slow Food Wroclaw – are organizing educational activities for children and adults in order to establish direct contact with producers, to improve food and taste education in schools and to promote the importance of agrobiodiversity.

Russia

Slow Food in Moscow, Moscow region and Saint Petersburg are dedicating Terra Madre Day to the launch of the Slow Food Chefs’ Alliance in the country. Slow Food Oka and farm restaurant “Mark and Leo” is organizing a charity gala dinner with regional products from the Ark of Taste. In Saint Petersburg the chef of the KoKoKo restaurant, Igor Grishechkin – part of the Slow Food Chefs’ Alliance network – has put a special Terra Madre plate on the menu for a whole week – “Kasha iz topora” (based on the “Stone soup” fairytale): a green buckwheat porridge with penny bun mushrooms and stewed beef cheeks.

Scotland

Slow Food Edinburgh and the Slow Food Youth Network Scotland organized a Terra Madre Tales’ evening, enjoying a delicious selection of artisan cheeses from Scotland and beyond. Scotland’s delegates to 2016’s Terra Madre Salone del Gusto in Turin shared their stories and experiences, together with the Ark of Taste Coordinator in Scotland, Wendy Barrie.

Spain

Slow Food Cantabria organized an excursion for families who will visit an organic beef cattle farm, enjoying a meal and talking about legumes.

United States

Slow Food USA is coordinating a Secret Snail Swap – Share a recipe, receive a recipe. Slow Food members from around the world are invited to share a family recipe by December 10 (Terra Madre Day), then receive a recipe from a member around December 15. As Slow Food USA says, “The Secret Snail Swap is a great way to start a conversation with members across the world through food.”

Turkey

Slow Food Türkiye / Fikir Sahibi Damaklar is organizing a “pickling workshop” to learn about preserving. The event name “Let’s pickle Istanbul!” is also a metaphor to communicate the need to preserve not only Istanbul’s culinary heritage but the city itself from the destructive activities of multinational companies.

Uganda

Slow Food Uganda is organizing many events in different parts of Uganda. Central Uganda (Mukono and Buikwe), Western Uganda (Kabale), Eastern Uganda (Mbale, Soroti and Jinja), West Nile region (Koboko), Northern Uganda (Lira). Terra Madre communities are meeting to exhibit different local and traditional food products: climbing yams (such as the Balugu Climbing Yam Presidium), bananas varieties (such as the Bogoya), coffees, fruits, cassava and potatoes.

Venezuela

Slow Food Mano a Mano Mérida will celebrate Terra Madre Day during the 5th Ecofestival de la Papa Nativa.

Slow Food protects biodiversity with projects around the world. To continue this work, we need everyone’s help and participation. http://donate.slowfood.com/en/

For further information, please contact the Slow Food International Press Office:

[email protected] – Twitter: @SlowFoodPress

Slow Food is a global grassroots organization that envisions a world in which all people can access and enjoy food that is good for them, good for those who grow it and good for the planet. Slow Food involves over a million activists, chefs, experts, youth, farmers, fishers and academics in over 160 countries. Among them, a network of around 100,000 Slow Food members are linked to 1,500 local chapters worldwide, contributing through their membership fee, as well as the events and campaigns they organize. As part of the network, more than 2,400 Terra Madre food communities practice small-scale and sustainable production of quality food around the world.