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Growing Resilience
Free Virtual Roundtable
Recording Now Available
Watch the latest event from Fair Food Network's virtual roundtable series featuring Malik Yakini, Co-founder and former Executive Director of the Detroit Black Community Food Sovereignty Network.
Malik joined Oran Hesterman, Founder & Resident Champion at Fair Food Network, for a discussion and live audience Q&A focused on how innovative, community-owned food organizations that are creating positive change in Detroit and beyond.
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Meet the Speakers
Malik Yakini
Co-founder and Former Executive Director, Detroit Black Community Food Sovereignty Network
Malik Yakini is a Co-founder and Former Executive Director of the Detroit Black Community Food Sovereignty Network (DBCFSN). The DBCFSN operates the seven-acre D-Town Farm and established the Detroit Food Policy Council, which Malik chaired from 2009 – 2012. The DBCFSN was also instrumental in the opening of the Detroit Food Commons in Detroit’s North End neighborhood that houses the Detroit People’s Food Co-op where Malik currently serves as a board member. Malik, a longtime Pan-Africanist, views the work of DBCFSN as part of the larger movement for building power, self-determination, and justice for African people.
Malik was a Michigan Food Policy Council member from 2008 – 2010 and served on the steering committee of Uprooting Racism Planting Justice from 2011 – 2013. He is a co-founder and on the leadership team of the National Black Food and Justice Alliance. He has an intense interest in contributing to the development of an international Black Food Sovereignty movement that embraces Black communities in the Americas, the Caribbean, and Africa.
Founder & Resident Champion at Fair Food Network
With more than 40 years of experience as a scientist, farmer, philanthropist, businessman, educator, and passionate advocate, Oran is a pioneer of the good food movement. He founded Fair Food Network in 2009; under his leadership, the organization has seeded and scaled food-based solutions that improve healthy food access for families and economic equity for farmers and food businesses, both in Michigan and nationwide. Working at the intersection of food, health, and economic justice, Oran ushered Fair Food Network into impact investing, fueling the success of food entrepreneurs through catalytic capital, wrap-around business services, and a commitment to place-based impact investing collectives. He is the author of Fair Food: Growing a Healthy, Sustainable Food System for All, an inspiring guide to changing not only what we eat, but how food is grown, packaged, delivered, and sold.
A former fellow in the Kellogg National Fellowship Program and the National Center for Food and Agriculture Policy in Washington, D.C., Oran has published more than 400 reports and articles on subjects that include crop rotation, the impact of philanthropy on food systems practice and policy, and trends in the good food movement, among others.
Oran serves on the board or in an advisory role for a number of national and Michigan-based organizations, including Fair Food Fund, Five Acre Farms, Groundwork Center, NextCycle Michigan, and Pardes Hannah Jewish Renewal Community. He participates in the Editorial Board of the Journal of Agriculture, Food Systems, and Community Development.
