Grassroots Research or Community-Based Participatory Research is a collaborative approach to research in which community members participate fully in all aspects of the research process along with the researchers by training.   It is an iterative process, incorporating research, reflection, and action in a cyclical process.  Grassroots research requires sharing decision-making power, resources, credit, results, and knowledge, as well as the reciprocal appreciation of everyone’s gifts.

Current Projects:

• Eco-APD: What is Snoqualmie Valley’s sustainable production capacity in light of food security? Research with Snoqualmie Valley Tilth

• Scaling Up Diversity: Can cooperative distribution reduce the cost and carbon footprint of bringing sustainable farming’s small-lot diversity to market? Research with Growing Washington, a local farmers’ cooperative, and WSU Extension.

• San Juan Island School District Pilot Project: Benchmarking the economic sustainability of an innovative farm-to-cafeteria program. Research with Chef Tom French, the Experience Food Project, San Juan Island School District and San Juan Island Agricultural Guild .

• Research on over-consumption as a root cause of the impending ecological/economic collapse.

• Research arm of the B-Sustainable Information Network. Visit B-Sustainable.org.

Past Projects:

• Local Food Economy Study for Sustainable Seattle: This research explains why we should care about our spending choices when it comes to food and sustainability.  It finds that locally directed spending supports a web of relationships, rooted in place, which makes for healthier and more prosperous communities. Click here to download the report, Why Local Linkages Matter: Findings from the Local Food Economy Study.

Award:

Recipient of the 2008 Eat Local Now! Jeff Fairhall Local Food Hero award.  Presented to Viki Sonntag for outstanding work in local food activism in the Puget Sound region and the implications that her research holds for the global community.  Read more at: http://www.eatlocalnow.org/the-jeff-fairhall-local-food-hero-award

Comments on Why Local Linkages Matter:

Sustainable Seattle’s excellent and detailed research on building a healthy local food economy encourages strong local relationships to create economic success for a region’s food producers. One finding of the Sustainable Seattle report is that “the emergence of the local food economy is changing the idea of what makes for healthy economies” and that “buying local is not only feasible but practical and profitable” for food producers and food businesses.2 Hence, while challenges exist, a healthy organic and local food economy creates opportunities for success for the community involved. — Washington State Future of Farming Report

While much has been written about the economics of our food system-most of it with an eye to improving production efficiencies, this report takes a different tack, shifting the focus of analysis to look beyond economic performance and consider how the web of relationships that make up the local food economy provide for economic sustainability, which in turn, contributes to social and ecological sustainability. — Full Circle Farm website

Read an article based on the report:

Going to the Source: Why Buying Local Matters, PCC Sound Consumer.  http://www.pccnaturalmarkets.com/sc/0806/sc0806-local.html