We asked chefs, politicians, and activists: How do you use your power?

A video series exploring how power plays out in the food system for the people who grow it, produce it, and cook it.

These are the first episodes in a video series that we filmed at the 2017 James Beard Foundation food summit in New York City. Subscribe to The New Food Economy Youtube channel, where you can find more interviews with industry figures from this year’s conference.

This year’s James Beard Foundation food summit was centered around the concept of “consuming power.” More specifically, it was about who has power, who doesn’t, and what levers exist to change those imbalances in the food industry. The two-day conference in New York City featured key players in the world of food, from big-name chefs to workers’ activists. Earlier, we reported five key takeaways from the conference. But we also wanted to bring you into the room where it happened. So we filmed a series of videos on-location, interviewing conference speakers on instances when they realized they had power in the food system—and how they chose to wield it.