Over the coming weeks before Terra Madre Salone del Gusto 2018 commences we will be sharing some short interviews with the youth delegates and other young leaders attending the biggest global gathering of food communities in the world!
First up is one of our youngest delegates, Halcyon Hayward, who is also a relative newbie to Slow Food but a talented Veterinary student at the University of Edinburgh who dreams of running her own pasture-fed dairy farm in the future –
What’s your happiest food memory?
Picking blackberries on the way to school with my mum and little brother when I was seven.
What originally inspired you to get involved in your work?
As a vet student, I am inspired by the opportunity to build relationships with farmers to improve the welfare of their livestock and be a ‘link in the chain’ of food production.
How are you helping to or hoping to build a better food system?
I hope that by improving animal health and welfare, better quality products will reach consumers and ensure that farmers can become sustainable – economically and environmentally
What’s the most pressing issue in food and agriculture that you’d like to see solved
I would like to see alternatives to fossil fuel fertilisers and pesticides being researched and embraced by the agricultural industry. I hope that permaculture ideas might become more mainstream.
How can we best stimulate young adults curiosity about food and agriculture and encourage their participation in building healthier food systems?
Getting young people outside and connecting them to the environment where food begins is essential. Also, new developments in urban agriculture are exciting and documentaries about this may inspire young people.
Who are your food heroes?
Louise Gray and Ruby Tandoh, food writers, and Chris Newman, an American permaculturist.
Which of this year’s Terra Madre themes most relates to your work and why?
Slow meat – I am determined that we can produce livestock sustainably, providing animals with a good life and a good death and that this should be affordable for all farmers and consumers.
If you could travel to one country in the world to experience their food culture where would it be?
Switzerland! I would like to follow the goat herds to their summer grazing in the Alps and learn how to make cheese.
You might not know this but…
I like pineapple on pizza!
