Joel Salatin to Speak on the Right to Local Food on Sept. 4 in Staunton, Va.

Online, August 11, 2010 (Newswire.com) - Alternative Farmer, Author, and Local-food Advocate to Call for Grass-Roots Food Activism

Staunton, Va.- Joel Salatin, an alternative farmer known worldwide for his appearance in the documentary films Food Inc. and Fresh, the Movie, will talk about "Food Emancipation" in Staunton, Va, on Saturday, September 4.

Salatin's talk on local food will start at 7:30 pm at the ShenanArts at nTelos Theatre, Gypsy Hill Place, located at 300 Churchville Avenue. Advance tickets are $19.50 for adults, $15.50 for seniors/students, and $8.50 for children 12 and under and are available at several stores in downtown Staunton and online. Tickets at the door will be one single price of $25. Information and tickets are available at http://transitionstaunton.org.

"Why can't you buy raw milk, ice cream with eggs in it, or home-made sausage? America's food system, enslaved by a global corporate bureaucratic fraternity, offers less choice amid the perception of abundance," Salatin said, calling for a lifting of restrictions on local, organic food that give industrial, mass-produced food an unfair advantage.

Joel Salatin, 53, is a full-time farmer in Virginia's Shenandoah Valley. His family's farm, Polyface Inc. ("The Farm of Many Faces") has been featured in Smithsonian Magazine, National Geographic, Gourmet, and in numerous other outlets in print, broadcast, and online media. Profiled on the Lives of the 21st Century series with Peter Jennings on ABC World News, his after-broadcast chat room fielded more hits than any other segment to date. Polyface achieved iconic status as the grass farm featured in the New York Times bestseller The Omnivore's Dilemma by Michael Pollan.

"The only reason the framers of the U.S. Constitution and Bill of Rights did not guarantee citizens freedom of food choice was because they could not have conceived of a day when private treaty neighbor-to-neighbor food commerce would be demonized and criminalized," said Salatin, who will explain how citizens can reclaim the right to buy food from local, smaller-scale producers.

Staunton (http://www.visitstaunton.com), located about 2.5 hours southwest of Washington, DC, in Virginia's Shenandoah Valley, is an increasingly popular weekend destination, with hundreds of restored Victorian buildings. Home to the Blackfriars Playhouse (the world's only re-creation of Shakespeare's indoor theatre), the Woodrow Wilson Presidential Library, and the Museum of American Frontier Culture, the city is located at the interchange of I-81 and I-64 and is served by Amtrak.

Salatin's talk is co-sponsored by Transition Staunton Augusta, a citizens' group dedicated to helping the central Shenandoah Valley of Virginia move to a strong local economy beyond fossil fuels, and Transition Voice, a new online magazine for the peak oil movement. All proceeds from Salatin's talk will support the two groups' outreach activities. More information at http://transitionstaunton.org.

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