Personal and Family Level
Personal commitments to eating local food and stopping or limiting
the consumption of imported foods have created awareness
and sparked others to follow. Rice is imported and is mainly white
non-enriched rice, low in fi ber and other nutrients, but energy-dense
and is thought to have contributed much to the non-communicable
disease burden in FSM. A founding member of IFCP stated at the
IFCP Foundation Meeting in 2003 that he had tried an experiment
and had gone one year without eating rice, despite his desires for
eating that food, and that this had had a positive impact in his family
and community for promoting local food. His statement led another
founding member and IFCP board member offi cer to stop eating
rice for health reasons and to promote local foods. He said after he
stopped eating rice, “Now I feel better.” After several years of eating
this way, he was so moved when one of his grandchildren said that
he also wanted to stop eating rice and to “go local.” As a testimony,
he then brought his grandchild and fi ve other family members to an
IFCP board meeting so that the story could be told.10 IFCP board
members were also moved and applauded this progress.