Lauren Melodia aims to link New York dairy farmers and high incarceration rates with her organization, Milk Not Jails. This week on Cutting the Curd, Anne Saxelby sits down with Lauren, founder and co-organizer, to talk about the prison system in New York, and how it connects the urban with the rural. How do prisons bolster New York's rural economy? Find out how government support for dairy farms as opposed to prisons creates a sustainable economy. Learn how a lack of processing and bottling plants limits production for small dairy farmers. Find out what Milk Not Jails aims to do to support local dairy farmers and help reform the prison system simultaneously. This program has been sponsored by White Oak Pastures. Thanks to Pamela Royal for today's musical interlude.

"The processing world has shut its doors to farmers who want to be entrepreneurial in their industries." [25:15] -- Lauren Melodia on Cutting the Curd

Gavin Raders is a co-founder and Executive Director of Planting Justice, a social justice activist, and a permacuture demonstrator/teacher. He dedicates his time to practicing permaculture wherever he can, having gone through extensive training with some of the most inspiring and effective permaculture teachers in the world: Geoff Lawton, Penny Livingston-Stark, Brock Dolman, Darren Dougherty, and Nik Bertulis. Before his stint as an intern at the Regenerative Design Institute, he studied cultural anthropology at UC Berkeley, and organized on a range of anti-war, anti-nuclear, environmental and human rights issues both on campus and off. He has knocked on nearly 30,000 doors in California, New Mexico, Colorado, and Nevada as a community organizer with Peace Action West. He comes to permaculture and ecological design through a social justice framework which recognizes the right of all people to peace, security, housing, healthy food, clean water, jobs and healthcare, and the rights of future generations to a just and livable world. For this to happen, he believes that Americans need to understand and respect the intimate connection and the shared fate we have with all people and all life on this planet, and organize effectively on the local level to come up with replicable and effective solutions to the range of hardships and oppressions we currently face. When families, communities, bio-regions, and nations work with nature instead of against her to provide their own sustainable food, water, and energy, this not only makes us more resilient, but also makes us less likely to violently take what they need from someone else. He is still riding on the inspiration and jolt of passion he experienced in India, studying and advocating for the right to water and against its privatization by massive water corporations (such as Coca-Cola). Thanks to our sponsor, Hearst Ranch.

"We have a great deal of power to change our environment and the things that serve us." [8:20] -- Gavin Raders on Greenhorn Radio

Check your privilege at the door! Nathaniel Coburn is talking with Just Food Conference 2013 workshop leader Marian Isel Barragan. Marian is a holistic healer through Marian Isel Wellness, and a community chef for Just Food. Tune into this segment to hear about Marian's upcoming workshop that will address white privilege in the food system. Hear how Mariana incorporates poetry and theater to touch on subjects that involve a lot of emotions, such as racism. Listen in to hear Mariana speak to the power of grassroots, person-to-person connection, and what she hopes to accomplish through cooking with Just Food. This segment has been sponsored by The International Culinary Center.

"Just because you have a good intention, that doesn't mean that there isn't a certain consequence that comes with white privilege." [10:10]

"Life is very hard for immigrants, and there's a lot that makes up what's going on their plate." [12:50]

-- Marian Isel Barragan, Just Food Conference 2013