UC Davis

The emergence of the COVID-19 pandemic has exacerbated existing barriers to food access for citizens in an unprecedented way, demonstrating the fragility of community access to essential goods within the present food system. The following paper documents this moment of urgency as it has impacted three communities within California and their access to food: Santa Clara County, the City of Stockton, and Woodland Joint Unified School District. This paper is exploratory in nature, and utilizes a diverse case method of cross case comparison. Across each case study, this research addresses two central questions: (1) What disruptions associated with COVID-19 occurred within the local food system from the perspective of respective community stakeholders? (2) What responses or adaptations occurred or were proposed as a result of these disruptions, and by whom? These cases were investigated using a combination of secondary document analysis and stakeholder interviews (n=24) with the goal of uncovering a nuanced understanding of each community food system as it has been impacted by COVID-19. Because my understanding of each case was also tied to different academic and community-lead projects, my level of community embeddedness and communication with local food system stakeholders varies across cases. Despite its unconventional methods, this study aims to contribute to an important body of research analyzing how different local food systems respond to disruptive events. Further, as communities work to build back better, this paper aims to make a case for equity as an essential component of a resilient food system through the use of a food justice framework. The lessons learned from this study suggest the value of inter-organizational collaboration.