—Systemic change begins with personal change—
Kate MacKenzie serves as the Executive Director of New York City’s Mayor’s Office of Food Policy. She advises the Mayor on all issues related to food policy and the city’s food system and executes his vision of ensuring that food nourishes New Yorkers rather than feeds the healthcare crisis.
MacKenzie leads the city’s Good Food Purchasing commitments, focused on increasing access to healthy, sustainable foods for the over 238 million meals and snacks served daily by city agencies — from public schools to senior centers. MacKenzie also drives the action to advance Food Forward NYC, the city's first ever 10-year food policy plan, that lays out a comprehensive policy framework to reach a more equitable, sustainable, and healthy food system by 2031.
MacKenzie is recognized across the globe for her leadership and approaches to food system governance. She came to the Mayor’s Office from nearly two decades in non-profit organizations and academia including City Harvest and teaching as an adjunct professor at Columbia University's Teacher's College.
On reappointing her, podcast guest Mayor Eric Adams said, “From launching Plant-Powered Fridays in all public schools to expanding Plant-Based Lifestyle Medicine Clinics in NYC Health + Hospitals facilities to all five boroughs, we are implementing transformative changes in the meals we serve and the food we source. Kate MacKenzie has been a critical partner in our efforts to envision and implement these transformative changes, and I am thrilled to reappoint her to lead the Mayor’s Office of Food Policy.”
For more background, see her profile at the New York City Food Policy Center: Kate Mackenzie, MS, RD: COVID-19 Food Hero
Food touches nearly all environmental issues, as well as health, social, economic, political, and cultural. Cities like New York and their governance do too. Regular listeners know I talk about food waste, doof, packaging, and related issues. I celebrate her boss, Eric Adams's dramatic change in his diet, which tells me his motivations to bring healthier food to New York are authentic and genuine. As the top food official in New York City's government, Kate is in the middle of it all. After covering her background, we talk about what New York is doing about food and doof, some initiatives guarded, some bold and visionary. As a New Yorker since the 1980s, you'll hear I want to offer my service. I want to help make doof go the way of cigarettes in the workplace---that is, no longer allowed. After New York banned them, the policy change received overwhelming support. While she speaks somewhat officially at the start, the conversation grew more personal as we spoke, in part, maybe because I shared with her an amazingly delicious local apple. Who knows, maybe I'll work with the city and get to help stop tragedies like this disgusting litter and this alarming litter, largely doof waste, from happening. New York is one of the most exciting and beautiful cities in the world when not covered with doof and its waste.
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