This work is dedicated to everyone who calls the Blackfeet Nation home.
Our Mission, Vision & Values
Mission Statement:
FAST (Food Access and Sustainability Team) Blackfeet is a nonprofit organization founded by a group of involved citizens who are dedicated to improving food security, providing nutrition education, and reclaiming & building food sovereignty within the Blackfeet Nation.
Vision Statement:
A healthy, strong, food secure Blackfeet Nation.
Core Blackfeet Values:
● Siksik̇aitsiitṫǔṗiiwǎssin(Blackfeet Way of Knowing): Blackfeet culture/spirituality in philosophy, thought and action.
● Ninnīyssin (to be a leader): professionalism, integrity, and responsibility in human interaction.
● Innǎak̇oǒtsiissin (to treat each other with respect): respect for oneself, all other people, all ideas and each thing in the natural world.
● Soōṗoōksiiṗāatṫǔṗiissin (the complete life): honest in all thoughts and actions.
● Iiyik̇ǎak̇imǎan (to try hard): commitment, dedication, sincerity in the pursuit of all our goals.
● Ō’k̇ǔnnoōṫǎaṫoōmo ́ (Accepting Everyone): embracing the unique talents and contributions of each individual.
● Ii•ṫǎamiiṗāatṫǔṗiissin (the happy life): humor, laughter, and enjoyment of life.
Video link to help with pronunciation: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QBc3jqZwlBk
Food Security for Our People:
Ensuring daily access to healthy, nutritious food for all.
Food security exists if - and only if - all people, at all times, have physical, social, and economic access to safe and nutritious food that meets their dietary needs and food preferences for a healthy life.
Food Sovereignty for Our Nation:
The right to healthy, culturally appropriate foods produced through ecologically sound and sustainable methods, and the right to define our own food and agricultural systems.
-Focuses on food for people providing the right to sufficient, healthy and culturally appropriate food, rejecting the proposition that food is just another commodity
-Values food providers supporting their contributions and rejecting policies, actions and programs that undervalue them, threaten their livelihoods and eliminate them
-Localizes food systems, bringing food providers and consumers closer together Puts control locally over territory, land, grazing, water, seeds, livestock and fish populations on local food providers and respects their rights
-Builds local knowledge and skills that conserve, develop and manage localized food production and harvesting systems
-Works with Nature to maximize the contribution of ecosystems and improve resilience and adaptation, especially in the face of climate change; it seeks to heal the planet so that the planet may heal us; and, rejects methods that harm beneficial ecosystem functions