Following the screening of FOOD CHAIN$, we’ll explore what’s happening locally in a panel discussion with the following guests:
Sanjay Rawal worked for over 15 years as a development consultant on humanitarian projects in over 40 countries while running a small agricultural genetics company with his father. He helped to start a number of foundations for philanthropists, corporations and celebrities and became involved in film after working on the outreach campaign of Abigail Disney and Gini Reticker’s doc Pray the Devil Back to Hell. His last two documentaries OCEAN MONK and CHALLENGING IMPOSSIBILITY have been screened in over 100 countries.
Emma Zavala-Suarez, J.D. is a proud Mexican immigrant and former farm worker. She is the middle child in a family of 8 siblings. Emma is committed to working on immigrant and farm worker rights. She is the current Board Chair of Community to Community for Development, a Bellingham immigrant and farm worker rights grassroots organization. Emma is passionate about public health and was previously appointed to by Governors Gregoire and Inslee to the Washington State Pharmacy Quality Assurance Commission where served one and a half terms; and serves on the Board of the Migrant Clinicians Network, a national health organization which advocates for migrant farm worker health access. Finally, as a second year medical student at the University of Washington School of Medicine, Emma intends bring a strong preventative care and public health focus to her medical practice and hopes to be a pediatrician. Before deciding to focus on public health, Emma attended the University of Washington School of Law and worked as an attorney in the Business Group at the Seattle office of Stoel Rives, LLP for a few years.
Dj Cavem is the founder of Eco HipHop, an award winning environmental activist, emcee, vegan chef, midwife, DJ, O.G. (organic gardener), bboy, educator, and founder of Going Green Living Bling, an organization dedicated to educating youth using Eco HipHop as a platform of engagement and education on the subjects of plant based nutrition, sustainability, organic gardening, food justice, and environmental awareness. He was nominated for the 2014 Music Educator Grammy Award, and was recently featured in Oprah Magazine and the June/July issue of Taste of Home Magazine.
Andrea Schmitt is an attorney with the Immigrant Workers Group at Columbia Legal Services, where she focuses on issues relating to farmworkers and other low-wage workers. Andrea’s time at CLS, and as a farmworker advocate, began as a Laurel Rubin Farm Worker Justice Fellow in her first year of law school. Most recently, she was part of a litigation team that won four injunctions under state labor and discrimination laws on behalf of farmworker union Familias Unidas against Sakuma Brothers Farms, a large berry grower in the Skagit Valley.
