Women Run our Food System
With Women’s History Month in full swing, we wanted to share this beautiful story crafted by Jo Phillips, our Harvest and Distribution Manager, pawpaw pro, market saleswoman extraordinaire, friend, sister, and all-around rockstar. Jo describes her experiences studying coffee agriculture abroad in Costa Rica, the women who inspire her farming practice, and how this shapes her relationship to farming and selling produce in our EarthDance community.
2026 also happens to be designated as the International Year of the Woman Farmer by the United Nations, aiming to “spotlight the essential roles women play across agrifood systems, from production to trade, while often going unrecognized.” As Jo shares, women are the cornerstone of a robust food system. We thank and honor the women and gender expansive people who power EarthDance—as well as our local food system in Ferguson, and around the globe. We’ll let Jo take it from here:
Women run our food system—from seed to plate, across all cultures and all throughout history. Women, across many cultures, have traditionally been seed keepers, carriers of medicinal plant wisdom, and kitchen magicians working to make sure all mouths are fed and nothing is wasted.
In college, I spent time in Costa Rica studying coffee agriculture. I met a number of women farmworkers, who I learned are the bulk of the labor force in coffee production. They traverse the steep, mountainside fields, harvesting each berry by hand, carrying harvest buckets on their hips, and sometimes children on their back. Many are paid by the bushel, and push themselves to work long hours during harvest seasons, all the while returning home to their “second shift” work of cooking, cleaning, and caring for children.
Snapshots from Jo’s time in Costa Rica.
Ecofeminists like Vandana Shiva (an iconic woman farmer) have guided me in unpacking how patriarchy and dominance culture have overtaken agriculture, both reliant on the exploitation of labor, women, and the environment. Intersectional philosophers like Kimberlé Crenshaw and Leah Thomas have taught me how our unique identities as women farmers cultivate distinct experiences of discrimination, and also unifying experiences of shared joy and wisdom.
Often women are seen as keepers of craft (gardening) and men of trade (farming), but this myth is rooted in the devaluation of women’s labor and also real life financial inequity which allows more (white) men to be farm and land owners. It is so important to me to amplify the work women do to feed the world.
I have also had the privilege of learning from a number of women and gender diverse farmers at EarthDance and around the St. Louis farm community. It is an absolute honor to be a woman farmer, it is such an important part of my identity.
Jo with her mom, who along with her aunt, introduced her to gardening.
I hope folks will celebrate by further educating themselves on women farmers and ecofeminism. Books I recommend: Ecofeminism by Maria Mies and Vandana Shiva, The Intersectional Environmentalist by Leah Thomas, Braiding Sweetgrass by Robin Wall Kimmerer, Woman and Nature by Susan Griffin.
