Slow Islands

Kathy Dunster of Bowen Island originated the Slow Islands movement in 2004.

The Slow Food Movement began in Italy in 1986 in response to the opening of the first McDonalds there. It countered the American "Fast Food" movement with the notion of local "Slow Food." Its mission is to promote food diversity and to prevent the extinction of domestic fruits, vegetables and animals.. Being a member of this international movement led Katherine Dunster of Bowen Island to think about the "Slow Landscapes" required to sustain Slow Food. She coined the term "Slow Islands" to mean islands that understand that their unique cultures are the result of a close relationship with both the land and their surrounding waters, islands that recognize that agriculture is the foundation of the cultural landscape, and islands that recognize that their biological and landscape diversity is an essential ecological asset that has existed for millennia. "In order to have slow landscapes, we need to have a revolution that firmly places landscape conservation ahead of landscape conversion for development....Slow islands have learned to say no to externally imposed changes that may lead their landscapes into extinction events." Slow islands mean slow, narrow roads full of pot-holes, acceptance that ferries rarely run on time, "places so diversely interesting that you are enticed to walk somewhere, and places where you can walk anywhere."

Katherine Dunster, "Cultural survival and the slow islands movement," in G. Brazier and N. Doe, Islands of British Columbia 2004: Conference Proceedings, Denman Island: Arts Denman, 2005.

Katherine Dunster, Slow Landscapes and Small Towns, http://www.comoxvalleyvalue.com/communityresources.htm#sstc3

See also Eating