Madoff scandal fells Fair food

Bernard Madoff: arrested over alledged $50bn fraud

The Bernard Madoff scandal has felled a charitable group, the Fair Food Foundation, which was aiming to use millions of dollars to bring healthy, sustainable food to America’s deprived inner cities.

The Foundation’s funding, which was coming from philanthropists Jeanne and Kenneth Levy-Church was invested with Madoff, who has allegedly defrauded a plethora of investors out of as much as $50bn (£34bn).

The foundation was going to receive as much as $20m from its benefactors and was to begin its work in the inner cities of Detroit, Michigan and Oakland, California. One project that was likely to be funded was with Greening of Detroit, which planned an urban farm in the city.

The masterplan was for the foundation to work with urban communities to design a food system that upholds the fundamental right to healthy, fresh and sustainably grown food.

It was to partner with local groups to encourage local selection, ownership and control of food sources that were environmentally sound, socially just, and economically viable. However, before it was able to distribute a single dollar, its existence is over.

The foundation’s chief executive, Oran Hesterman, issued a statement last week explaining that due to the loss of funding, the organisation was no longer in a position to consider any requests for funding and instead would be spending the next few weeks closing down its operation.

“The loss of the Fair Food Foundation and the potential financial support it would have provided is a stinging blow to the community of activists, advocates, organisers and funders dedicated to redesigning our broken food system,” he wrote.