The Slow Movement began with a protest against the opening of a McDonald's restaurant in Piazza di Spagna, Rome. This sparked the creation of the Slow Food organization.

Slow Food is a non-profit, eco-gastronomic member- supported organization that was founded in 1989 to counteract fast food and fast life, the disappearance of local food traditions and people’s dwindling interest in the food they eat, where it comes from, how it tastes and how our food choices affect the rest of the world. To do that, Slow Food brings together pleasure and responsibility, and makes them inseparable. Today, we have over 100,000 members in 132 countries.

Carlo Petrini Founder and President of the Slow Food movement.

GOOD It tastes good and gives us pleasure to eat it

CLEAN The way it’s produced respects the environment, animal welfare and our health

FAIR Those who produce it should receive compensation and recognition for their work

Slow Food is dedicated to bio-diversity (preservation of food variety) and sustainability (meeting present needs without compromising those of future generations). All the people involved in producing and distributing food, are closely linked to a geographic area from a historic, social and cultural point of view. Food communities make quality products in a sustainable way.

An African proverb says it all: ‘If you want to go fast, go alone. If you want to go far, go together.’

We produce food for 12 billion people. There are 6.3 billion of us on the face of the earth. One billion suffer from malnutrition and hunger. More than half of the food we produce is thrown away.

Food production nowadays is principally responsible for the planet’s destruction. People think its cause is industry and cars, but 70 per cent of the main cause is the massive production of food.

The Story of Bottled Water.

Local Communities, Global Results Slow food “Our vision is not an archaic one, but rather a particularly modern one. The dignity of the local economy is the last thing that allows the realization of what is fast becoming an oxymoron: sustainable development. Social sustainability must be sought as much with our actions at a global level as at a local level. We can do our part as an international organization as well as individual convivia and food communities.” Carlo Petrini, Slow Food Founder: Opening Speech, Terra Madre 2006

Sustainability It is necessary, therefore, to stimulate and sustain the "ecological conversion,“...not only is a "physical" ecology at stake, attentive to safeguarding the habitat of different living beings, but also a "human" ecology that will render the life of creatures more dignified, protecting the radical good of life in all its manifestations and preparing an environment for future generations that is closer to the plan of the Creator. - Pope John Paul 2’s General Audience Address, January 17, 2001

References. - International website. – Australian Based site.