CAFOD - the official aid agency of the Catholic Church in England and Wales - reaches out to people living in poverty by offering practical help, but CAFOD’s mission also calls on us to challenge the structures that bring about poverty and injustice in the first place.

This mission sits at the core of CAFOD's Fix the Food system campaign, which was supported by 200 parishes last year. The initiative aims to re-think the current global food system and, as Pope Francis says, transform it for the benefit of people and the planet.

Globally, just nine crops account for more than 65% of all crop production, which are traded and transported by a few big businesses.

This lack of crop diversity makes the current food system unfit to cope with the challenges brought about by the climate crisis, and also makes it unsuitable for quickly adapting to disease and conflict. Salina, a seed saver from Bangladesh says:

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"the seeds sold by the companies do not belong to the farmers. Farmers can grow the crops, but they cannot keep the seeds in their own hands. This is a very bad thing…”

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Salina has written a letter to the World Bank, an institution with significant influence in food policies, calling for the protection of the rights of small-scale farmers like herself to use their own varieties of seeds. This summer, you have the opportunity to support Salina by adding your names to her letter. You can find out more and get involved here.