Lexington teen wins national film competition about food insecurity

A Paul Laurence Dunbar High School student recently earned national recognition for his short film on food insecurity.

Seventeen-year-old Jonathan Conley was one of 10 winners of the nationwide “Mosaic Film Experience: Nourishing Narratives” competition. The competition prompts kids, ages 10-18, around the country to produce mobile films about food justice.

Before the competition, Conley said he had never been involved with anything related to filmmaking, but he said it was rewarding to see his project come together. As a winner of the competition, Conley earned a grant to “further support his efforts to champion food justice and provide a greater platform for his voice,” according to a news release.

According to a January report from the U.S. Department of Agriculture, 17.1 million people in the U.S. live in low-income, low-access tracts that are more than 1 mile from a supermarket in an urban area, or 20 miles from a supermarket in a rural area. In 2023, Kentucky had a food-insecure population of 753,410, and Fayette County had a food-insecure population of 47,930, according to a report from Feeding America, an organization that aims to make healthy food easier to access across the U.S.

“(Winning the competition) really encouraged me and showed me that my story matters and that what I can do can really make a difference on an even bigger scale,” Conley said.

Conley’s short film, “A Just Plate: Food For All,” explains his passion for food justice, an idea that Conley said means that “all people should have access to a place that sells fresh, affordable meals at an affordable price.”

“I have lived in many food deserts, where fresh and nutritious food is just not available,” Conley said in the film. “I want to help bring food justice to everyone.”

Conley’s film also explored his internship at Lexington-based non-profit FoodChain, which provides free and fresh meals to the community, made with locally grown ingredients. He started the internship when he was just 16, with little knowledge of food justice, but he said he is now well-versed in agriculture.

Conley works in FoodChain’s aquaponics farm, which grows vegetables without soil while using 90% less water than the typical gardening process. Conley said his work at FoodChain has taught him a lot about agriculture, something he said is rare among young people.

“A lot of people who are young aren’t really interested in being farmers,” Conley said. “I think that being educated about agriculture in general is just a very good thing, and it helps you understand a lot about your food and where it comes from.”

Conley said FoodChain is taking “a step in the right direction” when it comes to food justice in Lexington, but he said there is still work to be done to alleviate food deserts in the city.

“There is still a lot of barriers and things that need to change in order for more people to have access to fresh fruits and vegetables,” Conley said.

Conley doesn’t quite know what his future holds just yet, but he said he wants to work towards impacting his community through food justice.

“I think one of the best things I can do is just spread the knowledge... about the knowledge that I’ve gained from FoodChain and about food deserts and the food system that we live in,” Conley said. “Becuase it all starts with education. If you don’t understand something, how can you truly change it.”