20 YEARS OF
GRASSROOTS POWER
For two decades, Food & Water Watch has won against corporate interests to protect our food, water, and climate.
Check out some of our biggest victories yet.
2005
May 2005
Food & Water Watch founded by Wenonah Hauter.
In 2005, Wenonah joined several former staff from consumer advocacy organization Public Citizen to found Food & Water Watch.
“I saw the need for an organization that would not be afraid to call for the bold solutions we need to protect
our most important resources, food and water; an organization that would build the political power to win on these issues. I wanted to take on the biggest corporate abusers and polluters — Big Ag and the fossil fuel industry,” says Wenonah.
2007
July 2007
Won first water privatization campaign in Stockton, California.
Food & Water Watch worked with the community in Stockton to initiate a public takeover of what was previously a private water system. Since then, we’ve won over 50 water privatization fights across the country, including in Chicago, Milwaukee, and San Diego. Learn more about our more recent victories against water privatization.
2007
August 2007
Pressured Starbucks to stop using dairy products with rBGH.
Food & Water Watch’s first campaign, called “Hold the Hormones,” called on the coffee giant to stop using dairy products produced with Monsanto’s genetically modified hormone rBGH. Two years of rallies, reports, and pressure resulted in victory!
2011
January 2011
Advocated for farmers in the Food Safety Modernization Act.
The Food Safety Modernization Act allowed the Food and Drug Administration to regulate the growing, harvesting, and processing of foods, including the ability to issue mandatory recalls to protect us from foodborne illnesses. Food & Water Watch advocated for critical protections for small farmers in the law.
2011b
March 2011
Became the first national organization to call for a fracking ban.
At the time, many major environmental organizations were working to regulate fracking, but we knew it wasn’t enough. The risks to our water, health, and climate were clear — fracking could not be done safely.
Since then, we’ve brought the wider environmental movement to support fracking bans and passed four statewide bans, propelled the movement to ban fracking on federal lands, and stopped fracking projects nationwide.
2012
January 2012
Wenonah’s groundbreaking book, Foodopoly, is published.
Foodopoly shines a light on the powerful web of food corporations that have taken over our food policy and control our food from seed to table. Food & Water Watch fights against corporate greed to build an affordable, sustainable, and fair food system. Our advocacy has defended small and medium-sized farms, rural communities, and consumers from Big Ag’s abuses.
2013
October 2013
Banned arsenic in poultry and pig feed nationwide.
For years, factory farms had added drugs containing cancer-causing arsenic to animal feed. In 2012, we won a campaign to ban arsenic in chicken feed in Maryland, paving the way for a federal ban. The Food & Drug Administration withdrew its approval for nearly all of these drugs in 2013 and for the remaining ones in 2015.
2014
2014
december 2014
Banned fracking in New York statewide.
Following years of campaigning by Food & Water Watch and the New Yorkers Against Fracking coalition, then-Governor Cuomo outlawed fracking statewide. This was the first ban in a state with significant gas reserves. It protected New Yorkers and their food and water from fracking and pushed the national anti-fracking movement to new heights. Read more about how we won this fight in our eBook, “People Power vs. Fracking.”
2014
The ban propelled the national anti-fracking
movement to new heights.
2016
July 2016
Led the largest anti-fracking march in U.S. history to date.
The March for a Clean Energy Revolution in Philadelphia, PA took place ahead of the Democratic National Convention, demanding a national move to clean energy and off fossil fuels. Over 10,000 people from around the country marched with us in a display of the anti-fracking movement’s growing power!
2016
2017
April 2017
Banned fracking in Maryland statewide.
Following a multi-year campaign led by Food & Water Watch, Maryland officially banned fracking statewide. Maryland is the third state in the nation to ban fracking and the first with major gas reserves to do so through the legislature.
2017b
October 2017
Blocked a Nestlé Water bottling facility in Oregon.
For nearly ten years, Food & Water Watch fought a bottling facility near Cascade Locks that would have drained 100 million gallons of water every year for the sale of plastic bottled water.
Stopping it was a huge victory against corporate behemoth Nestlé and we continue to fight schemes to profit off our most precious resource, water. Facing down the bottled water industry is key to addressing the growing crisis of microplastic pollution in our water, which poses major risks to our health.
2018
May 2018
Called for a ban on factory farms
With the release of a groundbreaking report, Food & Water Watch called for a national ban on factory farms. The harms of factory farming, from air and water pollution to greenhouse gas emissions, make clear that factory farms must go.
In recent years, we have shut down proposed factory farms, passed state laws to constrain these facilities, and won litigation to improve regulations. We’ll continue to fight until our food system is factory farm-free.
To get rid of factory farms, we need to change the fundamental structure of the food system…
2020
March 2020
Stopped water shutoffs in 34 states during the COVID-19 pandemic.
When the COVID-19 pandemic began, clean running water became more essential than ever to protect people from the virus. Yet, cruel water shutoffs for unpaid bills threatened to cut off people’s access to clean water during an economic and public health crisis. Thanks to our swift and powerful moratoria campaign, we stopped water shutoffs for 247 million people nationwide at the height of the pandemic.
2021
2021
September 2021
Won a case to monitor factory farm water pollution.
Our country’s meager protections against factory farm water pollution largely hinge on weak Clean Water Act permits that allow factory farms to go unmonitored and unchecked.
But this year, we won a federal legal challenge to the Environmental Protection Agency’s Clean Water Act permit for Idaho factory farms. The Court agreed with us that Clean Water Act permits need monitoring requirements, setting an important precedent that helps us fight for better permits and more protections against factory farms nationwide.
2021b
November 2021
Secured $50 billion in federal funds for water infrastructure.
Our advocacy helped drive lawmakers to include the biggest federal investment in water in decades in the Bipartisan Infrastructure Law. This is a massive victory for clean, safe, and affordable water, and we will continue advocating for the full $1.3 trillion in federal funds we need to repair and upgrade our nation’s water and wastewater infrastructure.
December 2021
Shut down three fossil-fueled power plants in New York.
In one year, our efforts with frontline communities successfully shut down three dirty power plants in the state — Danskammer, Astoria, and the Gowanus. In the past twenty years, Food & Water Watch has blocked dozens of power plants, pipelines, compressor stations, and LNG export facilities across the country, protecting environmental justice communities from dangerous pollution. Learn more about frontline communities fighting fossil fuel power plants.
2023
June 2023
Passed SB85 to finally regulate polluting factory farms in Oregon.
Oregon’s factory farms pollute drinking water sources and have contributed to a dangerous nitrate crisis in groundwater sources that Eastern Oregon communities depend on. After years of advocacy with the Stand Up to Factory Farms coalition, state lawmakers passed SB85, the first bill to regulate factory farms in years.
2024
2024
February 2024
Banned fracking statewide in California.
Since the founding of Californians Against Fracking more than a decade earlier, California finally began the process to ban fracking statewide! This same year, we worked with partners to defeat Big Oil’s attempt to overturn a setback law that prevents drilling within 3,200 feet of homes, schools, and hospitals, allowing that historic law to go into effect. These are major strides in protecting frontline communities, reining in Big Oil and Gas, and fighting climate change.
2024b
December 2024
Passed New York’s Climate Change Superfund Law.
Climate Superfund laws would require the biggest contributors to the climate crisis to pay damages and fund climate resilience and recovery. Our advocacy helped New York become the second state in the country to pass such a law, and we’re fighting for more in Maryland, Massachusetts, New Jersey, and more.
As we pass more Climate Superfund laws, we’ll hold Big Oil and Gas accountable for their pollution, prevent families from shouldering the costs of climate change, and build a livable climate future for all.
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