In 2026, after nearly 30 years of work together as a coalition of small farmer advocates and farmworker organizations, the Agricultural Justice Project is closing down.
This has not been an easy decision. We badly need a better food system. For many years we persisted despite organizational challenges because of our dedication to the mission of AJP, “to transform the food system by seeking justice, fairness, and empowerment for everyone from farm to retail.” However, after an extended process to evaluate our programs and future possibilities for our work, we still lack the resources to keep going. While we take this step of closure with heavy hearts, we also know that many of our friends and collaborators are doing vital, beautiful work to transform our food and agriculture system and win a better world for our people. We trust that this transition for AJP will make space for new voices, new visions, and new projects to emerge that continue the important work of fighting for the people of the land.
This report summarizes an outreach and assessment process led by our General Coordinator, Jon Magee. This process has brought into sharp relief the incongruities between our organizational mission and the strategies that we employed through these many years—especially certification. This process also took place at a moment when our movements are strategizing how to resist an authoritarian administration’s attacks on working people across our country. We hope that the resulting report and its conclusions help all of us to meet this moment, building power and winning the justice we truly deserve.