Date Palm Symbol of Global Food Heritage Preservation Project

Global Food Heritage Day, March 21

To celebrate our world food heritage, to think about where our foods come from and to be grateful for them, seems appropriate on a day when warmth begins to return to the fields. That’s why we have chosen March 21 as Global Food Heritage Day. That date usually marks the beginning of spring in the Northern Hemisphere, the time of the vernal equinox, when day and night are nearly the same length.

Traditionally it has been a day of planting and renewal, and is linked to the Saxon goddess Eostre, from whose name Easter may be derived. Eostre was a goddess of fertility, whose close pal was a vitality-filled rabbit.

All manner of spring invocations and rituals have been undertaken by farmers and gardeners around this date, to insure healthy sprouting of seeds for the new season.

Though it is not the advent of spring in the Southern Hemisphere, there people will be heading into their food harvest festivals, so perhaps the date can work for us all.