Burning Trash in War Zone; Politics; Cult of Celebrity; Food Facts

"Veterans Administration and private physicians have seen a significant increase in respiratory problems in soldiers returning from Iraq and Afghanistan. Other physical problems among war veterans include shortness of breath, headaches and coughing up blood. Almost all of these soldiers had exposure to burn pits as well as battlefield smoke and dust storms. It seems unlikely that the thousands of Iraqis and Afghans working on U.S. military bases or living nearby have escaped such debilitating ailments themselves."

Pulled from a recent article on the USA's grand sustainability and green methods in Afghanistan -- burn pits. That's 10 pounds of trash generated by each American soldier (100,000 total), maybe more by the tens of thousands of contractors shooting up the desert. Pretty nifty -- each ground troop in Afghanistan costs around $1.2 million a year to keep alive and "supported" by infrastructure, energy output, etc.

Going to hell in a hand basket. Hmm, how apropos is that? Read the great piece here --

http://www.guernicamag.com/features/2972/burn_pits_afghanistan_8_15_11/

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WING Nut central -- Aspirants Bachmann and Perry are losers when it comes to basic science -- here's a pulled chunk from a great piece in Alternet:

Science. Both Perry and Bachmann object to the theory of evolution, even though evolution has a similar scientific consensus to the theory that mammals need to breathe oxygen to survive. Perry put his anti-science views into action, appointing creationists to the Texas School Board in hopes they can deceive Texas schoolchildren about reality.

Perry and Bachmann also object to global warming, even though it also enjoys scientific consensus. Bachmann’s objections to science won her a space on the House GOP American Energy Solutions Group, which is dedicated to killing off any actual solutions to American energy problems. Perry went beyond vague insinuations that he somehow knows better than scientists about climate into the territory of promoting the theory that climate change is a global hoax involving thousands---millions?---of scientists and leaders, in order to get the sweet cash from imaginary funders who have some non-disclosed interest in cutting into oil profits. Instead of listening to scientists on the subject of climate, Perry prefers a more 12th-century approach, asking people instead to pray for rain.

http://www.alternet.org/story/152096/michele_bachmann_vs._rick_perry%3A_who%27s_the_bigger_right-wing_extremist?page=1

We are heading for the Bronze Age, for sure, and James Howard Kunstler, of The Long Emergency and Geography of Nowhere fame, predicted the USA would be putting in more and more radically stupid and superstitious folk in low and high elected office. This is where we are heading, for sure, when you look at the GOP and tea bag party.

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Okay, Matt Damon for president is another reaction to these bizarre times --

The Guardian mentioned Damon as a defender of teachers and public education. As a misguided establishment consensus has emerged around standardized testing, privatization and charter schools, Damon has made a full-throated and deeply personal defense of public education, teachers and even the much-maligned teachers’ unions. He gave a real barnburner speech at a recent pro-public education “Save Our Schools” rally.

Like many other progressives, Damon has grown weary of Democrats looking for phony centrism instead of standing up to a shockingly far-right Republican party. Against this backdrop, Damon’s principled and public stands do indeed make us sit up and pay attention.

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Our own Spokane has some wing nuts running, including Mike Fagan for City Council --

Here are some questions pulled from the Seeping Spokesman Review --

LIBRARIES, PARKS AND ENVIRONMENT

12. Spokane’s library system offers significantly fewer hours than many of the 20 largest cities in Washington. Would you be willing to ask voters for a tax to boost this service as was requested earlier this year by the city library board?

Again, NO MORE TAXES! Please see answer #8. It is very imperative that we get a firm control on labor costs. Lower taxes, smaller and less intrusive and transparent government. To hear the Mayor claim that we are cut to the bone is laughable.

13. A consultant hired by the city to review city services in 2006 said that the city was not investing enough in its urban forest. Should the city do more to plant and maintain street trees. If so, how?

I believe the urban forest is adequate. While I love trees, they sure can do a lot of damage and require a lot of maintenance to our infrastructure, i.e. pruning, leaves, sidewalks, sewer, and water pipes. Let’s not forget, the expansion of our urban forest program has been a contributing factor to growing the size of our city government also as we now have at least 3 arborists working for the city and parks.

14. Do you support the sustainability plan promoted by Mayor Mary Verner, which was adopted by the Spokane City Council in 2010? Do you support the decision of former Mayor Dennis Hession to sign the U.S. Conference of Mayors’ Climate Protection Agreement?

I actively practice and support conservation, composting and recycling. I have been schooled and have hands-on experience with LEAN principles. I have had a hand in the creation of several community gardens in northeast Spokane, but, I do not and cannot support any taxation or regulation which has its roots in the “global warming” lie.

15. Some nearby cities have crafted restrictions for watering lawns during certain hours. Would you support instituting similar rules in Spokane?

AHH, notice the tea bag, Patriot Party, Libertarian-faux guy go at all these things. He'll be with some interesting council members, if Fagan wins. Laughable, the city would be, but then we had a child rapist mayor, Jim West, supported by conservatives, Christian-talkers, no less.

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Food, sustainable sanity --

Lastly, these are real tough times for people trying to eat, but here is a phalanx of ways to connect to positive action -- Nourishing the Planet (dot) ORG:

Nourishing the Planet also highlighted five plants that not only provide nutritious crops, but also help farmers mitigate the effects of climate change. And we discussed how energy from the sun is being used to provide water for crops. 

All the best,
Danielle Nierenberg
Nourishing the Planet Co-Project Director
www.nourishingtheplanet.org
Please connect with us on Facebook!
  
Here are some highlights from the week:

Marula Tree

Five plants you've never heard of that can slow climate change

Nourishing the Planet provides five plants that are helping farmers adapt to changes in the climate. Crop yields are estimated to decrease by 30 percent by the end of the century in the United States as a result of climate change. But heartier and more tolerant crops, such as the marula tree and marama, have significant potential to heal degraded soils and aid in the global fight against climate change.

SELF Innovation of the Week: Harnessing the Sun's Power to Make the Water Flow

This week's innovation discusses how energy from the sun is being used to get water to crops. In the Kalalé district of northern Benin, agriculture is a source of livelihood for 95 percent of the population, yet small-scale farmers lack access to effective irrigation systems. But the Solar Electric Light Fund (SELF), a U.S. nonprofit, has introduced an innovative solar-powered drip irrigation system that is helping farmers-especially women-irrigate their fields.   

Ending the Hunger Season

Fred Bahnson, co-founder of the Anathoth Community Garden in North Carolina, discusses the work that the Educational Concerns for Hunger Organization (ECHO), a Florida-based group, are doing to reduce global food insecurity. In addition to conducting research, ECHO provides free consulting for development workers, and promotes agricultural practices, such as growing indigenous crops, to make marginal land more productive. By helping small farmers, the staff at ECHO believe you increase food security for the whole country--and the world.
  

NtP TV Nourishing the Planet TV: Farmers Groups and Cooperatives

In this week's episode, we discuss the role cooperatives have in supporting small scale farmers in Africa. We highlight the role that organizations, including Urban Harvest and the Oromia Coffee Farmers Cooperative Union, play in helping farmers establish local groups, which help to increase crop yields and improve access to markets.

Creating a sustainable world: An interview with Barton Seaver

In this interview, National Geographic fellow and chef, Barton Seaver, discusses the role that a chef can play in creating a sustainable food system. He believes that chefs can act as advocates and educators and can be an important part of changing people's food habits and food choices.

Food Waste -- Letting funding go to waste

In the United States, an estimated 27 percent of all food available for consumption is thrown away. Food waste in the United States amounts to about 30 million tons and accounts for 12 percent of total waste produced in a year. But organizations, including the UN Food and Agriculture Organization, are working to ensure that food that would otherwise be thrown away is delivered to the people in need.

30 Project Dinner kicks-off in San Francisco

Ellen Gustafson and her colleagues brought together food advocates from a variety of organizations,including California Food Policy Advocates (CFPA), CoFed, and the Jamie Oliver Foundation, to eat and talk about the best ways to change the global food system. This is the first of 30 dinners that Gustafson will host in 30 states, where she plans to bring policy makers and other important stakeholders to the table to discuss the future of domestic food policies.

 
What did you think of this newsletter? Please give us your feedback...we will use your comments to constantly improve our work. Write Danielle Nierenberg, Senior Researcher and Co-Project Director of Nourishing the Planet, at dnierenberg@worldwatch.org.

Sustainability Is Coming More and More Through Our Stomachs -- Food for Thought

There will be more attention on this blog to techno-fixes, gizmo sustainability, and how sustainability is at a crossroads tied to greenwashing, this marketing concept of "green is the new black," and so on. Sustainable Development is a concept that came from a report, Our Common Future, compiled in 1987:

Here's the Norweigan prime minister's prefatory comments, and then a story on Kettle Falls, Washington, Quillisascut Farm, a tribute to sustainability on the ground:

Our Common Future, Chairman's Foreword From A/42/427. Our Common Future: Report of the World Commission on Environment and Development
	"A global agenda for change" - this was what the World Commission on Environment and Development was asked to formulate. It was an urgent call by the General Assembly of the United Nations: to propose long-term environmental strategies for achieving sustainable development by the year 2000 and beyond; to recommend ways concern for the environment may be translated into greater co-operation among developing countries and between countries at different stages of economical and social development and lead to the achievement of common and mutually supportive objectives that take account of the interrelationships between people, resources, environment, and development; to consider ways and means by which the international community can deal more effectively with environment concerns; and to help define shared perceptions of long-term environmental issues and the appropriate efforts needed to deal successfully with the problems of protecting and enhancing the environment, a long term agenda for action during the coming decades, and aspirational goals for the world community. When I was called upon by the Secretary-General of the United Nations in December 1983 to establish and chair a special, independent commission to address this major challenge to the world community, I was acutely aware that this was no small task and obligation, and that my day-to day responsibilities as Party leader made it seem plainly prohibitive. What the General Assembly asked for also seemed to be unrealistic and much too ambitious. At the same time, it was a clear demonstration of the widespread feeling of frustration and inadequacy in the international community about our own ability to address the vital global issues and deal effectively with them. The fact is a compelling reality, and should not easily be dismissed. Since the answers to fundamental and serious concerns are not at hand, there is no alternative but to keep on trying to find them. All this was on my mind when the Secretary-General presented me with an argument to which there was no convincing rebuttal: No other political leader had become Prime Minister with a background of several years of political struggle, nationally and internationally, as an environment minister. This gave some hope that the environment was not destined to remain a side issue in central, political decision making. In the final analysis, I decided to accept the challenge. The challenge of facing the future, and of safeguarding the interests of coming generations. For it was abundantly clear: We needed a mandate for change. We live in an era in the history of nations when there is greater need than ever for co-ordinated political action and responsibility. The United Nations and its Secretary-General are faced with an enormous task and burden. Responsibly meeting humanity's goals and aspirations will require the active support of us all. My reflections and perspective were also based on other important parts of ray own political experience: the preceding work of the Brandt Commission on North South issues, and the Palme Commission on security and disarmament issues, on which I served. I was being asked to help formulate a third and compelling call for political action: After Brandt's Programme for Survival and Common Crisis, and after Palme's Common Security, would come Common Future. This was my message when Vice Chairman Mansour Khalid and I started work on the ambitious task set up by the United Nations. This report, as presented to the UN General Assembly in 1987, is the result of that process. Perhaps our most urgent task today is to persuade nations of the need to return to multilateralism. The challenge of reconstruction after the Second World War was the real motivating power behind the establishment of our post-war international economic system. The challenge of finding sustainable development paths ought to provide the impetus - indeed the imperative - for a renewed search for multilateral solutions and a restructured international economic system of co-operation. These challenges cut across the divides of national sovereignty, of limited strategies for economic gain, and of separated disciplines of science. After a decade and a half of a standstill or even deterioration in global co-operation, I believe the time has come for higher expectations, for common goals pursued together, for an increased political will to address our common future. There was a time of optimism and progress in the 1960s, when there was greater hope for a braver new world, and for progressive international ideas. Colonies blessed with natural resources were becoming nations. The locals of co-operation and sharing seemed to be seriously pursued. Paradoxically, the 1970s slid slowly into moods of reaction and isolation while at the same time a series of UN conferences offered hope for greater co-operation on major issues. The 1972 UN Conference on the Human Environment brought the industrialized and developing nations together to delineate the "rights" of the human family to a healthy and productive environment. A string of such meetings followed: on the rights of people to adequate food, to sound housing, to safe water, to access to means of choosing the size of their families. The present decade has been marked by a retreat from social concerns. Scientists bring to our attention urgent but complex problems bearing on our very survival: a warming globe, threats to the Earth's ozone layer, deserts consuming agricultural land. We respond by demanding more details, and by assigning the problems to institutions ill-equipped to cope with them. Environmental degradation, first seen as mainly a problem of the rich nations and a side effect of industrial wealth, has become a survival issue for developing nations. It is part of the downward spiral of linked ecological and economic decline in which many of the poorest nations are trapped. Despite official hope expressed on all sides, no trends identifiable today, no programmes or policies, offer any real hope of narrowing the growing gap between rich and poor nations. And as part of our "development", we have amassed weapons arsenals capable of diverting the paths that evolution has followed for millions of years and of creating a planet our ancestors would not recognize. When the terms of reference of our Commission were originally being discussed in 1982, there were those who wanted its considerations to be limited to "environmental issues" only. This would have been a grave mistake. The environment does not exist as a sphere separate from human actions, ambitions, and needs, and attempts to defend it in isolation from human concerns have given the very word "environment" a connotation of naivety in some political circles. The word "development" has also been narrowed by some into a very limited focus, along the lines of "what poor nations should do to become richer", and thus again is automatically dismissed by many in the international arena as being a concern of specialists, of those involved in questions of "development assistance". But the "environment" is where we all live; and "development" is what we all do in attempting to improve our lot within that abode. The two are inseparable. Further, development issues must be seen as crucial by the political leaders who feel that their countries have reached a plateau towards which other nations must strive. Many of the development paths of the industrialized nations are clearly unsustainable. And the development decisions of these countries, because of their great economic and political power, will have a profound effect upon the ability of all peoples to sustain human progress for generations to come. Many critical survival issues are related to uneven development, poverty, and population growth. They all place unprecedented pressures on the planet's lands, waters, forests, and other natural resources, not least in the developing countries. The downward spiral of poverty and environmental degradation is a waste of opportunities and of resources. In particular, it is a waste of human resources. These links between poverty, inequality, and environmental degradation formed a major theme in our analysis and recommendations. What is needed now is a new era of economic growth - growth that is forceful and at the same time socially and environmentally sustainable. Due to the scope of our work, and to the need to have a wide perspective. I was very much aware of the need to put together a highly qualified and influential political and scientific team, to constitute a truly independent Commission. This was an essential part of a successful process. Together, we should span the globe, and pull together to formulate an interdisciplinary, integrated approach to global concerns and our common future. We needed broad participation and a clear majority of members from developing countries, to reflect world realities. We needed people with wide experience, and from all political fields, not only from environment or development and political disciplines, but from all areas of vital decision making that influence economic and social progress, nationally and internationally. We therefore come from widely differing backgrounds: foreign ministers, finance and planning officials, policymakers in agriculture, science, and technology. Many of the Commissioners are cabinet ministers and senior economists in their own nations, concerned largely with the affairs of those countries. As Commissioners, however, we were acting not in our national roles but as individuals; and as we worked, nationalism and the artificial divides between "industrialized" and "developing", between East and West, receded. In their place emerged a common concern for the planet and the interlocked ecological and economic threats with which its people, institutions, and governments now grapple. During the time we met as a Commission, tragedies such as the African famines, the leak at the pesticides factory at Bhopal, India, and the nuclear disaster at Chernobyl, USSR appeared to justify the grave predictions about the human future that were becoming commonplace during the mid-1980s. But at public hearings we held on five continents, we also heard from the individual victims of more chronic, widespread disasters: the debt crisis, stagnating aid to and investment in developing countries, falling commodity prices and falling personal incomes. We became convinced that major changes were needed, both in attitudes and in the way our societies are organized. The question of population - of population pressure, of population and human rights - and the links between these related issues and poverty, environment, and development proved to be one of the more difficult concerns with which we had to struggle. The differences of perspective seemed at the outset to be unbridgeable, and they required a lot of thought and willingness to communicate across the divides of cultures, religions, and regions. Another such concern was the whole area of international economic relations. In these and in a number of other important aspects of our analysis and recommendations, we were able to develop broad agreement. The fact that we all became wiser, learnt to look across cultural and historical barriers, was essential. There were moments of deep concern and potential crisis, moments of gratitude and achievement, moments of success in building a common analysis and perspective. The result is clearly more global, more realistic, more forward looking than any one of us alone could have created. We joined the Commission with different views and perspectives, different values and beliefs, and very different experiences and insights. After these three years of working together, travelling, listening, and discussing, we present a unanimous report. I am deeply grateful to all the Commissioners for their dedication, their foresight and personal commitment to our common endeavour. It has been a truly wonderful team. The spirit of friendship and open communication, the meeting of minds and the process of learning and sharing, have provided an experience of optimism, something of great value to all of us, and, I believe, to the report and its message. We hope to share with others our learning process, and all that we have experienced together. It is something that many others will have to experience if global sustainable development is to be achieved. The Commission has taken guidance from people in all walks of life. It is to these people - to all the peoples of the world - that the Commission now addresses itself. In so doing we speak to people directly as well as to the institutions that they have established. The Commission is addressing governments, directly and through their various agencies and ministries. The congregation of governments, gathered in the General Assembly of the United Nations, will be the main recipients of this report. The Commission is also addressing private enterprise, from the one-person business to the great multinational company with a total economic turnover greater than that of many nations, and with possibilities for bringing about far-reaching changes and improvements. But first and foremost our message is directed towards people, whose well being is the ultimate goal of all environment and development policies. In particular, the Commission is addressing the young. The world's teachers will have a crucial role to play in bringing this report to them. If we do not succeed in putting our message of urgency through to today's parents and decision makers, we risk undermining our children's fundamental right to a healthy, life-enhancing environment. Unless we are able to translate our words into a language that can reach the minds and hearts of people young and old, we shall not be able to undertake the extensive social changes needed to correct the course of development. The Commission has completed its work. We call for a common endeavour and for new norms of behaviour at all levels and in the interests of all. The changes in attitudes, in social values, and in aspirations that the report urges will depend on vast campaigns of education, debate and public participation. To this end, we appeal to "citizens" groups, to non governmental organizations, to educational institutions, and to the scientific community. They have all played indispensable roles in the creation of public awareness and political change in the past. They will play a crucial part in putting the world onto sustainable development paths, in laying the groundwork for Our Common Future. The process that produced this unanimous report proven that it is possible to join forces, to identify common goals, and to agree on common action. Each one of the Commissioners would have chosen different words if writing the report alone. Still, we managed to agree on the analysis, the broad remedies, and the recommendations for a sustainable course of development. In the final analysis, this is what it amounts to: furthering the common understanding and common spirit of responsibility so clearly needed in a divided world. Thousands of people all over the world have contributed to the work of the Commission, by intellectual means, by financial means, and by sharing their experiences with us through articulating their needs and demands. I am sincerely grateful to everyone who has made such contributions. Many of their names are found in Annexe 2 of the report. My particular gratitude goes to Vice Chairman Mansour Khalid, to all the other members of the Commission, and to Secretary-General Jim MacNeill and his staff at our secretariat, who went above and beyond the call of duty to assist us. Their enthusiasm and dedication knew no limits. I want to thank the chairmen and members of the Intergovernmental Inter-sessional Preparatory Committee, who co-operated closely with the Commission and provided inspiration and support. I thank also the Executive Director of the United Nations Environment Programme, Dr. Mostafa Tolba, for his valuable, continuous support and interest.   Gro Harlem Brundtland Oslo, 20 March 1987

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Here's the story on real sustainability, on the ground, on the farm, seeds and intellect, planted:

Planting Seeds

Conference on globalization recognizes new educational connections to gardens

Paul K. Haeder     

The workshops at Quillisascut let students take part in the farm experience, which includes taking care of crops.

For more information visit http://quillisascut.com/.

This is the second part of a series examining Quillisascut, a farm near Kettle Falls,Wash., which offers workshops in sustainable living. For Part 1 visit here

While food is at the top of the list of globalization experts’, climate change wonks’ and diversity proponents’ strategic plans, one might not see the seeds of community in a conference designed largely for educators and students presenting studies on what it means to be global in an educational framework.

The 7th annual Globalization, Diversity and Education conference was held in Spokane earlier this year. Mike Meyers, conference coordinator, invited me as a member of the press and a peer discussing my outlook and experience with globalization.

Meyers remains pumped about how well the presenters engaged the audience.

“Filmmaker and activist Jen Marlowe tapped into the emotion of Palestinian struggles in ‘One Family in Gaza’ and ‘Peaceful Thoughts.’ Denise Taliafero Baszile had the audience dancing to Bob Marley’s ‘Get Up Stand Up’ as a reminder of our commitment to social justice. Not your usual academic conference fare, but what we have come to expect at this conference,” he said.

Prior to the workshop, I talked with Meyers on my radio show, “Tipping Points: Voices from the Edge. I insisted that we in education are jaded, how silo-ed academia has become, and how a conference like this should be publicly engaged, with more from the community taking part, including high school students.

He agreed that not enough money and backing from colleges help create this lack of marketing, and reaching out to a broader, more engaging community. Globalization is the linchpin to many of our regional, national and local problems, like jobs, food, energy, and the faltering economy. The solutions to problems we face in the sustainability community come from peasant farmers, civil society, people on the ground.

While the conference hopefully encouraged a broader educational experience at the college level for understanding the international experience, and to encourage international students and those in their midst from the U.S., there were certainly furrows cut into earth where seeds were planted.

The theme was “From here to everywhere: Placing local and global practices in dialogue.” I enjoyed listening to EWU students talk about medicine women, or curanderas, in Mexico, where they went to conduct ethnographic interviews in many of my old stomping grounds. I enjoyed the University of British Columbia –Vancouver folk trying to tie international students and their education to a sustainability model.

But the especially fertile seeds came from land-based thinking, creativity, poetry and a trust in the gift of sunlight, water, soil and seed. The Land-Learner Connection was a presentation given by participants who in the summer of 2010 participated in workshop “on the farm,” also known as the place of goats, or Quillisascut (see story here).

The Land-Learner Connection was a five-day workshop for teachers and administrators who are training primary and secondary school teachers. According to Quillisascut, gardens are a perfect way to connect teachers and students, and offer “limitless opportunities for environmental learning.”

The presentation at the globalization workshop was a wrap-up and analysis of the earlier Quillisascut visit, where participants, funded in part by the DeVlieg Family Foundation, hit these main educational and learning goals:

• Research and practice in learning gardens with Dr. Veronica Gaylie
• Curriculum development to intertwine current instruction with garden experiences
• Basic information on organic farm production.
• Simple ways to tap into and learn from your local food system
• Essential Learning Requirements and hands-on environmental learning
• Biodiversity and our food environment

Participants learned a new respect for community, for land, and for those who not only shepherd the concept of sustainability to outsiders, which have included cooks, writers, teachers, students, and others, but they also live the life of goat tending, cheese making and holistic farming.

Rick and Lora Lea Misterly have been at Quilisascut for 30-plus years, and have turned what might have been a ideal rural home into a learning experience for themselves, those in the Rice-Kettle Falls, Wash., community, and those coming to the farm to learn what high-level sustainability thinking looks like on 35 acres of farmland near Lake Roosevelt. The 2010 ‘farmers in training’ came from colleges and school districts throughout the Northwest.

They all have learned from the Misterlys and Karen Jurgenson, Quillisascut Farm School/Seattle Culinary Academy chef, that they themselves hold the seeds of change firmly in their hands and their students’ hearts.

Laurie Morley from Eastern said the workshop brought her to a new place after 24 years as an educator in nutrition and health, and she has been been spurred to help shepherd the EWU sustainable food project – www.sustainable-ewu.org.

A former Spokane Falls Community College English student, Nathan Calene, is now working with other students on EWU’s food and dining elements, including, as an undergraduate planning student, planning the university’s organic garden.

Justin Hougham helped start the Palouse Pollinators in Pullman, and sees firsthand how youth have been almost bred to be afraid of nature, something called “ecophobia.” Planting seeds is just one step to a garden, Francene Watson said. It’s about place-based education, getting youth to see how the world works one stomach and one garden at a time.

For Veronica Gaylie, UBC - Okanagan poet and sustainability proponent, gardens and sustainability allow for a better conversation in colleges, because she sees unnecessary and unsustainable compartmentalization and battle lines over deep ecology and how community has to be defined as the people, the garden and the food.

She is also pushing an anti-prestige movement to make gardens and sustainability simple, not huge multi-layered, administration-driven projects.

As part of a later presentation, Gaylie and Michael Marchand, of UBC- Okanagan, showed native wisdom and sustainability through a cool process titled: “The Learning Garden and the Firepit: An Exploration of Land as the Basis for an Interdisciplinary Pedagogy.”

They built an Okanagan First Nation fire-pit to get students and others to think of “alternative ways of knowing.”

“The development of local and global knowledge around environment has evolved in a way that is inclusive of both academic and community involvement. Any meaningful knowledge around environment now requires a re-visioning of research, and the place of the university, as an equal partner with community,” they both wrote for their presentation preface.

Seeds carry collective DNA from tens of thousands of years of nature’s trial and error. The seeds of education change the course of individuals’ intellectual growth. They can pass on the learning, and thereby change each generation.

The key to this germination, this growth, is knowledge and practice. Gardens are the microcosm of life, and the roots in each variety hold the potential for resiliency and sustainability.

One farm can change much, and Quillisascut is humble in its origins and humble in its design, but the practice of a community-based farm ethos and deep knowledge of how to know oneself in the field are what blossom on that farm.

Quillisascut is like an endless garden of ideas, a global classroom, where the art of growing and the tools of planting fertilize the mind for a time of endless possibilities.

To Bee or Not to Bee

Want to Help Save the World? Get Yourself a Hive or Two

By Paul K. Haeder

If the bee disappears from the surface of the earth, man would have no more than four years to live.
– erroneously attributed to Albert Einsten


We think of ourselves as a species that’s as busy as bees, 7 billion of us seemingly clamoring to keep active doing good things to do good for the whole. Some of us hold onto postage-stamp sized spits of land in our urban mega cities of 10 million or more (18 total thus far in the world).

While we look like bees in Tokyo (35 million) or Mubai, our carbon footprints are huge as we require more and more land for food and resources to feed our oil addiction.

We build and destroy cities. We create culture and live for the moment, consuming vast quantities of junk. We spray land with chemicals to get more from it and kill more biodiversity to control what we need. We love genetically altering organisms, damming river systems, and plowing under rainforest for a mono-crop, for instance, palm oil, so chocolate and crackers taste creamy and snappy.

A thing left out of this process is that we are just ONE part of nature, a link that has so much viral power to alter all other niches, ecosystems and individual species like polar bears or woodpeckers.

Busy as bees we are not, since these amazing creatures – especially the Mediterranean and Russian varieties – are built to move mountains. According to its Greek origins, Apis mellifera is the “honey-carrying” bee, although in reality it carries nectar and pollen. Linnaeus wanted to rename it Apis mellifica, “honey-making” bee, but taxonomical protocol trumped that idea.

For one Cheney couple, bee keeping and leaving the madhouse of Southern California may have saved them.

“We were seeing everything collapse,” Martin Davis said while looking out at his property, Bee-Chicken Farm, in the Hog Creek basin, abutting DNR wetlands. “The oceans were dying before my eyes. Each year I went spear fishing, I could see more pollution from all those people … and less fish.”

Martin surfed and scuba dived those ecosystems, and while jostling in his neighborhood for parking when 30 cars at a time were cruising for curb space, it was nothing compared to seeing 18 million people’s voracious appetites help destroy his recreational world.

Finding 20 acres here in 2005 was an act of self-preservation for themselves and their 24-year-old daughter, Martina.

Little did the Davises know their project to escape traffic, polluted surf, long store queues (“lines everywhere, even at 1 in the morning”) and the ‘reckless self-organizing of humanity’ (land use planning) in a place like LA or Ventura would include a complete transformation into bee keepers.

Each of their hives supports 30,000-40,000 animals, though 60,000 to 90,000 bees in one hive is not uncommon.

The bees’ self-organizing campaign and wondrous efficiency looking for nectar and pollen are beyond anything humans, even with a bank of hard drives and a million robotic gizmos, could muster.

The Davises now have their sustainable farm up and running — they’ve decided to eliminate any chemical inputs for bees and the egg- laying, meat-providing chickens. Marcia even makes dog food for their three mutts.

“I really have no faith in corporations knowing what they put into anything… dog food or human, it doesn’t matter, I don’t trust them to do the right thing,” Marcia said, emphasizing the recent cases of pet deaths because of melamine-enhanced wheat gluten from China.

She’s got engineering under her belt all the way back to the University of Texas-Arlington and her current position is with the City of Spokane as a civil engineer in the capital facilities department.

Bee-Chicken produces several types of honey, including snowberry, a buckwheat variety and mixed varieties sourced from indigenous flowering plants and trees, to orchards in the area. One honey from Zambia is amazingly complex and evocative of those variable terroirs used in the wine grower’s parlance. Each elixir has complex layers of flavors and various potency tones and hues that play magic on the tongue.

They plan to make the land pay off with more chickens, bees, and sustainable living. They talked about how their daughter struggled in California with mood disorders and behavior issues, caused in part by what Martin connects to the synergistic effects of bad stuff in the water, food, air and the spiritual deficit of Southern California.

The Davises believe we as a species are causing our own demise. Looking at the incredible death rates of hives all over the U.S., called Colony Collapse Disorder, they make the connection to our own species being overly revved up on stimulants like consumerism, hydrocarbon burning and junk entertainment. We’re too fat on bad food, and we are so chewed up genetically and endocrine-wise because of our plasticized and chemically-induced stupor that we too experience a sort of civilization
collapse disorder.

Marcia admitted that our wet and cold weather plays havoc on hives, and she agonizes over each bee, hitting near rock bottom emotionally when an entire hive was wiped out last winter. Martin is a doting parent checking his hives daily, and is confounded by the region’s extreme weather.

The couple forgives coyotes, owls and red-tailed hawks that snatch up a few of their egg-laying and meat-producing chickens. They’ve enlisted the services of a rooster to guard the hens.

While they understand the issues behind books like “The End of Food” and “Fast Food Nation,” or films like “Food, Inc., and “Big Corn,” Marcia feels that a transition into a sustainable food system will take time.

“We have to have a plan for transition. We can’t close all the CAFOs [concentrated animal feeding operations] and stop the main industrial producers of food overnight. We’d see a lot of social disorder… hunger, I believe,” she said.

The couple has been moved by recent films like “The Last Bee Keeper” and “Vanishing of the Bees,” but don’t give up hope as they are active in the West Plains Beekeeper Association, learning all the ins and outs of good beekeeping.

Martin is pursuing a degree in entomology after spending 30 years as a union man in the area of interior finish carpentry. He’s supervised construction projects, like interiors for Star Trek theme parks and all sorts of projects in Las Vegas and Burbank. Marcia went through an intensive 14-week training course on forestland management and worked with a logger to thin out ponderosa pines.

Theories as to why bees are dying are tied to six or seven major vectors, and they’re studying each, applying essential oils from thyme, peppermint and eucalyptus to treat hives for some of the top culprits.

The varroa (vampire) mite is one pest which takes advantage of the human connection to altering the bees’ home — the honey frames man designed 100 years ago. Honeycomb cells are larger than what bees make in a wild hive, allowing for more mites to live and lay eggs.

Then there’s foulbrood, a contagious disease, and Nosema ceranae, a digestive problem which bees contract over long, cold winters when confined to their hives for extended periods. Beekeepers also face wax moths. Conventional remedies in our modern age have involved antibiotics, mitacides, fungicides even moth balls. Their local association has nothing to do with these modern chemical cocktails.

They recently threw a party for their bees – pounds and pounds of seeds for flowering plants sowed all over their new forest floor.

For Martin and Marcia Davis, education, experience and a group of beekeepers are the only way to manage bees correctly.

Yet, there are limits, as Marcia says: “We don’t control the bee, really.”


For more information on Bee-Chicken Farm please contact (509) 239-4592 or email beechickenfarm@yahoo.com.

Beer, Hops, Solar, Clean Brew -- Pump Grade Fuel, Too?

We have to take our hats off to companies -- and this is a mid-sized one, to be sure -- for looking at green ways to do their triple bottom lines, low carbon impacts as members of the local and biotic communities, and alternative and clean energy to produce a product many of us in the tech and environmental fields just love -- ale, beer, pilsner, stout, porter, IPA, you name it.

This solar project produces over 1.4 MW of AC power for the brewery. This—coupled with its existing 1.2 MW fuel cell plant—provides the majority of the brewery’s electrical energy needs with clean power produced on-site. Surplus electrical energy will be available to help supply the overloaded California power grid during peak power usage periods. Covering a majority of the brewing facility’s roofs, this system utilizes over 6700 Mitsubishi 185-watt lead-free panels.

The environmentally conscious Sierra Nevada Brewery in California is taking steps to become partially powered by the sun. A 1.3 megawatt solar system is being installed at the Chico plant in two phases and will provide 34% of the brewery’s power.

"With the addition of our solar panels, we are approaching our goal of providing 100% of our energy needs with clean on-site alternative energy generation."--Ken Grossman, CEO, Sierra Nevada Brewing

The system will be installed by Chico Electric and incorporate technology from Mitsubishi Electric. Chico Electric completed the first phase of the project in December 2007. The next phase will be finished in June 2008 after construction of a new building on the brewery’s property. In addition to the new solar electric system, the brewery has installed a 1MW fuel cell, a 500 kW solar array shade structure in its parking lot, and it also makes methane from brewery waste products, all part of an effort to use clean energy and make the brewery energy independent.

Mitsubishi Electric is providing nearly 7000 of its 185Wp high-strength, corrosion-resistant modules for the project. The modules contain no lead solder, a technology Mitsubishi Electric introduced to the United States in 2005. Instead of lead-solder coating for the cells, Mitsubishi Electric developed silver electrodes that offer superior weatherproofing and higher PV module conversion efficiency.


“Sierra Nevada Brewery is one of the most environmentally conscious companies in the industry and we are honored to be working on this project with them,” says Gina Heng, director of marketing for Mitsubishi Electric & Electronics USA’s Photovoltaic Division. Not only does the company boast impressive green credentials, but they make a decent beer too. For those who haven’t tried it, Sierra Nevada’s Pale Ale is exceptionally good, and it's free from preservatives.

http://greenbiz.com/podcast/2008/04/14/suds-solar-greening-sierra-nevada-brewing-co

“The plan is to have a machine here on site that would distill the ethanol that’s remaining in the yeast slurry,” said Cheri Chastain, Sierra Nevada Sustainability Coordinator.

“We could make it available for employees. If we have a lot of it we could end up selling it. We could use it for our shop vehicles and company vehicles,” said Chastain.

Currently, production waste is sold as dairy feed to local farmlands. In fact, Sierra Nevada sells 1.6 million gallons of beer yeast waste annually. But not once this system is in place. Testing will start in Q2 of this year with a goal of full-production by q3.

The beer yeast contains between five and eight-percent alcohol content, but the MicroFueler is expected to raise the level to 15-percent.

“Creating ethanol from discarded organic waste is an excellent example of how the MicroFueler can help eliminate our reliance on the oil industry infrastructure. This is especially true when considering Americans reportedly discard 50% of all agricultural farmed products,” said Tom Quinn, E-Fuel founder and CEO. “Using a waste product to fuel your car is friendlier to the environment and lighter on your wallet, easily beating prices at the gas pump.”

Of course, Sierra Nevada has a history of being a bit eco-friendly: they are home to one of the largest private solar installations in the US.

Food Shouldn't Be Engineered by Gene Splicing -- A stronger Critique of GMO's

Boy, Bio-tech gets glossed over by writer who gets book published by Harvard University Press. But thank goodness for Jill Richardson and a legion of organic, sustainability, and Ag in the Middle folk, even Organic Valley, for fighting these giants of the morphed genes, the split DNA, and all else that adds to their profit line. A critique of Monsanto is now deeply ingrained in conservative ag programs throughout the land, not just those so-deemed rabblerousers like Wes Jackson, Wendell Berry and Michael Pollan.

From Robert Calson's blog on his book, pictured on the left.

"In general, as we shall see, there is no reason to think that any country's lead in developing or using biological technologies will be maintained for long. Nor will the culture and experience of any given country dominate the discussion. Access to biological technologies is already ubiquitous around the globe. Many countries are investing heavily to build domestic capabilities with the specific aim of improving health care, providing fuels and materials, and increasing crop yields.

Research efforts are now accelerating, aided by rapid advances in the technology we use to manipulate biological systems. It is already possible to convert genetic information into electronic form and back again with unprecedented ease. This capability provides for an element of digital design in biological engineering that has not heretofore been available. More important, as measured by changes in commercial cost and productivity, the technology we use to manipulate biological systems is now experiencing the same rapid improvement that has produced today's computers, cars, and airplanes. This is evidence that real change is occurring in the technologies underlying the coming bioeconomy.

The influence of exponentially improving biological technologies is only just now starting to be felt. Today writing a gene from scratch within a few weeks costs a few thousand dollars. In five to ten years that amount should pay for much larger constructs, perhaps a brand-new viral or microbial genome. Gene and genome-synthesis projects of this larger scale have already been demonstrated as academic projects. When such activity becomes commercially viable, a synthetic genome could be used to build an organism that produces fuel, or a new plastic, or a vaccine to combat the outbreak of a new infectious disease.

This book is an attempt to describe a change in technology that has demonstrably profound social and economic implications. Some parts of the story that follows I know very well, either because I was fortunate to witness events or because I was in a position to participate. Other parts of the story come in because I had to learn something new while attempting to paint a picture of the future. Delving into details is necessary in places in order to appreciate the complexity of biological systems, the challenge of engineering those systems, and the implications of that technology for public policy, safety, and security. Whatever else the reader takes from this book, the most important lesson is that the story is incomplete. Biology is technology, and as with any other technology, it is not possible to predict exactly where the project will go. But we can at least start with where that technology has been.

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Even this pretty open ended look at bio-tech, ag and the elements of biodiversity gives us a deeper look at the bio-tech field.

http://www.biotech-monitor.nl/3502.htm

Effects of Biotechnology
on Agro-biodiversity
By Bert Visser

Various biotechnologies have been developed which can have both a positive and negative effect on agro-biodiversity. The socio-economic context in which these technologies are developed and utilized will determine which applications, and thus which effects, will dominate.

Since the Convention on Biological Diversity (CBD) was signed in 1992, the value of biological diversity in general, and agro-biodiversity in particular, has gained recognition world-wide. Agro-biodiversity can be defined as the total of components, structure and functions in agro-ecosystems relevant for agricultural production. Agro-biodiversity is first of all of vital importance for the food security of future generations. This diversity can be exploited to overcome new pests and diseases, to cope with climate changes and a growing world population, to react to changing consumer demands and to make production more sustainable. Furthermore, agro-biodiversity is related to cultural values and traditions. Finally, many believe that diversity has an intrinsic value and that mankind is responsible for the survival of ecosystems and all that constitutes these systems. Technology in general has had an impact for ages on the development of agro-biodiversity. Utensils in agriculture, food processing technology and seed storage systems, for example, have always been developed in close interaction with the diversity present in agriculture. This includes the genetic diversity of landraces and varieties within crop and animal species, the diversity of different crops and animals at the farm and the diversity within the entire agro-ecosystem. Some technologies, like fermentation technology, have influenced the properties that farmers consciously selected for their crops and animals. Others, like seed storage and fodder production, have resulted in conscious as well as unintended selection in landraces and animal breeds. The adaptation of crops and animals to the available technologies has determined their role in the farming system. And finally, the development of the farming systems has greatly influenced the agro-ecosystems in which they function, as is evident from the current discussions on the sustainability of high-external-input systems. Biotechnology, like all preceding technologies, has influenced and will further influence agro-biodiversity. In this article an inventory will be made of the likely or potential effects of modern biotechnology on agro-biodiversity.

Common effects of agriculture and biotechnology on biodiversity Both agriculture and biotechnology make use of biodiversity and thus show us the value of biodiversity. Likewise, both agricultural practices and biotechnology impose a threat to the existing biodiversity on which they depend. Modern agricultural practices, stemming from the rise of a modern breeding industry and from the Green Revolution, have caused massive genetic erosion, the disappearance of many diverse populations of crops maintained by farmers and adapted to local circumstances. The application of modern biotechnology may result in a wider use of genetic diversity, whether present in wild or domesticated species, for the benefit of future food security. However, it may also potentially result in the further narrowing of the genetic base of our food crops, because of the high costs of biotechnology and, consequently the tendency to focus on few varieties or breeds only. It may even result in the introduction of novel organisms which form a risk to the (agricultural) environment. Genetic erosion, now commonly regarded as a negative development, was caused by the rise of the modern breeding industry and marketing decisions of that industry, and did not form a natural necessity. The socio-economic context in which biotechnology is developed and applied includes competition, research structures, seed markets and intellectual property rights. It will also determine which applications and, consequently, which effects of biotechnology on the conservation and utilization of biodiversity will dominate. For a number of biotechnologies the picture of positive and negative potentials, depending on the socio-economic context, begins to appear.

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Finally, a quick review of Jill's book DailyKos on :

"Richardson, who first discovered her talent for writing about food issues here at Daily Kos as OrangeClouds115, has turned in a terrific book in Recipe for America, managing to organize into one smooth narrative information as disparate as employing undocumented workers and the lobbying that goes into the Farm Bill. Under her educated eye, the pieces of the enormous puzzle of legislation, policy, science and environmentalism are woven together in a book that can serve as an introduction to those unfamiliar with the sustainable food movement, while expanding the base of knowledge of those who've been reading on the topic for years.

"This is no small feat. Juggling the needs of newcomers to a topic without losing the interest of the already informed is a problem that many writers with many more books under their belt than Richardson have failed to solve."

We really need to develop stronger resolve in understanding how insecure our food and farming communities are, and bio-tech and genetic engineering and all those fossil fuel and toxic inputs are just not doing the world any good anymore.

Food, Biofuel, Biochar -- Earth Beat Radio's On the Air -- KYRS Spokane LP

Biofuels Watch: African Land-Grab Deals Questioned

by Stacy Feldman - May 21st, 2009

Despite widespread research indicating that growing biofuels on Africa's 'idle' lands could help to starve the continent, the practice remains rampant, according to a new study.

The report is the work of the Washington, D.C.-based International Food Policy Research Institute (IFPRI), a research center funded by 64 governments, private foundations and global organizations.

Researchers revealed that foreign companies are buying or leasing vast chunks of land in Africa and elsewhere for their own use. In fact, up to 50 million acres have been sold off or soon will be. That's equivalent to about 25 percent of all the farmland in Europe.

http://solveclimate.com/blog/20090521/biofuels-watch-african-land-grab-deals-questioned

Then, we share with you biochar and other issues, tied to Biofuel Watch/UK

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http://www.biofuelwatch.org.uk/

http://www.globalforestcoalition.org/
http://www.earthbeatradio.org/home/?s=Rachel+Smolker

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Earth Beat Radio's Mike Tidwell will be on KYRS, Spokane, Thin Air Community Radio,

Feb. 3 at 3 PST, http://www.kyrs.org/, 92.3 FM, and then rebroadcast Feb. 5, 6 a.m.

President Obama sharply reverses the Bush administration’s policies on transportation emissions – and appoints an international climate negotiator. Meanwhile, scientists say that even if all carbon dioxide emissions stop today – global warming will continue for a thousand years.

Joining host Daphne Wysham discusses Obama’s new policies on climate change is David Bookbinder, Senior Attorney with the Sierra Club, Tony Massaro, Vice President of Legal Affairs for the League of Conservation Voters and with the California perspective, Danielle Fugere, West Coast Regional Program Director for the Friends of the Earth.

Then we discuss two possible techno-fixes for global warming – seeding the ocean with iron filings and biochar. Discussing ocean seeding is Jim Thomas a researcher with the ETC Group in Montreal, Canada.

ETC is dedicated to the conservation and sustainable advancement of cultural and ecological diversity and human rights. Joining him is Paul Epstein, the associate director for the Center for Health and the Global Environment at Harvard Medical School.

Discussing biochar is Rachel Smolker with the Global Forest Coalition and, the leading scientific voice on the possibilities of biochar, Johannes Lehmann, Professor of soil fertility management at Cornell University.

Corn, Inputs, Pollution -- Filmmakers do Good by Big River and King Corn

Curt Ellis is in Spokane, Jan. 19, 2010 at SCC and Community Builiding -- he's on KYRS.org, 92.3 FM, 2-3 Tuesday, Jan. 13, and then rebroadcast Friday, 1 to 2. That's Paul Haeder's Tipping Points: Voices from the Edge. His film, King Corn, with Ian Cheney as co-editor and co-producer, has won a Peabody Award.

http://www.bigriverfilm.com/

http://www.kingcorn.net/

http://www.pbs.org/independentlens/kingcorn/corn.html

http://www.scc.spokane.edu/?hfchevents


There is another movie that follows the downstream affects of industrial corn, called, Big River. That's at SCC, next week, Jan. 19. Curt's in town too.


Here's something about King Corn -- which is about Ian and Curt going to Iowa and buying an acre and seeing all the ins and outs of the American 70 million acre corn industry.





Inputs for Ian and Curt’s One-Acre Farm:

· 5.4 tons of eroded topsoil (Iowa average per latest NRCS Natural Resources Inventory)
· 130 pounds Anhydrous Ammonia (injected as fertilizer)
· 1.5 pints Guardsman Max herbicide (dimethenamid-P and atrazine for weed control)
· 3 gallons 18-46-0 liquid starter fertilizer (nitrogen-phosphorus-potassium for germination)
· 2 ounces Regent insecticide (fipronil for planting-time pest control)
· 3 gallons liquid So-il Cal calcium supplement (for stabilizing nitrogen and nutrient uptake)
· 1 pound Atrazine herbicide (for weed control)
· 1.25 pints Landoil additive (for emulsification and stabilization of chemicals)
· 20 ounces Liberty herbicide (glufosinate for application to GMO LibertyLink corn)

Pesticide and Herbicide Facts:

· The incidence of Non-Hodgkin’s lymphoma has more than doubled since the 1970s (Mayo)
· More than 70 million lbs of Atrazine are applied annually; 75% of corn crop is treated (EPA)
· 33 million Americans have been exposed to Atrazine in drinking water (NY Times)
· Atrazine is associated with cancers including non-Hodgkyn lymphoma, ovarian, and colon.

Soil Erosion Facts:

· Soil planted in prairie can absorb 5-7 inches of rainfall per hour without major erosion
· Soils planted in row crops can only absorb only .5-1.5 inches before erosion begins
· In the 1950s, many Midwestern soils were nearly 20% carbon; now many are 1-2% (Rodale)
· If carbon-building organic agriculture was practiced on the earth’s 3.5 billion tillable acres, it could sequester nearly 40% of current CO2 emissions (Rodale Institute)

Fertilizer Facts:

· The Gulf of Mexico’s hypoxic “Dead Zone” averages 6,000 square miles in size (NY Times).
· Agriculture contributes 70% of nitrogen and phosphorus to the Dead Zone (EWG).
· 400 Dead Zones now exist around the world, including off all coasts of the US (Science)

What Can We Do?

Transition from commodity subsidies that reward all-out production to a “green payments” system that promotes conservation, carbon sequestration, and buffers along waterways.
Support local and organic producers and practice organic maintenance of lawns and gardens.

For Further Reading:

· The Pesticide Action Network offers a comprehensive database of agrochemicals and their risks, searchable by chemical component or brand name. www.pesticideinfo.org
· The New York Times “Toxic Waters” series looks closely at Atrazine and farm runoff. http://projects.nytimes.com/toxic-waters
· The Iowa Daily Soil Erosion Project is an attempt to model any given day’s rainfall and soil loss on any chosen acre of Iowa land.
· The Mississippi River Gulf of Mexico Watershed Nutrient Task Force is an intergovernmental project to assess and address the Dead Zone. www.epa.gov/mbasin





Footage for Big River was gathered between 2004 and 2009. The film employs previously unseen material shot during the making of King Corn, and footage captured after King Corn’s release. A handful of King Corn scenes are revisited in flashback, denoted by Super 8 film grain and letterbox.

Big River was shot on the DVCPRO50 Panasonic SDX-900 camera and edited in Final Cut Pro. Animations for the film were prepared using stop-motion photography, digital SLR and After Effects.

Editing took place in Austin, TX and Brooklyn, NY, in 2008 and 2009. The budget for creating and launching Big River came in the form of a $75,000 grant from the McKnight Foundation, with additional in-kind support from Mosaic Films, the WK Kellogg Foundation, and the IATP Food and Society Fellows Program.

Biodiversity Counts -- For Humanity, For Food

Less than 2 percent of the USA population grows our food. This is a bad ratio for eaters and growers. In 1900, more than 50 percent of jobs were directly or indirectly tied to growing food and producing it. We have to protect our soil, we have to protect our ecosystems, our sources of water, and the biodiversity of all commercial species -- potatoes, pigs, the types of eggs in stores, all of it. Growth Management groups and legislation work toward protecting farmland -- or even open space -- because they see that land use tool as necessary in these tipping points times when growing food closer to the consumption source is powerful as a way to fight the negative effects of Peak Oil and climate change. Over the past 80 years, entire lines of beans, livestock, fruits, vegetables have gone the way of near extinction or extinction. That's why there are seed savers and seed repositories --

Above is a rendition of the Svalbard Global Seed Vault, a "doomsday" seed bank that will store backup copies of as many as three million different crop varieties in case of a worldwide catastrophe. The high-tech vault, opened for storage in February 2008, is going to "put an end to extinction [of] agricultural crops," said Cary Fowler, executive director of the Global Crop Diversity Trust in Rome, Italy, which is the leading force behind the project.

http://news.nationalgeographic.com/news/2007/12/photogalleries/seedbank-pictures/index.html

We have International groups tied to food security and food and farming. RAFT -- Renewing America's Food Traditions, Tierra Madre, Slow Food USA. Even in our own Spokane neck of the woods, we have the Main Market co-op and Quillisascut Sustainable Farm School. More on food and ag and what high tech and planning and science and rural sociologists are doing to work on this untold story of the past 10 years.

http://quillisascut.com/

http://www.mainmarket.coop/

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For now, though, recognizing the work of farmers is important, and they too are recognizing the value of diversity in thought, people, food, livestock, technique and what needs to be done in a time of 7 billion people, global climate destabilization and the like.

International Year of Biodiversity:

Farmers Say that Conserving Biodiversity is a Shared Responsibility

Today marks the launch of the International Year of Biodiversity under the theme Biodiversity is Life - Biodiversity is Our Life. It is a theme of critical interest to farmers since biodiversity and agriculture are interdependent; both are also key elements to address climate change and food security. Conserving biodiversity is a shared responsibility of stakeholders worldwide, and farmers are willing to do their part.

The International Federation of Agricultural Producers (IFAP) will be highlighting, throughout this year, the crucial role played by farmers to conserve ecosystems. IFAP will also be challenging national governments and the international community to put in place programs to help secure the planet's biodiversity, while at the same time, ensuring that farmers have the necessary tools to increase food production by 70 percent by 2050 to feed a growing world population.

''The main issue for farmers is gaining recognition for the multiple roles that agriculture is expected to fulfil and identifying appropriate mechanisms in order to achieve them. We need to help and encourage farmers to improve their current practices, while ensuring they can sustain their families and remain competitive in the markets. These efforts all need be undertaken simultaneously, otherwise you will have food security problems or a compromised ecosystem,'' said Ajay Vashee, IFAP President.

Farmers understand the need to protect and conserve biodiversity, and their role in doing so. At the same time, it is crucial that they maintain the economic viability of their agricultural activities. In 2010, IFAP will strive to find genuine and long-lasting approaches to better conserve and enhance biological diversity that can be implemented by farmers, and will advocate positive and constructive policy approaches to governments and the Convention on Biological Diversity.

"Through such practices as land set asides for wildlife and native species, conservation farming, organic farming, reforestation practices, pastoralism, rotational grazing and rehabilitation of degraded lands, farmers are contributing to the conservation and protection of biodiversity. However, this is a shared responsibility with the rest of society. All stakeholders need to participate. If these efforts are to be expanded on a global scale to reduce biodiversity degradation, appropriate funding, positive incentives for farmers such as payment for ecosystem services, training and policy implementation will be needed to achieve results,'' concluded Vashee.

To move forward on conserving biodiversity, the world farmers'
organization advocates the following actions:


* Government policies for secure land tenure systems and
adequate infrastructure that allows farmers to invest in long-term farming strategies related to biodiversity enhancement.

* Economic partnerships between developing and developed
countries aimed at transferring and adapting stewardship programs, such as credit systems and extension services.

* Recognition of farmers' indigenous knowledge of local resource
management and conservation.

* Increased funding for the scientific research that underpins
the development and sound understanding of how agricultural management interacts with biodiversity. Scientific knowledge and findings should be disseminated, scaled-down and be specific to the dynamics of a particular region.

* Strengthened farmers' participation in the formulation and the
implementation of research projects and rural development strategies to enhance biodiversity.

* Improved policy coordination and planning of environmental
legislation affecting agricultural production. Often different government departments deal with these issues in isolation. There is also a need to increase capacity to enforce legislation in a coordinated way.

* Mainstreaming of the Agricultural Biodiversity program of work
of the CBD (UN Convention on Biodiversity) with the programs of work of the other Multilateral Environment Agreements, such as the UNFCCC (United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change) and the UNCCD (United Nations Convention to Combat Desertification), as well as with food security and rural development programs.


IFAP will be placing biodiversity as a policy priority in 2010.
"Sustainable solutions can be found and many are already available", said the IFAP President, "but responsibility must be shared among all stakeholders".

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IFAP is the farmers' voice at the world level, representing 600 million family farmers grouped in 112 national organizations in 87 countries. It has been advocating farmers' interests at the international level since 1946. IFAP's mission is to develop farmers' capacities to influence decisions that affect them at both the domestic and international levels. http://www.ifap.org/ <http://www.ifap.org/>

Michael Pollan, food writer, journalist, activist, in Spokane-Pullman area

Michael Pollan, Wed. 13th, in Pullman, WA -- WSU Campus

His book, The Omnivore's Dilemma, was chosen as a common reading text for Washington State University. The president, Mr. Floyd, pulled the program, due to some booster's disregard of free speech and the research and message of Michael Pollan. Luckily, an alum and food safety attorney and former Board of Regent put up $60,000 for the books and for Pollan's visit.

"The Omnivore's Dilemma" author Michael Pollan will present a lecture at 7 p.m. Wednesday, Jan. 13, in Beasley coliseum. He also will participate in a question-and-answer session with students only that day, 3-4 p.m. in the CUB auditorium.

"The Omnivore's Dilemma: A Natural History of Four Meals" is the Common Reading selection at WSU Pullman for 2009-10.

Pollan will lecture on the "Sun Food Agenda." About 10 questions will be taken as part of the presentation. Submit questions in advance to cindyw@wsu.edu.

In "The Omnivore's Dilemma," Pollan follows each of the food chains that sustain us - industrial food, organic or alternative food, and food we forage ourselves - from the source to a final meal, and in the process develops a definitive account of the American way of eating.

The sun food agenda has to do with Pollan's advocacy of weaning the food industry from fossil-fuel-based support (fertilizers, pesticides, gasoline/diesel vehicles) and returning to a (technologically enhanced) reliance on the sun's energy.

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Read the post below regarding the WSU decision to cut the common reading program and Pollan, BEFORE he got back onto WSU's agenda:

Thursday, May 21, 2009

WSU decision brings heightened attention to Michael Pollan's Omnivore's Dilemma

In a revealing irony, from which cowardly university officials everywhere may have something to learn, the decision by Washington State University (WSU) officials to cancel Michael Pollan's Omnivore's Dilemma as the common reading assignment for freshman orientation next year is raising the book to new heights of notoriety and importance in that university community.

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Reports today in the Spokesman-Review and the Chronicle of Higher Education (pay site) make a plausible case that pressure from Washington agribusiness interests may have been behind the cancellation. One faculty colleague, who asked not to be named in connection with this controversy, told U.S. Food Policy that WSU has its own Pacific Northwest character that distinguishes it from traditional agricultural universities in other regions.

That said, WSU Regents include politically powerful farmers and ranchers such as former Regent Peter Goldmark who ran for U.S. Congress in 2006 and is currently Washington State Commissioner of Public Lands. With extreme budget pressures, I understand how this could happen, but I don't like it.I imagine this foolishness will triple the number of incoming students at WSU who read the book.In any case, it was never going to be possible to suppress engagement of these issues at Washington State.

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A different faculty member, economist Trenton Smith, just this semester shared a provocative and ambitious essay (.pdf) about market power and information economics in industrial food production.

An excerpt:

[O]ver the course of the last century, the U.S. has witnessed a dramatic shift away from traditional diets and toward a diet comprised primarily of processed brand-name foods with deleterious long-term health effects. This, in turn, has generated increasingly urgent calls for policy interventions aimed at improving the quality of the American diet. In this paper, we ask whether the current state of affairs represents a market failure, and—if so—what might be done about it.

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In a way, Trent's essay is an economist's reflection on the issues raised by the tradition of food industry criticism exemplified by Pollan.

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A while ago, when I reviewed Omnivore's Dilemma for the American Journal of Agricultural Economics, I encouraged professional colleagues to read the book in exactly this spirit -- to wrestle with it, criticize it, and be inspired by it to work on novel economics questions that have been neglected by the mainstream literature.

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Regarding today's controversy, Smith says, "I have discussed (and will continue to do so) Pollan's work in my undergraduate food / commodities marketing course, and it would have been great to expand the discussion to the rest of the student body." He adds, "I also find it ironic that this was all happening around the time I issued a working paper on the insidious influence big business has historically had on consumer access to information about food!"