Insight and inspiration in turbulent times.
The eventual decline in fossil hydrocarbon flows, and the inability of renewables to fully substitute, will create a deficiency of energy to power bloated urban agglomerations and require a shift of human populations back to the countryside. In short, the future is rural.
The majority of people interested in his soil generally have an affinity for growing their own food. He hopes to help others who might not — especially those who are food insecure.
The dictionary definition of ‘farmer’ is simply: “someone who owns or manages a farm”. A farm is: “an area of land and its buildings used for growing crops and rearing animals”.
Usually a recurring event, food swaps allow direct trades to take place between attendees — for instance, a loaf of bread for a jar of preserves or a half-dozen backyard eggs. Your special kitchen concoctions become your own personal currency, allowing you to diversify your pantry while getting to know members of your local food community.
Tune in as Jill Buck of Go Green Radio talks with Dr. Bradford about his report and an upcoming event designed to identify and discuss key leverage points where individuals and communities can most effectively shift our food system towards long-term sustainability through greater energy efficiency and localization.
“It’s what a farm should be doing, feeding local people surrounding the farm,” says Gerald, “if every farmer did that, we wouldn’t need supermarkets. It’s therapy for the farmer and for the community.”
In this episode, Rob, Asher, and Jason talk about why fossil fuels are so embedded in our food system and how changes in the way we grow food might change where all of us live. This episode is designed especially for people who like to eat food and hope to continue doing so.
Recently, cities have been rethinking their hard alleys. Montreal has an official Ruelle Verte (“Green Alley”) program encompassing more than 250 back routes that have been turned into gardens, play spaces, and neighborhood gathering spots.
Soils are, after all, the structural foundation for any food production system. So when we first undertake an agroecological approach to farming, we are literally building a sustainable food system from the ground up.
Dobson’s work is an early step toward finding a way to grow food that restores, rather than exhausts, the earth. “We’re not all the way there yet,” he said. “Humanity has yet to discover 98 percent of what’s under our feet.”
Well, however one construes it, keeping in mind that rebuilding a sense of place will probably also mean rebuilding a sense of mutual obligation between different types of places is an important lesson, I think.
Virtually all of these papers and the FAO’s figure of 14.5 percent are flawed because they employ a formula for equating the climate impact of methane emissions with that of carbon dioxide— through the unit known as “CO2 equivalent “— which is highly misleading.
