Insight and inspiration in turbulent times.
Spaces like the Concrete Garden or Les Grands Voisins are amazing in that they enable us to see that another society based on social harmony and a different understanding of work is possible. But let’s make these spaces permanent, let’s not confine them to small bubbles that can burst. We should demand that any piece of land unused for long period be permanently given to the community.
An annual analysis of the planet’s climate reaffirms what researchers knew was the case: that 2016 was the hottest year since at least 1880, when reliable global measurements were first kept. Record concentrations of heat-trapping gases and a strong El Nino raised the global average temperature to a new high, breaking a mark set just a year earlier.
The persistent question for me as we explore local food issues here at Strong Towns is: Could any of our communities actually survive on local food alone? Could we ever get to a point where local food makes up most of our diets and where local farmers are successfully supplying that? These questions (inspired by the Strong Towns Strength Test) have been buzzing in the back of my mind and, while I want to believe it’s feasible to live off of local food, the more I study this, the more I realize it would be pretty darn tough, if not impossible.
Over the centuries, indigenous peoples have provided a series of ecological and cultural services to humankind. The preservation of traditional forms of farming knowledge and practices help maintain biodiversity, enhance food security, and protect the world’s natural resources.
The smallest livestock on our farm are also the most fascinating to observe, from their daily diligence and complexity of social organization to the extraordinary “waggle dance” they use to communicate the location of nectar and new homes. Today, as we prepare to harvest the last of this year’s honey, I’m reminded that the bees have a lot to teach us. We only have to listen.
There is a vibrant food movement in the UK and Brexit means that there will be a national food and agriculture policy in the future. Will the UK stick to its neoliberal free trade politics or will it take the opportunity to re-shape its food system? A People’s Food Policy want it to be fundamentally transformed.
When we talk about the economic benefits of gardening, farming, and otherwise fostering a comprehensive local food system, we usually bring up reduced grocery bills, import replacement, and even preparation for national supply chain disruption if our big agriculture model ever proves unsustainable. But we less often talk about the ways that plants—including edible plants—can double as green infrastructure that can take the pressure off the man-made systems we rely on to make our cities function.
It’s high time we think in terms of sustainability report cards on food issues, because report cards bring responsibility and agency into our mindset. Responsibility and agency are the missing ingredients in most reports we get on global warming, the environment and social trends. It’s as if these results are just facts, not results that were caused by someone, or the responsibility of someone.
An old housemate introduced me to the concept of gin o’clock, and it’s stayed firmly on the schedule ever since. The rise of the micro distillery has been a wonderful thing to watch over the past few years, and Bristol a pretty splendid place to watch it from. My interest was particularly piqued when I discovered that a new distillery had popped up, mere metres from where I worked. Yes, under the Rummer hotel, there lies a still producing some really rather splendid spirits.
Wendell Berry’s astute statement that “eating is an agricultural act,” uncontrovertibly connects food back to the land and back to the soil. As he reminds us elsewhere, the soil is where we begin in the most fundamental way: it is “…the great connector of lives, the source and destination of all… Without proper care for it we can have no community, because without proper care for it we can have no life.”
Revitalizing the practice of seed saving is vital for the world’s collective food security. Conservation techniques, such as the creation of seed banks and seed exchanges among farmers, gardeners, and even nations, play an important role in not only preserving ancient, heirloom varieties of important food crops, but also in mitigating against the increasing risks of pests, diseases, and climate change.
Foodies are a fragile thread could alter that trajectory. Gourmet feasts and fads, celebrity chefs and gastronomic tournaments are also standard fare during Peak Excess periods, but the contemporary variety bears a slightly different flavor. We have begun, at the edges of that movement, to compute nutrient density and score it along with flavor and tradition.
