Making the most of it in dry times
As California endures what may be its driest and hottest year on record, farmers and farmworkers have been among those most heavily hit by the drought.
Food & Water
Food Nation: We are what we cook
Food is an intimate commodity. It is bought, sold, and controlled just like any other, but what makes it so personal is that it is wrapped up in deeply individual and cultural values.
The Energetics of Food Distribution
The question of whether locally distributed food requires more or less fuel in its delivery revolves around how we define local.
New book: “Sustainable Phosphorus Management”
Phosphorus is one of the key nutrients necessary to human, animal and plant life. The finite resource must be used more effectively. Sustainable Phosphorus Management: A Global Transdisciplinary Roadmap provides up-to-date information on global phosphorus flows and identifies options to improve phosphorus efficiency and sustainability.
Finding Hope in an Era of Climate Chaos
So, can a book about soil and carbon give us … hope? In this Q&A, Courtney White, author of Grass, Soil, Hope: A Journey Through Carbon Country, talks about the hope he found as he researched a wide variety of simple strategies that anyone can undertake to help create a more sustainable future.
The Energetic Evolution of the US Food System
Before 1900 the US food system likely delivered more calories of food than it required as energy inputs in the form of fuel and labor. Only as our food system industrialized did today’s energy deficit emerge.
The fat of the land: Eating red meat
Contrary to most other campaign groups, in direct opposition to them in fact, we believe that the consumption of red meat, dairy produce and animal fats needs to be increased, not decreased.
Shaping Water and Soil at Inspiration Farm
If you grow good soil, everything else falls into place.
It’s the Sugar, Stupid: A Review of the Documentary ‘Fed Up’
The messages we hear in advertisements have a huge impact on our food choices. This reality is the starting point of the documentary Fed Up, produced by Katie Couric and Laurie David and directed by Stephanie Soechtig.
Local Food and the Art of Tractor Maintenance
The fact is, a local food economy requires more than just farmers and their customers: it also requires people like Morris and Fred, two of the unsung heroes of this particular local food system.
Why Grow Organic?
In this interview between Douglas Gayeton and Fred Kirschenmann, Fred explains the history of USDA organic certification, the trouble with milking 50,000 cows and why the story behind our food means more to some than third party organic certification.
Seeking the Whole Story: New metrics needed to evaluate agricultural practices
If metrics focus solely on yields it can support the illusion that our agricultural system is meeting the nutrition, health, environmental sustainability, rural development and other needs of the population.
