GPRI statement on global phosphorus scarcity
Researchers investigating a coming peak in world phosphorous production have urged caution on the revising up of estimates of reserves in a new report.
Food & Water
Swinging the hammer for justice
A new book by longtime bioregionalist Stephanie Mills tells the story of one of our forerunners in relocalization’s long history. Bob Swann may be the most important pioneer for a just world whom you’ve never heard of. He worked tirelessly over a long life to bring together practical structures for economic justice, land reform, rural investment and credit, complementary currencies, and education.
Conserving and rebuilding soils
Together, restoring the earth’s tree and grass cover and practicing conservation agriculture protect soil from erosion and reduce flooding. They also sequester carbon, making them powerful tools in the effort to fight global warming.
Urban agriculture – Oct 14
-Urban farming yields small climate gains
-Case study: The Year of Urban Agriculture in Seattle
-How to grow food in strange places – by the experts
Energy and food constraints will collapse global economic recovery
We are failing at even the most basic risk management. The real-time convergence of peak oil, peak food, and severe instabilities in the global economy may terminally collapse the systems upon which we depend for our basic welfare. The principal risk management challenge is not about how we introduce the energy infrastructure and conservation measures to maintain those systems, but about how we deal with the consequences of their collapse.
The end of the experiment
If I want something, I won’t forbid it. I’ll just do it eyes wide open. Food and judgment don’t mix—they turn the stomach. I will be kind to myself and others as we stumble towards an ethical relationship with food.
Our math is not nature’s math
We built our house on the edge of a woodlot thirty some years ago. Now the trees have reached out and enveloped us. They shade us in summer, protect us from wind in winter, and try to kill us by falling in all seasons.
Food & agriculture – Oct 13
– What a Scientist Didn’t Tell the New York Times About His Study on Bee Deaths
– What Monsanto’s fall from grace reveals about the GMO seed industry
– Russia backs away from plans to break up the unique Pavlovsk seed bank
Soils and souls: the promise of the land
In the search for alternatives to our dead-end industrial agriculture system, Land Institute researchers are pursuing plant breeding programs in Salina, KS that just may be the key to post-oil farming. In late September, the Institute’s 2010 Prairie Festival began with three talks – by poet/novelist Wendell Berry, economist Josh Farley, and biologist Sandra Steingraber. The three were telling the story of how sin brought us to this place, how we must redefine success if we are to atone, and how essential that change is for our own safety. I left the barn that day with one revelation burning in my brain: While evil lurks in many places, it is most concentrated in fossil fuels.
Eric’s Tomato – Why we need a local food movement (and why it has a fighting chance)
Local food, while spreading like quackgrass, is hardly out of the starting gate. It has many strong seeds. Not all of them will grow but I’m betting a lot will.
Africa market garden: A smarter approach to agriculture
In Tanka village, 50 women have started farming using solar drip irrigation to grow okra, tomatoes, eggplant, and other vegetables, as well as moringa and fruit trees. The women each manage their own plots, but share tools and water—and skills—with one another.
Two experiments: Slow and sustainable
“What you doin’?” asked the three-year-old who lives next door.
I was standing on my front porch wielding a paintbrush.
“Finishing my shelves.” I showed him my brush.
“But I don’t smell anything,” his mother said as they went by.
“Hah!” I thought, exactly the point.
