Agriculture – Apr 19
A drought in Australia, a global shortage of rice
Potash the new crude
Sulphur: From waste byproduct to billion-dollar commodity
Food & Water
Solutions & sustainability – Apr 17
Activist LeDuke focuses on climate, PO, food
Australia’s 2020 Summit: ‘Now that’s a bright idea’
Transition City Leeds
Home remedies – Apr 17
Pakistan: Ban wedding meals, lighting?
Bread expert: we need to bake our own
NYT on kitchen gardens, survivor gardens
Change our diet to resolve the food crisis?
Trouble on the farm – Apr 17
Food shortage looming if crop focus isn’t altered
China agrees to pay triple for potash fertilizer
Unwelcome face of ag-inflation
Rednecks and peak oil: Valuing the farmer’s contribution
“The Farmer is the Man” (and Woman)
International agriculture report calls for paradigm shift
Sixty countries backed by the World Bank and most UN bodies yesterday called for radical changes in world farming to avert increasing regional food shortages, escalating prices and growing environmental problems.
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2,500-page International Assessment of Agricultural Science and Technology for Development (IAASTD)
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– Change in farming can feed world
– UNESCO calls for move away from fossil fuels in agriculture
– ‘Increase agricultural productivity, reduce footprint’ (project director)
Food crisis – Apr 17
BBC: Feeding the world
UN fears tragedy over N. Korean food shortage
The fury of the poor
Global South view of crisis (IPS)
Food & agriculture – Apr 16
NY Times: Fuel choices, food crises and finger-pointing
EU defends biofuel goals amid food crises – not ‘a crime against humanity’
UN body urges agriculture reforms to stave off food crisis
One less burger, one safer planet
Global hot spots of hunger set to explode
Solutions & sustainability – Apr 16
Transition Towns in New Zealand
Daily Mail: An entire village turns against supermarkets and grows its own food
Author trades suburbia for ‘simple’ life
Food & agriculture – Apr 15
Struggling Egypt where bread means life
WSJ: Food inflation, riots spark worries for world leaders
Monbiot: Credit crunch? The real crisis is global hunger. And if you care, eat less meat
How to drink beer and save the world
Crisis & response – Apr 14
World finance ministers emphasize food crisis over credit crisis
Energy and food problems need global solutions, says Jeffrey Sachs
Bill McKibben: Where have all the joiners gone?
New York Times on the New Survivalism
Food & agriculture – Apr 13
Canadian Medical Journal – Obesity reduction and its possible consequences: What can we learn from Cuba’s Special Period?
The recipe for food rights (Vandana Shiva interview)
Manufactured foodscape
It has been a truism from the beginning of civilization that cities require stocks of grain, surpluses that can last a year or even two to sustain them through drought or war. In the last two decades, the champions of the globalized trade system have turned that truism on its head and foolishly convinced governments and their leaders that food production and storage can be largely left to the marketplace. All that is changing rather quickly.
