Act: Inspiration

“A Nighttime Letter to the Grandchildren”

by

My dear ones, your generation will face a series of environmental challenges that will dwarf anything any previous generation has confronted. I’m hoping to add some insights of my own based on things I learned as a policymaker in the 1950s and ’60s, when I observed and participated in some monumental achievements and profound misjudgments. As a freshman congressman in 1955, I regrettably voted with my unanimous colleagues for the Interstate Highway Program. All of us acted on the shortsighted assumption that cheap oil was super-abundant and would always be available.

A Perspective on Ag 2.0 Silicon Valley

by

I attended the Agriculture 2.0 Silicon Valley conference co-hosted by New Seed Advisors, U.S. Venture Partners and Spin Farming…The agenda was much larger and diverse than in New York, and given the level of interest I expect more events are being planned. The following are some notes and thoughts that reflect the highlights of the day for me.

The collapse of journalism / The journalism of collapse

by

The first step in crafting a new narrative for journalists is to reject technological fundamentalism and deal with a harsh reality: In the future we will have to make due with far less energy, which means less high-technology and a need for more creative ways of coping. Journalists have to tell stories about what that kind of creativity looks like. They have to reject the gee-whizzery of much of the contemporary science and technology reporting and emphasize the activities of those with a deeper ecological worldview.

What works: food

by

When we started this endeavor, about two years ago, I could barely distinguish between a hammer and a zucchini. And that tells you all you need to know about my construction skills as well as my gardening skills. As I’ve pointed out many times before, if I can do this, I can hardly imagine somebody who can’t. But you’d better get cracking. The time to plant a garden is not when you’re hungry.

Fear and loathing in Ohio

by

The passage of health care reform legislation in the House of Representatives last weekend was met with such a crescendo of hyperbole and vitriol on both sides of the political aisle that even William Shatner thought, "Jeez, tone down the theatrics.” … If Koch and others are feeding fear to protect the profits of health insurers, just imagine the kind of fomenting we’ll see when the stakes are even higher—when the energy and climate crises come front and center in the national debate.

The New Agriculture-A Revolution

by

It is hardly possible to read the news these days without tripping over another story about scrappy city folk turning wasted space into lush gardens that produce astonishing amounts of nutritious food—vegetables, honey, eggs, goat cheese—you name it. Every day, greater numbers of ordinary people appear to be answering Sharon Astyk’s call for an army of new farmers to return to the land, wherever they can find it.

In other words, this is no passing novelty.

Food & agriculture – Mar 26

by

-Is urban farming Detroit’s cash cow?
-Looming citrus disease could annihilate county’s trees
-The Great Sustainability Debate: Meat Or No Meat?
-The London Orchard Project: bringing fruit to car parks
-Don’t confuse manure tea with Earl Grey
-China faces ‘diabetes epidemic’, research suggests
-Big food push urged to avoid global hunger
-The Radical Necessity of Cooking: Mollie Katzen, Vegetablist