Mark Thurstain-Goodwin Responds to Colin Tudge on ‘Can Totnes and District Feed Itself?
Mark Thurstain-Goodwin, Transition Culture
Food security and the need for GIS models
As expected, the recent paper ‘Can Totnes and district feed itself?’ has started stirring things up. An intriguing response comes from Colin Tudge, a director of LandShare CIC (co-funders of the research) and leader of the Campaign for Real Farming. Colin’s thesis is that the food security issue is a simple matter of feeding the population as far as practical from local sources, recognising that some trade between specialist production areas will always be necessary. He argues that we simply need macronutrients (energy foods and protein), mainly in the shape of grains, and micronutrients – vitamins and minerals – and that by growing lots of wheat and encouraging more urban horticulture we can feed ourselves. I’m brutally over-summarising, of course, but he is keen to keep things simple.
This desire for simplicity makes him question the value of analyses like the land use mapping Geofutures did for this piece of research: “Elaborate models analyzing overall ecological footprints of particular communities in fine detail are not necessary. So long as we do the best we can within the guidelines we can’t really go wrong,” he writes.
However, at the end of his commentary he includes a postscript in a different mood. “This and all the other questions raised in this essay could and should have been addressed decades ago, and would have been addressed by any government that was truly alert to world trends. There are many other questions, too – scientific, economic, sociological, moral, practical. Since the government is unlikely to act this side of food riots (which it will treat at “terrorism” and call out the riot police) people who give a damn need to ask the questions for ourselves.”…
(1 Sept 2009)
Under the Clinton Global Initiative, Growing Power takes its grassroots-agriculture model to Africa
Tom Philpott, Grist
At the Clinton Global Initiative wrap-up on Friday, ex-President Clinton made waves in the sustainable-ag world by declaring Will Allen of Milwaukee/Chicago-based based Growing Power his “hero.”
The real news was buried in the press release, though. Toward the bottom of a listing of verbal “commitments” from NGOs and foundations, we find this:
Growing Power commits to strengthen food security for school children and their care givers in South Africa and Zimbabwe. Growing Power will build a new model of local food systems to ensure adequate nutrition in the short-term and build a long-term foundation for competitive African human capital in the global market place.
So Growing Power will be bringing its community-based, low-input style of agriculture to Africa—under the aegis of a group most known for its top-down, Big Solution way of development work…
(28 Sept 2009)
Americans turn to backyard chickens for food, security
AFP
Cindy Thomas spends a quarter of an hour a day tending four hens in her backyard that provide her with eggs she and her husband eat or sell through a ranch supply store in east central Idaho.
Thomas is not a farmer and she was not raised on a farm. But the Salmon woman is one of a growing number of Americans who have turned to chickens in the face of a flagging economy, scares about the food supply and a strengthening drive to acquire locally produced food.
“It’s not that I’m against stuff in the grocery store but, in these times, I feel more secure if I can produce things myself,” said Thomas.
In Idaho and Washington state, poultry hatcheries and farm stores say sales of chicks are soaring, with some reporting a rise of 70 percent compared to last year…
(16 Sept 2009)
Could Food Shortages Bring Down Civilisation?
Lester Brown, ips via countercurrents.org
In early 2008, Saudi Arabia announced that, after being self-sufficient in wheat for over 20 years, the non-replenishable aquifer it had been pumping for irrigation was largely depleted.
In response, officials said they would reduce their wheat harvest by one-eighth each year until production would cease entirely in 2016. The Saudis would then import virtually all the grain consumed by their Canada-sized population of nearly 30 million people.
The Saudis are unique in being so wholly dependent on irrigation. But other, far larger, grain producers such as India and China are facing irrigation water losses and could face grain production declines.
Emerging Trends Threaten Food Security
Fifteen percent of India’s grain harvest is produced by overpumping its groundwater. In human terms, 175 million Indians are being fed with grain produced from wells that will be going dry. The comparable number for China is 130 million. Among the many other countries facing harvest reductions from groundwater depletion are Pakistan, Iran, and Yemen.
The tripling of world wheat, rice, and corn prices between mid-2006 and mid-2008 signaled our growing vulnerability to food shortages. It took the worst economic meltdown since the Great Depression to lower grain prices…
(30 Sept 2009)
related: Lester Brown speaks sense on the food/climate crisis
Critic’s Notebook: From earth to table, in more ways than one
Lesley Chesterman, The Montreal Gazette
One of the biggest trends on the food scene right now is acquiring food directly from its source. That source is usually a farmer, or, better yet, an organic farmer. Restaurants have long had strong ties with farmers, many of whom grow vegetables following the chef’s specifications. But now consumers, too, are exploring alternatives to supermarket products that have been shipped in from around the globe, more likely produced in an industrial plant than a farm, and have often been exposed to an alarming array of chemicals.
Some of us rely on our local farmers’ market for food, while others opt for baskets of organic produce that are delivered weekly. There are also those who drive directly to a favourite farm to purchase fruit, vegetables, meat, coffee, flour and more.
This “locavore” movement of people who prefer to eat locally grown/produced food is gradually evolving from obscure to mainstream. And judging by the number of cookbooks that endorse this way of thinking, eating local and seasonal is a mantra that’s here to stay.
The latest such book to hit the shelves, Earth to Table: Seasonal Recipes from an Organic Farm (Random House Canada 2009, $45), is written by Ontario chef Jeff Crump and pastry chef Bettina Schormann, who work at the Ancaster Old Mill in Ancaster, Ont. With the idea of “let nature write the menu” as their driving force, these chefs wholeheartedly endorse the earth-to-table philosophy of organic farming, Slow Food, and artisanal producers…
(19 Sept 2009)
Thanks to Kalpa again for this one. Because she featured so many good stories this week, I will be running another Food and Ag section tomorrow. And speaking of new books, the latest Transition Towns’ publication: Local Food, How to Make it Happen in your Community, is now released. I just got my copy today, and it looks well worth a read. -KS
