On the efficiency of my scythe

By Chris Smaje, Small Farm Future

Small farm does equal more labour per unit area and per unit product (which is why most rich countries import a large proportion of their horticultural produce … and why modern diets involve too much refined carbs and oils, and not enough fruit and veg). The challenge is to show that this (along with less energy, less carbon, less water, less soil loss, more product and more fun per unit area) is precisely what makes small farming the wave of the future.

‘Be bolder, go further’

By Landworkers' Alliance Staff, Landworkers Alliance

What we need from Part 2 of the National Food Strategy are bold recommendations for alternatives that help us move away from the corporate controlled supermarket model, which create good quality jobs in the food and farming sector, inspire healthier diets and build community food resilience.

The Brotherhood of the Buffalo

By Talli Nauman, Esperanza Project

Dawn Sherman and her colleagues are committed to growing the Tanka brand against all odds, as part of their community service, she noted. “We’re more than a brand. It’s who we are,” she said. “We’re like the buffalo. We face the storm. Eventually the storm’s going to end.”

Building Bioregional Food Systems Post-COVID 19: The Northeast Healthy Soil Network & the power of regional food system reform consortium work

By Josie Watson, 350 Vermont

COVID-19 has reminded us, perhaps as never before, that we need an overhaul, not only of our health care system, but our food system as well. [1]  As a steady stream of studies and articles point out, a priority of future food system policy should be to support the emergence of local and regional, diversified, healthy food and farming systems, derived from fertile, carbon-rich soils.

Now is the time to re-think everything about how food businesses work

By Oscar Perry Abello, Shareable

With the COVID-19 pandemic shuttering many food businesses temporarily or permanently, FoodLab Detroit has refocused on supporting surviving businesses that want to break the cycles of racist, exploitative, profit-first practices — such as tipping — that have long been taken for granted.

Nature’s store of wisdom: The value of open-pollinated seeds

By Marianne Landzettel, Sustainable Food Trust

To a plant, its genetic base is like a huge toolbox that helps it adapt to changes in weather and climate, and fight diseases and pests. Plants grown from open pollinated seeds have this genetic toolbox.

Creating the Passion to Achieve Rural Resilience

By Uche Isieke, Uche Isieke Blog

I grew up seeing the very ingenious and efficient means by which our most valued resource, the natural ecosystem, can be replicated to meet human needs without altering its capacity and propensity to meet the needs of the oncoming generations.

Why we need racial justice in farming

By Josina Calliste, Landworkers Alliance

We need all the support we can get to build this movement locally. In the spirit of “a high tide raises all ships”, racial justice in the progressive farming movement will benefit everyone.

To Be Farming and Fortunate

By Marie Hoff, Fibershed

A relationship to one’s place remains a work in progress, a continual process of growth, change, and renewal. Fortunate Farm was founded on a passion for local resilience, for food justice and community accountability.

The return of home-grown cereals

By Steven Jacobs, Sustainable Food Trust

People are working hard, on the ground, in fields, mill houses, bakeries and kitchens to build better systems, from seed stock all the way through to gut health, creating a regenerating, whole system design on a person-to-person scale.

Giving Good Grains a Better Future

By David McKenzie, Sustainable Food Trust

While grains have fallen from grace in the rise of fad diets and industrialisation, they remain an essential food that has nourished human societies for thousands of years – we should make sure they continue to be a healthy and valuable food source going forward.

No Radicals Please. We’re British

By Colin Tudge, Oxford Real Farming Conference

Food culture means a diet and a cuisine geared to whatever is produced by Enlightened Agriculture – which in most countries, and certainly in Britain, should cause no hardship at all. Though first we would need to re-learn how to cook.