Insight and inspiration in turbulent times.
Agriculture’s role in a country like Iraq goes beyond food production: it’s the second-largest sector in the Iraqi economy, a major source of rural employment, and a vital cultural signifier. As the rest of Iraq joins the Kurdish region in enjoying greater stability, the inevitable expansion of industrial agriculture paradoxically threatens to undermine the local communities that depend on agriculture for their way of life.
Articles from last month that we found fresh or significant.
Articles on economic contraction, the ghost of ASPO-9 (climate change), the PUBLIC Library.
Plus: peak oil on Australian TV, Bathtubs: A theory of community relations, UK’s happiness movement, building a mass climate movement, sustainable ideas from religion, Octogenarian recalls the First Great Depression.
Need a tool for a few days? Don’t have it? Neighbor doesn’t have it? Borrow it from your neighborhood tool library! No tool library? Check out Portland, where several neighborhoods have started successful tool libraries just in the last few years. Organizers Tom Thompson, Karen Tarnow and Stephen Couche discuss how they got started, stories of community generosity, and the enthusiastic response of all who stop by. In these neighborhoods, there’s no reason not to grab the tools you need and do that project!
– Eric Schlosser: Why Being a Foodie Isn’t ‘Elitist’
– Fava beans: Roasting pods simplifies preparation
– Are mushrooms the new plastic (video)
– Eliot Coleman: Organic agriculture: deeply rooted in science and ecology
– Radical plots: The politics of gardening
I write and research to learn more about something I feel is important, not because Bob and I are experts at implementing all the concepts. We published Radical Homemakers as a result of being on that path, not because we have mastered the lifestyle.
This is not the time to take the word “public” out of the public library. It is time to put it in capitals.
– Happiness theory at center stage in Soros economic conference
– The ‘I’m-happy-I’m-green’ consensus won’t placate our lust for novelty
– Simplicity Institute report shows that less can be more
– Prophets of the Environmental Apocalypse
– Venezuela Comes Sixth in Gallup “Wellbeing” Survey
Where have all the people gone? Not to mention the citizenry, human beings, neighbors, inhabitants, individuals, men, women, adults, children, workers, employees, employers? Suddenly, everywhere, gone, all of them. Their places taken by consumers.
-Cleveland artisans craft their own economic force
-Vauxhall boss warns over UK carmaking future
-Sweatshops are still supplying high street brands
-THE 25% SHIFT The Benefits of Food Localization for Northeast Ohio & How to Realize Them (report)
Recorded 11/16/10 at the City Club of Cleveland, this video features a special City Club program with Michael Shuman entitled “Revitalizing the Northeast Ohio Economy through Local Food”.
One thing is clear from all of the extreme weather slamming the United States: We are ill-prepared for human-caused climate change, whose primary near-term impact on most Americans will be from the ever-worsening weather extremes.
-How close is peak oil?
-Russia halts petrol exports
-EIA budget cuts to curb some energy data gathering
-University Vows to Lock Out Students Opposed to ExxonMobil
