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.

Cotton in Community: Field to Fashion with Acadian Brown Cotton

By Lauren Odom, Fibershed

This rich intertwined story of an heirloom seed, an age-old tradition, and a bright future all began when Sharon Gordon Donnan, an experienced filmmaker and textile conservator, spotted an old blanket while browsing at an antique sale in Washington, Louisiana.

Sacred Cow: The Case for (Better) Meat – Review

By Edward D'Amato, Resilience.org

Sacred Cow:  The Case for (Better) Meat by Diana Rodgers and Robb Wolf is a book (and forthcoming film) challenging what has become conventional wisdom:  that regardless of how it is raised, beef is bad for the planet.

Should No-Till Farming Be Adopted by All to Help the Earth?

By Emily Folk, Resilience.org

Is no-till growing as great as it's made out to be? Should it be adopted by all to help the Earth? The answer is yes and no.

Slaughter of the Innocents: COVID-19 & the Future of Agriculture

By Kollibri terre Sonnenblume, Macska Moksha

Our practices must return to regenerative methods that work with natural processes, instead of against them. We’ve knocked things so far out of balance that the road back to health will be challenging, but the sooner we get to it, the better.

False Solutions to Climate Change: Agriculture

By Mary Wildfire, Resilience.org

The heart of the conflict between real solutions and false ones is no different here than with other sectors. The false solutions in each sector are aimed at maintaining current power relations. The real ones are aimed at rescuing ecosystems and leading to a better world for all humans and other life forms.

Q&A with Regi Haslett-Marroquin on The True Cost of Food: The Bill Is Already in the Mail

By Christine Grillo, John Hopkins Center for a Livable Future

Working with the Regenerative Agriculture Alliance in Minnesota, Reginaldo Haslett-Marroquin is the architect and engineer behind the regenerative poultry system, one of many farm operations at the 100-acre farm in Northfield, through the Main Street Project. His approach to regenerative agriculture involves a biodiverse system of symbiotically connected livestock and perennials, with no chemical inputs, building soil, cleaning water and delivering economic benefits to the community.

What U.S. Farming Can Do to Stop Climate Change

By Ronnie Cummins, YES! magazine

However, for the Green New Deal to accomplish its climate goals, it must spur two large-scale transitions: the transition away from fossil fuel use toward renewable energy, and the transition away from industrial agriculture, a huge polluter and greenhouse gas emitter in its own right, toward organic regenerative practices that draw down and sequester carbon.

Blazing New Trails beyond the Bushfires

By Eva Perroni, Sustainable Food Trust

It is the collective experiences, voices and defined action of people from impacted communities that will help shape the vision for long-lasting, impactful, transformative change. For frontline farming communities, the solution starts with building thriving local economies which provide farmers with dignified livelihoods that are ecologically diverse, healthy and resilient.

Grassroots Rising (Excerpt)

By Ronnie Cummins, Resilience.org

The primarily low-tech, shovel-ready, affordable solutions that we need already exist in every nation and region. We don’t need to invent new techniques. We simply need to identify, publicize, replicate, and scale up currently existing best practices utilizing farmer-to-farmer education and training, with major support and funding from the public and private sectors.

‘Clean Meat’ is Neither – We Can and Must Do Better

By Nicolette Hahn Niman, Sustainable Food Trust

Clearly, mainstream meat production needs much improvement. But this is precisely why faux meats are such a distraction. They get people like Bill Gates and other techies all excited. This siphons the energy, media attention and money away from the work that really needs to be done to fix agriculture. We need all hands on deck to transform mainstream agriculture from extractive to regenerative.

Down Under

By Courtney White, Resilience.org

As Australians grapple with the consequences of the fires in upcoming months and embark on the necessary journey of regenerating themselves and their land, I hope they will look to nature – and farmers like Colin, Eric and others – for inspiration.