Letter From The Farm: Realism And Planning For Utopia
The concept of diversity has been leading our choices as we see its potentialities both in agriculture and diet.
agro-ecology
Campesino a Campesino: a Trip to Nicaragua
As I’ve mentioned, I recently visited Nicaragua as part of a research project on ‘Transitions to agro-ecological food systems’ that I’ve been involved with, conducted by the Institute of Development Studies at the University of Sussex. The research involved working with agro-ecological farmers in the UK, Senegal and Nicaragua, and the trip brought together some of the farmers and researchers from each country. In this post, I thought I’d offer a few informal reflections on the research, and the Nicaragua trip.
Self-Build Commmunities in Farming
L’Atelier Paysan is a French cooperative that works with farmers to design machines and buildings adapted to the specific practices of small farm agroecology. In addition to distributing free plans on its website, L’Atelier Paysan organizes winter self-help training sessions, during which farmers train in metalworking and build tools which they can then use on their own farms.
Six Steps Back to the Land
I am a great fan of Colin Tudge, not least because he is an original thinker, as amply demonstrated in his latest book, Six Steps Back to the Land.
Field trip to an agroecological “teikei” family farm
In teikei consumers participate in the production through labour and capital, and in return they get seasonal, local, organic food directly from the farm.
Food & agriculture – April 30
• The Trouble with Biofuels: Costs and Consequences of Expanding Biofuel Use in the United Kingdom
•Dance of the Honey Bee
•The benefits of alternative farming methods
•A Brief History of Our Deadly Addiction to Nitrogen Fertilizer
•Connecting the Dots: the Big Permaculture Picture
•YFF: Using the Sun to Empower Women and Help Family Farmers
•International Day of Peasant struggles
•Why Saving Seed and Growing Organic Food is a Powerful Weapon Against Corporate Tyranny
•Why farmers still struggle when food prices rise
2% solutions
Mitigation or adaptation? It’s usually an either/or choice: either we work on ways to reduce the amount of greenhouse gases in the atmosphere or we find ways to adapt to new conditions created by climate change, including reducing society’s vulnerabilities and raising its resilience. Fighting to close a coal plant or developing green energy alternatives, for example, is a different job than translocating an imperiled species or planning for inevitable sea level rise. Same problem, separate responses. Different tribes. Mitigation and adaptation even have separate conferences!