Insight and inspiration in turbulent times.
Driven by fossil fuels, powering new technologies, society (and the global climate) has been completely changed. But like all celebrations, that process is arguably coming to an end; and like all the best parties, those who have had a really good time don’t want it to stop!
Either we accept cheap food at the grocery store, and have people – invariably poor people – pay for environmental damage in health, social and economic costs incurred elsewhere. Or we have more expensive food that reflects the full costs of its production.
Nothing illustrates the weirdness, injustice, and unpleasantness of the present economy more clearly than the misdirected attempts of government to reduce the price of food.
Several groups teamed up to bring Michael Pollan to the University of Vermont for a question and answer session and book signing this past Thursday evening, and I was lucky enough to attend the event.
We need to rethink our calculus on food spending. Rather than looking at food as an expenditure with no long term implications, we instead need to view our food spending as an investment.
This month alone has seen riots kick-off in Venezuela, Bosnia, Ukraine, Iceland, and Thailand. This is not a coincidence.
When looking for insights into food, policy and politics, the first place I would turn is to Professor Tim Lang, Professor of Food Policy at City University London.
Putting gasoline blended with corn in your gas tank can increase the cost of food on your kitchen table. That’s the claim of farmers and ranchers who say federal policies mandating corn ethanol production raise the price of feed for American cattle, pork and poultry.
Although Adli Mansour, the new interim leader sworn in today by the army, promises to pave the way for new democratic elections, the fundamental drivers of Egyptian rage remain overlooked.
•Science as Dialogue: What My Garden and I Are Discussing in 2013
•Biofuels a big cause of famine
•Food Price Inflation as Redistribution: Towards a New Analysis of Corporate Power in the World Food System
•Over half the world’s population could rely on food imports by 2050 – study
•Agriculture and Livestock Remain Major Sources of Greenhouse Gas Emissions
The first thing to know is that illth is a real word which you can find in Volume VII of the Oxford English Dictionary. It was coined in 1860 by John Ruskin, the English writer, artist, philanthropist and all-around too-smart-guy-with-spot-on-taste. Ruskin, from his vantage point in the cockpit of the industrial revolution, realized that reality had outpaced the language. In an era of spectacular explosions of riches and astounding leaps in material culture — that is, the stuff that we have access to — there was something else happening, too. That something was the opposite of wealth, which he termed illth.
• 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
