This entry started as a mere update on all of our lives, but by the end progresses to my thoughts on the global food/energy/economic crisis. Read on...
Me--worrying about the global food crisis; reading The Automatic Earth's more than daily posts; buying food on sale and/or in bulk; sprouting potatoes and planting them in a couple of days; adding compost to garden (later today now that the snow is gone again); planning to start tomato seedlings today too; sprouting clover seeds and oat groats for indoor greens; planting outdoor lettuce, greens, etc.; also making quilt tops to use around the house as insulated window coverings, and possibly to sell at a craft show...
George--teaching music to kids days and some evenings; preparing for a job interview and getting to teach a Music Educ. methods class at St. John's University next week (a 1/4 time position for next year--wish him luck!); playing something or other on his flute most days; he'll tell you "it's all about the music" in his life; helping me with garden, though he has been forbidden from planting since he never follows my plan!; gathering free wooden pallets around town for a summer birdhouse making project extravaganza (and maybe a chicken coop project if I can convince him because surely with a food crisis chickens in St. Cloud won't be against the law for much longer...)
Unlike some policy makers, I don't see another "Green Revolution" aka genetically modified seeds as the solution to the problem. Norman Borlaug's original Green Revolution has in part caused what we're seeing now. It took people away from their indigenous food production methods and made them/us heavily dependent on corporate seed programs, petroleum-based fertilizers and pesticides/herbicides and the whole import/export cycle which we're seeing now is problematic due to ever-present corporate and government greed. Genetic modification seed programs would just be more of the same, not to mention the possibly terrible health repercussions eating food from G.M. seeds can cause.
What I see as the solution is "Grow Your Own", buy local, find a farmer to grow it for you, reacquaint ourselves with the food-growing and raising process. This is the only way I see to have true, real food security. It only makes sense, as fuel prices rise the cost of trucking in food makes purchasing that food difficult. Oil is only getting scarcer and demand worldwide is only growing, too. Then how do we make our petroleum-based agricultural inputs? How do we keep up the highways as people get poorer and cities tax bases decrease?
The solution lies not in just "going back" to the old ways, but in combining those "old ways" of local farming with new technologies, new understandings of how things grow best, and a global picture of world citizens feeding themselves again. For more information on what others are doing in this regard, check out blogs like Sharon Astyk's (and her forthcoming books, Depletion and Abundance: Life on the New Home Front and A Nation of Farmers), Path to Freedom's website, the Permaculture Institute and Local Harvest.
The future is positive, the food tastes great, and we'll all thrive in the new society making its way in!
Me--worrying about the global food crisis; reading The Automatic Earth's more than daily posts; buying food on sale and/or in bulk; sprouting potatoes and planting them in a couple of days; adding compost to garden (later today now that the snow is gone again); planning to start tomato seedlings today too; sprouting clover seeds and oat groats for indoor greens; planting outdoor lettuce, greens, etc.; also making quilt tops to use around the house as insulated window coverings, and possibly to sell at a craft show...Elijah--reading The Icebound Land, Book 3 of the Ranger's Apprentice series (and probably staying up too late); rehearsed last night with the four-school orchestra in preparation for their May school tour and concerts; playing hours of Pokemon with his sister; resisting going outside to play for any amount of time, as usual...
Rose--read her American Girl Magazine for an hour last night! (maybe recovering from school-induced hatred of reading soon...); feeling blue because best friend is grounded for the week and who can she play with?!; playing hours of Pokemon with her brother; "stealthily" helping me with housework just because she hates to see something undone (gosh, so like me as a kid! seriously); and all the usual girl stuff...
George--teaching music to kids days and some evenings; preparing for a job interview and getting to teach a Music Educ. methods class at St. John's University next week (a 1/4 time position for next year--wish him luck!); playing something or other on his flute most days; he'll tell you "it's all about the music" in his life; helping me with garden, though he has been forbidden from planting since he never follows my plan!; gathering free wooden pallets around town for a summer birdhouse making project extravaganza (and maybe a chicken coop project if I can convince him because surely with a food crisis chickens in St. Cloud won't be against the law for much longer...)Remember Scarlett O'Hara in Gone With The Wind? "As God as my witness, I will never be hungry again!" (click on the quote to see the immortal video...) Maybe I'm overreacting, surely most of you will think so, but I am prepared and no matter what we'll eat the stuff for heaven's sake!
Seriously, on the global food crisis, I'm not panicking for myself (much). I feel great compassion for those who can't afford to eat, both in America and in the many countries abroad where we're seeing food riots. Much of it is about national and corporate greed around the world, as well as American's using food for fuel, and a great deal of it is about drought and desertification of farmlands probably due to deforestation and subsequent climate change.
Unlike some policy makers, I don't see another "Green Revolution" aka genetically modified seeds as the solution to the problem. Norman Borlaug's original Green Revolution has in part caused what we're seeing now. It took people away from their indigenous food production methods and made them/us heavily dependent on corporate seed programs, petroleum-based fertilizers and pesticides/herbicides and the whole import/export cycle which we're seeing now is problematic due to ever-present corporate and government greed. Genetic modification seed programs would just be more of the same, not to mention the possibly terrible health repercussions eating food from G.M. seeds can cause.
What I see as the solution is "Grow Your Own", buy local, find a farmer to grow it for you, reacquaint ourselves with the food-growing and raising process. This is the only way I see to have true, real food security. It only makes sense, as fuel prices rise the cost of trucking in food makes purchasing that food difficult. Oil is only getting scarcer and demand worldwide is only growing, too. Then how do we make our petroleum-based agricultural inputs? How do we keep up the highways as people get poorer and cities tax bases decrease?
The solution lies not in just "going back" to the old ways, but in combining those "old ways" of local farming with new technologies, new understandings of how things grow best, and a global picture of world citizens feeding themselves again. For more information on what others are doing in this regard, check out blogs like Sharon Astyk's (and her forthcoming books, Depletion and Abundance: Life on the New Home Front and A Nation of Farmers), Path to Freedom's website, the Permaculture Institute and Local Harvest.
The future is positive, the food tastes great, and we'll all thrive in the new society making its way in!
Comments
:) Food for thought! Thanks~!
Honestly, most of us probably do have enough food around to get us through an emergency. I'm trying to be a bit more deliberate about it right now, however, until things stabilize (and by buying sales and items in bulk, I'm just stocking my pantry for less money). Not that I want to be feeding my family while others around me go hungry! No, I just want some security and would hope to feed my neighbors if it came to that. There are lots of stories of neighbors feeding neighbors and helping in other ways during the Great Depression.
I think it is smart and prudent to think about these things. I used to think a Katrina or other disaster couldn't hit Minnesota--until we had the major flooding in Rochester last summer caused by massive amounts of RAIN, pure and simple rain. Preparing for an emergency, whether food or other supplies, can't hurt. My in-laws live on water off the Chesapeake Bay where hurricanes and ice storms often knock out their power and water sometimes for a week or more. They're always prepared with a wood stove, generator, drinking water and other resources. And they're "modern" folks!
I, however, won't be stocking ammo anytime soon. I'd rather be shot than shoot someone!