South African farmers suffered millions of dollars in lost income when 82,000 hectares of genetically-manipulated corn (maize) failed to produce hardly any seeds. The plants look lush and healthy from the outside. Monsanto has offered compensation. Monsanto blames the failure of the three varieties of corn planted on these farms, in three South African provinces,on [...]
Wednesday, March 31, 2010
The Dervaes Family have created the original modern urban homestead that has yielded an entirely new, revolutionary alternative lifestyle. (ABC Nightline, May 15, 2008)
The certificate was only one of several that emerged from the prestigious Salon du Chocolat in Paris, the annual summit of the world’s master chocolatiers. But it may be enough to start a revolution in Peru. In October 2009, chocolate produced from the cacao beans of a small agricultural cooperative deep in one of the [...]
Filed in Green Living, News Blurbs
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Also tagged Agriculture, Chocolate, Coca, Cocoa, Cooperatives, Institute for Tropical Crops, ITC, Organic Food, Peru, San Martin, Tocache, USDA
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Geoff Lawton‘s groundbreaking implementation of permaculture in The Dead Sea Valley. This video illustrates how permaculture design techniques can restore a salt-ridden degraded landscape to a flourishing and diverse oasis. For more information about Geoff and his Permaculture work please visit: http://www.permaculture.org.au/ To find out more about the Global Permaculture movement, please visit http://www.permacultureplanet.com/
The people in this Texas town—and their families, and friends, and visitors—will never again think of clean energy as something by and for dirty hippies. That once-cursed wind that blows across the Big Country may ultimately pay royalties to as many as 400 property owners. Depending on the size of the turbine, a landowner can [...]
Thursday, January 7, 2010
Nearly 40 years ago, Oregon, facing an onslaught of urban sprawl, adopted the nation’s toughest land-use laws. In 1979, greater Portland became the first metropolis in the country to impose an urban-growth boundary, a hard-and-fast line beyond which suburban development is essentially banned. Along with creating dense neighborhoods, encouraging mass-transit use, and irritating free-market zealots, [...]
Wednesday, January 6, 2010
Perhaps I spent too much time with developers and real estate people in my architectural career, but Hartz has said it all in Fortune, from his first comment about sopping up excess land and creating scarcity to his last quote about buying a penthouse in New York. This sure sounds like a classic real estate [...]
Filed in Green Living, News Blurbs
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Also tagged Agriculture, Detroit, Gardening, Green Jobs, Green Living, John Hantz, Michigan, Permaculture, Real Estate, Sustainability, Urban Agriculture
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The urban agricultural movement has grown nationwide in recent years, as recession-fueled worries prompted people to raise fruits and vegetables to feed their families and perhaps sell at local farmers’ markets. Large gardens and small farms — usually 10 acres or less — have cropped up in thriving cities such as Berkeley, where land is [...]
Thursday, December 17, 2009
Even in Copenhagen, where agriculture is getting less attention than it arguably should be considering its impact and potential for mitigating climate change, U.S. Secretary of Agriculture Tom Vilsack spoke about the need for research, and seeing agriculture as an opportunity for climate change mitigation. He even said to the delegates in Copenhagen, “We need [...]
Filed in News Blurbs
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Also tagged Agriculture, Barack Obama, Biodiversity, Climate Change, COP15, Copenhagen, Environment, Food Safety, GMO, Monsanto, Tom Vilsack
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Listening To
