tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4391809431213658962024-02-28T05:24:28.535-05:00Permaculture & Regenerative Design NewsCurrent Events & News about Permaculture & the Design of Sustainable Ecologies / EconomiesAnonymoushttp://www.blogger.com/profile/03009370115428649864noreply@blogger.comBlogger493125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-439180943121365896.post-35029277841071005852015-05-16T14:27:00.001-05:002015-05-16T14:27:52.567-05:00<h1 class="item_detail">
<a href="http://www.resilience.org/stories/2015-05-15/what-would-happen-if-we-all-grew-food" target="_blank"><span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">What Would Happen if We all Grew Food?</span></a><a href="http://www.resilience.org/stories/2015-05-15/what-would-happen-if-we-all-grew-food" target="_blank"></a></h1>
<span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">
</span><div class="byline">
<span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">
by <a href="http://www.resilience.org/author-detail/2597483-patrick-m-lydon">Patrick M. Lydon</a>, originally published by <a class="external" href="http://www.finalstraw.org/the-real-need-for-gmo-and-industrial-scale-food/" target="_blank">FinalStraw.org</a>
<span class="article_date">
| May 15, 2015 (and republished at <a href="http://resilience.org/">Resilience.org</a>, where I found it.)</span></span>
</div>
<span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">
</span><span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;"><a class="external" href="http://www.finalstraw.org/wp-content/uploads/2015/05/central_valley_california_farm_FinalStraw.org_PML1429.jpg" target="_blank"><img alt="A Fall sunset in California's Central Valley (photo: P.M. Lydon, Final Straw)" height="332" src="http://www.finalstraw.org/wp-content/uploads/2015/05/central_valley_california_farm_FinalStraw.org_PML1429-597x396.jpg" width="500" /></a></span><br />
<span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">
</span><span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;"><em>A Fall sunset in California's Central Valley (photo: P.M. Lydon, Final Straw)</em></span><br />
<br />
<span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">
</span><span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">I'd like to start off with a story about a woman I know who works
full time, takes home a below-median income, and raises two kids in
Silicon Valley. This woman also has an organic garden in her tiny back
yard, partially for her own enjoyment, and partially so she can afford
to eat good food.</span><br />
<br />
<span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">
</span><span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">Every year, her tiny part time garden produces far more than she
needs. She shares the excess, and I mean huge excess. She shares peppers
and lettuce and lemons and cucumbers and spinach and beets and all else
with dozens of people. This full-time worker, part time farmer produces
more food than her and her friends know what to do with.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">
</span><span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">And her story is not unique.</span><br />
<br />
<span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">
</span><span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">Let's pause here to think about what this means for a moment, about
this woman, her part time passion, and how much she and those around her
receive from it.Now, think about this single instance of plentiful
food, and multiply it across your block. How many people could all the
empty yards in a suburban block feed if they were put to use growing
food?</span><br />
<br />
<span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">
</span><span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">Now multiply that across your neighborhood, all the empty yards,
lawns, abandoned lots. How much of a bounty in food could you have?</span><br />
<br />
<span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">
</span><span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">Now think further, across your entire city, your entire region.
Imagine yards and blocks and rivers and valleys filled perennials,
fruits, berries, filled with lush vegetable gardens.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">
</span><span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;"><a class="external" href="http://www.finalstraw.org/wp-content/uploads/2013/05/Farming-Final-Straw_DSC0055.jpg" target="_blank"><img alt="Yoshikazu Kawaguchi at his home natural farm garden in Nara, Japan (Photo: P.M. Lydon | FInal Straw)" class="wp-image-1955 size-large" data-mce-="" height="332" src="http://www.finalstraw.org/wp-content/uploads/2013/05/Farming-Final-Straw_DSC0055-597x396.jpg" width="500" /></a></span><br />
<span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">
</span><span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;"><em>Yoshikazu Kawaguchi at his home natural farm garden in Nara, Japan (Photo: P.M. Lydon | FInal Straw)</em></span><br />
<br />
<span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">
</span><span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">A silly agrarian dream? The <a class="external" href="http://unctad.org/en/Docs/ditcted200715_en.pdf" target="_blank">United Nations Doesn't Think So</a>, nor does its <a class="external" href="http://www.yesmagazine.org/planet/un-only-small-farmers-and-agroecology-can-feed-the-world" target="_blank">Food and Agriculture Organization</a>, or decades of research by <a class="external" data-mce-="" href="http://rodaleinstitute.org/" target="_blank">Rodale Institute</a>, or the millions of <a class="external" href="http://newfarm.rodaleinstitute.org/features/0802/regenerative.shtml" target="_blank">Regenerative Farmers</a>, <a class="external" data-mce-="" href="http://sociecity.org/2015/its-enough/" target="_blank">Natural Farmers</a>, and <a class="external" data-mce-="" href="http://www.whale.to/a/blume.html" target="_blank">Permaculturists</a> who are working today to feed most of the world.</span><br />
<br />
<span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">
</span><span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;"><a class="external" data-mce-="" href="http://grist.org/industrial-agriculture/2011-03-10-debunking-myth-that-only-industrial-agriculture-can-feed-world/" target="_blank">The Myth that We Need Industrial Agriculture</a> has been debunked, and the only ones who are holding onto this myth, are the industry giants who helped create it.</span><br />
<br />
<span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">
</span><span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">Ecologically speaking, we have the ability to <a class="external" data-mce-="" href="http://www.commondreams.org/news/2014/10/09/solution-soil-how-organic-farming-can-feed-world-and-save-planet" target="_blank">grow much of our own food while also enriching the land </a>around
us, assuming we understand and follow somewhat seasonal diets;
biologically speaking, this way of eating can contribute great benefits
to our body's health; psychologically speaking, <a class="external" data-mce-="" href="http://www.usatoday.com/story/news/nation/2014/05/11/health-benefits-gardening/7971047/" target="_blank">the garden is therapeutic</a>, our minds are put more at ease and operate more clearly and peacefully after time spent working in the garden.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">
</span><span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">Again, replicate this view across your neighborhood, city, and
region. How different does your world look? More peace? More good food?
More neighborly neighbors?</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">
</span><span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;"><a class="external" href="http://www.finalstraw.org/wp-content/uploads/2015/04/hongcheon_farm_DSC1435.jpg" target="_blank"><img alt="Rice harvest instruction at 최성현 Seonghyun Choi's natural farm in South Korea" class="wp-image-4479 size-large" data-mce-="" height="281" src="http://www.finalstraw.org/wp-content/uploads/2015/04/hongcheon_farm_DSC1435-597x336.jpg" width="500" /></a></span><br />
<span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">
</span><span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;"><em>Rice harvest instruction at 최성현 Seonghyun Choi's natural farm in South Korea (photo: P.M. Lydon, FinalStraw.org)</em></span><br />
<br />
<span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">
</span><span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">Not only is there a benefit to the human world, but there is great
ecological benefit to our earth as a whole. Through regenerative growing
methods such as permaculture and natural farming, the process of
growing food – and flowers and shrubs and trees alongside – is also a
process of regenerating land and wildlife in our cities, and a process
of reducing the need for destructive industrial agriculture.</span><br />
<br />
<span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">
</span><span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">Once more, replicate this view across the land where you live;
envision the process of making humanity more healthy and peaceful, and
making our earth more beautiful, more healthy, and more resilient at the
same time.</span><br />
<br />
<span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">
</span><span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">When you see the reality of how our current food system works – and
how it works against health, peace, and resilience at every turn – you
begin to wonder how we were ever tricked into believing that we need
industrial agriculture. Or pesticide. Or synthetic chemicals. Or a food
system where global distribution is the rule and not the exception.</span><br />
<br />
<span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">
</span><span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;"><img alt="korea_supermarket_PML6544-624x413" class="wp-image-3393 size-medium" data-mce-="" height="198" src="http://www.finalstraw.org/wp-content/uploads/2014/01/korea_supermarket_PML6544-624x413-300x198.jpg" width="300" /></span><br />
<span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">
</span><span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;"><em>Rural Korean supermarket (photo: P.M. Lydon, <a href="http://finalstraw.org/">FinalStraw.org</a>)</em></span><br />
<br />
<span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">
</span><span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">This view of industrial agriculture as our savior has of course been
debunked both by scientific and anecdotal evidence over the past several
decades. So one wonders, why we are still operating our food systems in
such a way?</span><br />
<br />
<span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">
</span><span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">The real reason why we need GMOs, synthetic fertilizers, pesticides,
and industrial agriculture is because it increases profit, scarcity, and
control of food as a commodity. Make no mistake, there is little to no
benefit for us as individuals in this reasoning, and myriad pitfalls.</span><br />
<br />
<span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">
</span><span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">The real reason we need GMOs, synthetic fertilizers, pesticides and
industrial agriculture is, by any measure of social or biological
wellness, a lie; one invented and carefully maintained to benefit a few
very wealthy people.</span><br />
<br />
<span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">
</span><span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">Show the heads of the food industry that you know the truth. Grow a garden. Show them your power.</span><br />
<br />
<span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">
</span><span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;"><a class="external" href="http://www.finalstraw.org/wp-content/uploads/2015/04/IMG_3698.jpg" target="_blank"><img alt="Garden vegetables (photo: Suhee Kang, FinalStraw.org)" class="wp-image-4518 size-large" data-mce-="" height="333" src="http://www.finalstraw.org/wp-content/uploads/2015/04/IMG_3698-597x398.jpg" width="500" /></a></span><br />
<span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">
</span><span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;"><em>Garden vegetables (photo: Suhee Kang, FinalStraw.org)</em></span><br />
<br />
<span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">
</span><span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">Show careless profit seekers the truth. Share your bounty freely with your friends and neighbors. Show them your compassion.</span><br />
<br />
<span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">
</span><span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">Show those who seek to hold the keys to a basic human need, that you
won't abide by their treachery to the human race. Show them your
awareness and your strength.</span><br />
<br />
<span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">
</span><span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">There is hope for the world, and it lies in your awareness and actions, and also... in your gardens.</span><br />
<br />
<span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">
</span><span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">==</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">
</span><span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">Patrick M. Lydon<br />
Co-director, FinalStraw.org</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">
</span><span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">==</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">
</span><span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;"><strong>Resources and Further Reading</strong></span><br />
<span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">
</span><span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">Health Benefits Bloom By Digging in the Garden – USA Today</span>
<span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;"><a class="external" data-mce-="" href="http://www.usatoday.com/story/news/nation/2014/05/11/health-benefits-gardening/7971047/" target="_blank">http://www.usatoday.com/story/news/nation/2014/05/11/health-benefits-gardening/7971047/</a></span><br />
<br />
<span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">
</span><span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">Small-Scale Traditional Farming Is the Only Way to Avoid Food Crisis, UN Researcher Says – YES Magazine</span>
<span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;"><a class="external" data-mce-="" href="http://www.yesmagazine.org/planet/un-only-small-farmers-and-agroecology-can-feed-the-world" target="_blank">http://www.yesmagazine.org/planet/un-only-small-farmers-and-agroecology-can-feed-the-world</a></span><br />
<br />
<span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">
</span><span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">Dr. Vandana Shiva on Poverty and Globalization – BBC</span>
<span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;"><a class="external" data-mce-="" href="http://news.bbc.co.uk/hi/english/static/events/reith_2000/lecture5.stm" target="_blank">http://news.bbc.co.uk/hi/english/static/events/reith_2000/lecture5.stm</a></span><br />
<br />
<span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">
</span><span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">Genetically modifying and patenting seeds isn't the answer – Guardian UK</span>
<span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;"><a class="external" data-mce-="" href="http://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2012/oct/09/genetically-modifying-patenting-seeds" target="_blank">http://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2012/oct/09/genetically-modifying-patenting-seeds</a></span><br />
<br />
<span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">
</span><span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">The More Beautiful World: Chapter 29, Evil – Charles Eisenstein</span>
<span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;"><a class="external" data-mce-="" href="http://charleseisenstein.net/books/the-more-beautiful-world-our-hearts-know-is-possible/evil/" target="_blank">http://charleseisenstein.net/books/the-more-beautiful-world-our-hearts-know-is-possible/evil/</a></span><div class="blogger-post-footer">http://kjpermaculture.blogspot.com/feeds/posts/default
<p id="blogfeeds"><$BlogFeedsVertical$></p>
<p id="postfeeds"><$BlogItemFeedLinks$></p></div>Anonymoushttp://www.blogger.com/profile/03009370115428649864noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-439180943121365896.post-69255815931910480372015-05-16T14:20:00.000-05:002015-05-16T14:20:10.793-05:00Peak Oil: A Graphic Story<h1 class="item_detail">
Peak Oil: A Graphic Story</h1>
<div class="byline">
by <a href="http://www.resilience.org/author-detail/2674996-stuart-mcmillen">Stuart McMillen</a>, originally published by <a class="external" href="http://www.stuartmcmillen.com/comics_en/peak-oil/#page-1" target="_blank">Stuart MacMillen Blog</a>
<span class="article_date">
| May 15, 2015
</span>
</div>
Australian artist Stuart MacMillan has spent over 700 hours
creating this amazing cartoon of the life and work of M.King Hubbert.
Below are just 2 images of the 139 that make up the full story.<br />
<div style="text-align: center;">
<span><b><a class="external" href="http://www.stuartmcmillen.com/comics_en/peak-oil/#page-1" target="_blank">View the cartoon in full</a></b></span></div>
<table border="0" class="defaultText" style="background-color: white; border-width: 0pt; color: black; font-family: Arial; font-size: 12px; line-height: 150%; padding: 0px; width: 590px;" valign="top">
<tbody>
<tr>
<td colspan="2" valign="top"><a class="external" href="http://www.stuartmcmillen.com/comics_en/peak-oil/#page-1" target="_blank"><img align="left" alt="US oil graphic" border="0" src="http://www.resilience.org/articles/General/2015/05_May/2015-04-en-Peak-Oil-057.png" style="padding-right: 10px;" width="295" /></a></td>
<td colspan="2" valign="top"><a class="external" href="http://www.stuartmcmillen.com/comics_en/peak-oil/#page-1" target="_blank"><img align="left" alt="US oil graphic" border="0" src="http://www.resilience.org/articles/General/2015/05_May/2015-04-en-Peak-Oil-058.png" style="padding-right: 10px;" width="295" /></a></td>
</tr>
</tbody>
</table>
<div style="text-align: center;">
<span><b><a class="external" href="http://www.stuartmcmillen.com/comics_en/peak-oil/#page-1" target="_blank">View the cartoon in full</a></b></span></div>
<br />
For more about the project, or to find out how to support Stuart's work <a class="external" href="http://www.stuartmcmillen.com/blog/cartoon-blog/making-of-peak-oil-1-topic/" target="_blank">read his blog</a> and <a class="external" href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rhpVo06hPKE" target="_blank">watch the video</a>.<div class="blogger-post-footer">http://kjpermaculture.blogspot.com/feeds/posts/default
<p id="blogfeeds"><$BlogFeedsVertical$></p>
<p id="postfeeds"><$BlogItemFeedLinks$></p></div>Anonymoushttp://www.blogger.com/profile/03009370115428649864noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-439180943121365896.post-61022362824942412352015-03-27T00:06:00.002-05:002015-03-27T00:06:48.461-05:00The Plan to Mop Up the World's Largest Oil Spill With Fungus - Written by Maddie Stone <a href="http://motherboard.vice.com/read/the-plan-to-mop-up-the-worlds-largest-oil-spill-with-fungus?trk_source=recommended"><span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;"><b>The Plan to Mop Up the World's Largest Oil Spill With Fungus </b><br /><span style="font-size: x-small;">Written by Maddie Stone</span></span></a><br />
<br />
<span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;"> March 5, 2015 // 11:00 AM EST
The dinner plate-sized mushroom encircles its host tree like a bloated tumor. I'm about to snap a photo of the beast when something flickers in the corner of my eye. Faint, smoky wisps give off the impression of smoldering coals. At this very instant, the fungus is releasing billions of microscopic spores. </span><br />
<br />
<span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;"> I feel as though I'm witnessing one of nature's secret acts, something an urbanite like me was only supposed to see on National Geographic. With a lush green canopy overhead, the hum of insects and warbles of tropical birds filling my ears, the moment would be Avatar-worthy, save one jarring detail: The air reeks of petroleum. </span><br />
<br />
<span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;"> That's because I'm standing over a patch of blackened, crude-soaked ground. I’m here in the Sucumbíos province of northeast Ecuador with Donald Moncayo, a community organizer with the <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Amazon_Defense_Coalition">Amazon Defense Coalition</a>. This spot, Moncayo says, holds a special significance. It’s the first in a series of nearly a thousand toxic waste pits that litter this remote part of the Ecuadorian Amazon, festering like open sores under the fierce equatorial sun. </span><br />
<br />
<span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;"> "All the pools are in direct contact with the water and the soil," said Moncayo, who has been taking visitors on his so-called 'toxic tours' since the early 2000s. "There are no membranes, no barriers, nothing. All of this was intentional." </span><br />
<br />
<span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;"> These toxic waste pools—locals call them 'piscinas'—are the legacy of Texaco's twenty six-year stint extracting oil from Sucumbíos. (Texaco has since become a subsidiary of Chevron.) The spills have been poisoning the soil, water, vegetation and people of the region for over twenty years.
<img height="394px;" src="https://lh4.googleusercontent.com/-MW6RxqPHkHGo-_ppDEfgo2NUTFPGSqN8M4Tx2p87fTh2N24LP_uYFjoOGMJ6UL2WohTVFUmsJ9GMPqDe9R6jQ4NPVT2PZSz6DkduBxy0DsQjRYpyub_cSxMj4dFR2qovLB3etQ" style="border-style: none; transform: rotate(0rad);" width="612px;" />
Credit: Amazon Mycorenewal Project </span><br />
<br />
<span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;"> Not ten meters away, one of the most amazing mushrooms I'd ever laid eyes on—and, after years as a microbial ecologist, I’ve seen my fair share—is breathing new life into the forest. To me there’s something serendipitous about this, because I’ve traveled to Sucumbíos to meet a group of scientists and activists who hold the <a href="http://radicalmycology.com/">radical notion</a> that fungi are the key to empowering the victims of a horrific <a href="http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/earth/earthnews/3349076/Amazonian-Chernobyl-Ecuadors-oil-environment-disaster.html">environmental disaster</a> to clean up their land. </span><br />
<br />
<span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;"> "Oil companies don't teach people the solutions to their problems, because that would be an admission of their own wrongdoing.” Lexie Gropper, the program coordinator for the Sucumbíos Alliance of Bioremediation and Sustainability (ABSS), told me. “They prefer people who lack the power to make a change.” </span><br />
<br />
<span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;"> But Gropper believes that change is coming. In less than a year, the exuberant, Spanish-speaking 24-year-old from Atlanta, Georgia has rolled together enough local and international resources to lay the groundwork for an organization dedicated to improving the health of humans and the soiled Amazonian environment through fungi. A collaboration between the US-nonprofit the Amazon Mycorenewal Project, and the Instituto Superior Tecnológico Crecermas (ISTEC), Sucumbíos's only higher education institute, ABSS aspires, over the coming years, to transform a humble agricultural university into Ecuador's primary hub for mushroom cultivation, distribution, and education. </span><br />
<br />
<span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;"> The project’s aim? Nothing short of cleaning up <span id="goog_47074890"></span>the <a href="http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2011/01/24/chevron-accused-by-ecuado_n_813117.html">one of the world's largest oil disasters</a>—using giant, petroleum-gobbling fungi. </span><br />
<br />
<span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;"><img height="416px;" src="https://lh3.googleusercontent.com/MRvv0bv5OZSx-cjEmUTk_4fUA1ryL5H4EXEv9zePxYoXBy0d1tzFhqyp0XaATWwtv1SZxr55cXPSK4D6HoNdovTMTstRJXk4OyXg86a7hnSbM5JDH8cGWRkLEFAoR1iWObeELb8" style="-webkit-transform: rotate(0rad); border-style: none; transform: rotate(0rad);" width="624px;" /> </span><br />
<span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;"><a href="http://motherboard.vice.com/read/the-plan-to-mop-up-the-worlds-largest-oil-spill-with-fungus?trk_source=recommended">Read the rest here..</a>. <a href="https://www.blogger.com/null"><span id="goog_47074891"></span></a></span><div class="blogger-post-footer">http://kjpermaculture.blogspot.com/feeds/posts/default
<p id="blogfeeds"><$BlogFeedsVertical$></p>
<p id="postfeeds"><$BlogItemFeedLinks$></p></div>Anonymoushttp://www.blogger.com/profile/03009370115428649864noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-439180943121365896.post-23845298135167703952015-02-17T20:05:00.003-05:002015-02-17T20:05:30.520-05:00<h2 class="date-header">
<span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;"><span style="font-size: small;">The latest from Dmitry Orlov...</span><br /><span style="font-size: x-small;">Tuesday, February 17, 2015</span></span></h2>
<span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">
<a href="https://www.blogger.com/null" name="5865782816421017418"></a>
</span><br />
<h3 class="post-title entry-title" itemprop="name">
<span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;"><a href="http://cluborlov.blogspot.com/2015/02/extinctextincterextinctest.html#more" target="_blank">Extinct—Extincter—Extinctest</a><br />by Dmitry Orlov</span></h3>
<span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">
</span>
<span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">
</span><br />
<table cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="float: left; margin-right: 1em; text-align: left;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgImTDOPJaXhFyFkFVPodT4i1tp8aRxzxSAqkKsEwepmpiodV0mETSgLYsitQGYQfmHMwQuf-sarUbeWjiPtyFSyhBPrNcEpdtXjDyOt-S4M9WPzeOHVDXelJgOyH9fgmwXfZXW5xnqVlY/s1600/DavidHerbert_Rocker.jpg" style="clear: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgImTDOPJaXhFyFkFVPodT4i1tp8aRxzxSAqkKsEwepmpiodV0mETSgLYsitQGYQfmHMwQuf-sarUbeWjiPtyFSyhBPrNcEpdtXjDyOt-S4M9WPzeOHVDXelJgOyH9fgmwXfZXW5xnqVlY/s1600/DavidHerbert_Rocker.jpg" height="200" width="150" /></a></span></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">David Herbert</span></td></tr>
</tbody></table>
<span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">
This blog is dedicated to the idea of presenting the big picture—the
biggest possible—of what is going on in the world. The abiding areas of
interest that make up the big picture have included the following:<br />
<br />
1. The terminal decay and eventual collapse of industrial civilization
as the fossil fuels that power it become more and more expensive to
produce in the needed quantities, of lower and lower resource quality
and net energy and, eventually, in ever-shorter supply.<br />
<a href="https://www.blogger.com/null" name="more"></a><br />
The first guess by Hubbert that the all-time peak of oil production in
the US would be back in the 1970s was accurate, but later prediction of a
global peak, followed by a swift collapse, around the year 2000 was
rather off, because here we are 15 years later and global oil production
has never been higher. Oil prices, which were high for a time, have
temporarily moderated. However, zooming in on the oil picture just a
little bit, we see that conventional oil production peaked in 2005—just 5
years late—and has been declining ever since, and the shortfall has been made up by oil
that is difficult and expensive to get at (deep offshore, fracking) and
by things that aren't exactly oil (tar sands).<br />
<br />
The current low prices are not high enough to sustain this new,
expensive production for much longer, and the current glut is starting
to look like a feast to be followed by famine. The direct cause of this
famine will not be energy but debt, but it can still be traced back to
energy: a successful, growing industrial economy requires <i>cheap</i> energy; <i>expensive</i>
energy causes it to stop growing and to become mired in debt that can
never be repaid. Once the debt bubble pops, there isn't enough capital
to invest in another round of expensive energy production, and terminal
decay sets in.<br />
<br />
2. The very interesting process of the USA becoming its own nemesis: the USSR 2.0, or, as some are calling, the USSA.<br />
<br />
The USA is best characterized as a decomposing corpse of a nation lorded
over by a tiny clique of oligarchs who control the herd by wielding
Orwellian methods of mind control. So far gone is the populace that most
of them think that things are just peachy—there is an economic
recovery, don't you know—but a few of them do realize that they all have
lots of personal issues with things like violence, drug and alcohol
abuse, and gluttony. But don't call them a nation of violent,
drug-abusing gluttons, because that would be insulting. In any case, you
can't call them anything, because they aren't listening, for they are
too busy fiddling with their electronic life support units
to which they have become addicted. Thanks to Facebook and the like they
are now so far inside Plato's cave that even the shadows they see
aren't real: they are computer simulations of shadows of other computer
simulations.<br />
<br />
The signs of this advanced state of decomposition are now unmistakable
everywhere you look, be it education, medicine, culture or the general
state of American society, where now fully half the working-age men is
impaired in their ability to earn a decent living. But it is now
particularly obvious in the endless compounding of errors that is the
essence of American foreign policy. Some have started calling it “the
empire of chaos,” neglecting to mention the fact that an empire of chaos
is by definition ungovernable.<br />
<br />
A particularly compelling example o failure is the Islamic Caliphate,
which now rules large parts of Syria and Iraq. It was initially
organized with American help topple the Syrian government, but which now
threatens the stability of Saudi Arabia instead. This problem was made
much worse by alienating Russia, which, with its long Central Asian
border, is the one major nation that is interested in fighting Islamic
extremism. The best the Americans have been able to do against the
Caliphate is an expensive and ineffectual bombing campaign. Previous
ineffectual and expensive bombing campaigns, such as the one in
Cambodia, have produced unintended consequences such as the genocidal
regime of Pol Pot, but why bother learning from mistakes when you can
endlessly compound them?<br /><br />Another example is the militarized mayhem and full-blown economic
collapse that has engulfed the Ukraine in the wake of American-organized
violent overthrow of its last-ever constitutional government a year
ago. The destruction of the Ukraine was motivated by Zbigniew
Brzezinski's simplistic calculus that turning the Ukraine into an
anti-Russian NATO-occupied zone would effectively thwart Russian
imperial ambitions. A major problem with this calculus is that Russia
has no imperial ambitions: Russia has all the territory it could ever
want, but to develop it it needs peace and free trade. Another slight
problem with Zbiggy's “chessboard” is that Russia <i>does</i> have an
overriding concern with protecting the interests of Russians wherever
they may live and, for internal political reasons, will always act to
protect them, even if such actions are illegal and carry the risk of a
larger military conflict. Thus, the American destabilization of the
Ukraine has accomplished nothing positive, but did increase the odds of
nuclear self-annihilation. But if the USA manages to disappear from the
world's political map without triggering a nuclear holocaust, we will
still have a problem, which is that...<br />
<br />
3. The climate of Earth, our home planet, is, to put it as politely as
possible, completely fucked. Now, there are quite a few people who think
that radically altering the planet's atmospheric and ocean chemistry
and physics by burning just over half the fossilized hydrocarbons that
could possibly be dug up using industrial means nothing, and that what
we are observing is just natural climate variability. These people are morons. I will delete every single one of
the comments they submit in response to this post, but in spite of my
promise to do so, I assure you that they will still submit them...
because they are morons.<br />
<br />
What we are looking at is a human-triggered extinction episode that will
certainly be beyond anything in human experience, and which may rival
the great Permian-Triassic extinction event of 252 million years ago.
There is even the possibility of Earth becoming completely sterilized,
with an atmosphere as overheated and toxic as that of Venus. That these
changes are happening does not require prediction, just observation. The
only parameters that remain to be determined are these:<br />
<br />
1. How far will this process run? Will there still be a habitat where
humans can survive? Humans cannot survive without plenty of fresh water
and sources of carbohydrates, proteins and fats, all of which require
functioning ecosystems. Humans can survive on almost any kind of
diet—even tree bark and insects—but if all vegetation is dead, then so
are we. Also, we cannot survive in an environment where the wet bulb
temperature (which takes into account our ability to cool ourselves by
sweating) exceeds our body temperature: whenever that happens, we die of
heat stroke. Lastly, we need air that we can actually breathe: if the
atmosphere becomes too low in oxygen (because the vegetation has died
out) and too high in carbon dioxide and methane (because the dead
vegetation has burned off, the permafrost has melted, and the methane
currently trapped in oceanic clathrates has been released) then we all die.<br />
<br />
We already know that the increase in average global temperature has
exceeded 1C since pre-industrial times, and, based on the altered
atmospheric chemistry, is predicted to eventually exceed 2C. We also
know that industrial activity, thanks to the aerosols it puts into the
atmosphere, produces an effect known as <i>global dimming</i>. Once it's
gone, the average temperature will jump by at least another 1.1C. This
would put us within striking range of 3.5C, and no humans have ever been
alive with Earth more than 3.5C above baseline. But, you know, there is
a first time for everything. Maybe we can invent some gizmo... Maybe if
we all put on air-conditioned sombreros or something... (Design
contest, anyone?)<br />
<br />
2. How fast will this process happen? <br />
<br />
The thermal mass of the planet is such that there is a 40-year lag
between when atmospheric chemistry is changed and its effects on average
temperature are felt. So far we have been shielded from some of the
effects by two things: the melting of Arctic and Antarctic ice and
permafrost, and the ocean's ability to absorb heat. Your iced drink
remains pleasant until the last ice cube is gone, but then it becomes
tepid and distasteful rather quickly. Some scientists say that, on the
outside, it will take 5000 years for us to run out of ice cubes, causing
the party to end, but then the dynamics of the huge glaciers that
supply the ice cubes are not understood all that well, and there have
been constant surprises in terms of how quickly they can slough off
icebergs, which then drift into warmer waters and melt quickly.<br />
<br />
But the biggest surprise of the last few years has been the rate of
arctic methane release. Perhaps you haven't, but I've found it
impossible to ignore all the scientists who have been ringing alarm
bells on Arctic methane release. What they are calling the <i>clathrate gun</i>—which
can release some 50 gigatons of methane in as little as a couple of
decades—appears to have been fired in 2007 and now, just a few years
later, the trend line in Arctic methane concentrations has become
alarming. But we will need to wait for at least another two years to get
an authoritative answer. Overall, the methane held in the clathrates is
enough to exceed the global warming potential of all fossil fuels
burned to date by a factor of between 4 and 40. The upper end of that
range does seem to put us quite far towards a Venus-type atmosphere, and
the surviving species may be limited to exotic thermophilic bacteria,
if that, and certainly will not include any of the species we like to
eat, nor any of us.<br />
<br />
Looking at such numbers has caused quite a few researchers to propose
the possibility of near-term human extinction. Estimates vary, but, in
general, if the clathrate gun has indeed gone off, then most of us
shouldn't be planning to be around beyond mid-century. But the funny
thing is (humor is never in poor taste, no matter how dire the
situation) that most of us shouldn't be planning on sticking around
beyond mid-century in any case. The current oversized human population
is a product of fossil fuel-burning, and once that's over, human
population will crash. This is called a die-off, and it's something that happens all the time: a population (say, of yeast in a
vat of sugary liquid) consumes its food, and then dies off. A few hardy
individuals linger on, and if you throw in a lump of sugar, they spring
to life, start reproducing and the process takes off again.<br /><br /><a href="http://cluborlov.blogspot.com/2015/02/extinctextincterextinctest.html#more" target="_blank">Read the rest here...</a><br />
</span><div class="blogger-post-footer">http://kjpermaculture.blogspot.com/feeds/posts/default
<p id="blogfeeds"><$BlogFeedsVertical$></p>
<p id="postfeeds"><$BlogItemFeedLinks$></p></div>Anonymoushttp://www.blogger.com/profile/03009370115428649864noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-439180943121365896.post-74486200736304822892015-01-08T23:55:00.001-05:002015-01-08T23:55:29.202-05:00Authoritarianism, Class Warfare and the Advance of Neoliberal Austerity Policies <h3 class="post-title entry-title" itemprop="name">
</h3>
<div class="post-header">
</div>
<div class="itemTitle">
<span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">Some might
question what this has to do with permaculture, however it
well-describes conditions amidst which we are living and that will
affect ALL our designs and plans. I doubt the author's "solution" will
be sufficient but this article CLEARLY identifies the increasingly
obvious social patterns we see unfolding all around us. A real lesson in
"invisible" structures and pattern recognition. </span></div>
<div class="itemTitle">
<span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;"><br /></span></div>
<span class="wf_caption" style="display: inherit; max-width: 638px;"><img alt="Riot police shadow a protest march against recent austerity measures in Montreal, November 29, 2014." height="253" src="http://www.truth-out.org/images/Images_2015_01/2015_0105gir_.jpg" style="margin: auto;" width="400" /><span style="display: block; margin-top: 3px; max-width: 640px; text-align: left;">Riot police shadow a protest march against recent austerity measures in Montreal, November 29, 2014. (Photo: <a href="https://www.flickr.com/photos/bikeman04/15761245358" target="_blank">Gerry Lauzon</a>)</span></span><br />
<h2 class="itemTitle">
<span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">Henry A. Giroux | Authoritarianism, Class Warfare and the Advance of Neoliberal Austerity Policies
</span></h2>
<span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">
<span class="itemDateCreated">
Monday, 05 January 2015 10:54 </span>
<span class="itemAuthor">
By <a href="http://www.truth-out.org/author/itemlist/user/47063">Henry A. Giroux</a>, Truthout | News Analysis
</span></span><br />
<span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">Right-wing calls for austerity suggest more than a market-driven
desire to punish the poor, working class and middle class by
distributing wealth upwards to the 1%. They also point to a politics of
disposability in which the social provisions, public spheres and
institutions that nourish democratic values and social relations are
being dismantled, including public and higher education. Neoliberal
austerity policies embody an ideology that produces both zones of
abandonment and forms of social and civil death while also infusing
society with a culture of increasing hardship. It also makes clear that
the weapons of class warfare do not reside only in oppressive modes of
state terrorism such as the militarization of the police, but also in
policies that inflict misery, immiseration and suffering on the vast
majority of the population.</span><br />
<br />
<span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">
</span><span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">Capitalism has learned to create host organisms and in the current
historical conjuncture one of those organisms is young people, who are
forced to live under the burden of crushing debt. Moreover in the midst of a widening inequality in wealth, income and
power, workers, single mothers, youth, immigrants and poor people of
color are being plunged into either low-paying jobs or a future without
decent employment.
For the sick and elderly, it means choosing between food and medicine.
Austerity now drives an exchange relationship in which the only value
that matters is exchange value and for students that means paying
increased tuition that generates profits for credit companies while
allowing the state to lower taxes on the rich and mega corporations. </span><br /><span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">Under this regime of widening inequality that imposes enormous
constraints on the choices that people can make, austerity measures
function as a set of hyper-punitive policies and practices that produce
massive amounts of suffering, rob people of their dignity and then
humiliate them by suggesting that they bear sole responsibility for
their plight. This is more than the scandal of a perverted form of
neoliberal rationality; it is the precondition for an emerging
authoritarian state with its proliferating extremist ideologies and its
growing militarization and criminalization of all aspects of everyday
life and social behavior.
Richard D. Wolff has argued that "Austerity is yet another extreme
burden imposed on the global economy by the capitalist crisis (in
addition to the millions suffering unemployment, reduced global trade,
etc.)." He is certainly right, but it is more than a burden imposed on the 99%;
it is the latest stage of market warfare, class consolidation and a
ruthless grab for power waged on the part of the neoliberal, global,
financial elite who are both heartless and indifferent to the mad
violence and unchecked misery they impose on much of humanity.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;"><br />Read the rest at (no, really, read the whole thing) <a href="http://www.truth-out.org/news/item/28338-the-shadow-of-fascism-and-the-poison-of-neoliberal-austerity-policies">http://www.truth-out.org/news/item/28338-the-shadow-of-fascism-and-the-poison-of-neoliberal-austerity-policies</a></span><div class="blogger-post-footer">http://kjpermaculture.blogspot.com/feeds/posts/default
<p id="blogfeeds"><$BlogFeedsVertical$></p>
<p id="postfeeds"><$BlogItemFeedLinks$></p></div>Anonymoushttp://www.blogger.com/profile/03009370115428649864noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-439180943121365896.post-12391518208617936282013-03-26T20:49:00.001-05:002013-05-11T21:53:14.203-05:00Toward Resilient Architectures I: Biology Lessons<br />
<h1 class="item_detail" style="border: 0px; color: #231f20; font-family: 'Amasis MT W01 Medium', serif; font-size: 48px; font-weight: inherit; line-height: 50px; margin: 0px; padding: 0px 0px 0.5em; vertical-align: baseline; width: 560px;">
Toward Resilient Architectures I: Biology Lessons</h1>
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Part 2. <a href="http://www.metropolismag.com/Point-of-View/April-2013/Toward-Resilient-Architectures-2-Why-Green-Often-Isnt/">Toward Resilient Architectures 2: Why Green Often Isn't</a><br /> Part 3. <a href="http://www.metropolismag.com/Point-of-View/April-2013/Toward-Resilient-Architectures-3-How-Modernism-Got-Square/">Toward Resilient Architectures 3: How Modernism Got Square</a> </span><br /><div class="clear" style="border: 0px; clear: both; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;">
</div>
<div class="byline" style="border: 0px; margin: 0px 0px 12px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;">
<br />
<div style="color: #231f20; font-family: 'DIN Next W01 Regular', 'Helvetica Neue', Helvetica, Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 15.454545021057129px; line-height: 16.988636016845703px;">
by <a href="http://www.resilience.org/author-detail/1153282-nikos-a-salingaros" style="border: 0px; color: #6d8d3b; font-family: inherit; font-style: inherit; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;">Nikos A. Salingaros</a>, <a href="http://www.resilience.org/author-detail/1153102-michael-mehaffy" style="border: 0px; color: #6d8d3b; font-family: inherit; font-style: inherit; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;">Michael Mehaffy</a>, originally published by<a class="external" href="http://www.metropolismag.com/March-2013/Material-Savvy/" style="border: 0px; color: #6d8d3b; font-family: inherit; font-style: inherit; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;" target="_blank">metropolismag.com</a> <span class="article_date" style="border: 0px; color: #b7a131; font-family: inherit; font-size: 12px; font-style: inherit; line-height: 15px; margin: 0px 0px 2px; padding: 0px; text-transform: uppercase; vertical-align: baseline;"> | MAR 25, 2013</span></div>
</div>
<div class="clear" style="border: 0px; clear: both; color: #56575b; font-family: 'DIN Next W01 Regular', 'Helvetica Neue', Helvetica, Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 15.454545021057129px; line-height: 16.988636016845703px; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;">
</div>
<div class="article_body_detail dinNormal" style="border: 0px; color: #333333; font-family: 'DIN Next W01 Regular', serif; font-size: 15.454545021057129px; line-height: 21px; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;">
<div style="border: 0px; font-size: 15px; line-height: 21px; padding: 0px 0px 0.7em; vertical-align: baseline;">
The word “resilience” is bandied about these days among environmental designers. In some quarters, it’s threatening to displace another popular word, “sustainability.” This is partly a reflection of newsworthy events like Hurricane Sandy, adding to a growing list of other disruptive events like tsunamis, droughts, and heat waves.</div>
<div style="border: 0px; font-size: 15px; line-height: 21px; padding: 0px 0px 0.7em; vertical-align: baseline;">
We know that we can’t design for all such unpredictable events, but we could make sure our buildings and cities are better able to weather these disruptions and bounce back afterwards. At a larger scale, we need to be able to weather the shocks of climate change, resource destruction and depletion, and a host of other growing challenges to human wellbeing.</div>
<div style="border: 0px; font-size: 15px; line-height: 21px; padding: 0px 0px 0.7em; vertical-align: baseline;">
We need more resilient design, not as a fashionable buzzword, but out of necessity for our long-term survival.</div>
<div align="center" style="border: 0px; font-size: 15px; line-height: 21px; padding: 0px 0px 0.7em; text-align: center; vertical-align: baseline;">
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<a href="http://www.metropolismag.com/images/cache/b207bc160823ee9b747697c1c3d5e8cb.jpeg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="320" src="http://www.metropolismag.com/images/cache/b207bc160823ee9b747697c1c3d5e8cb.jpeg" width="640" /></a></div>
</div>
<div style="border: 0px; font-size: 15px; line-height: 21px; padding: 0px 0px 0.7em; text-align: center; vertical-align: baseline;">
<em>An illustration of a resilient architecture: fossils of a marine ecosystem from the Permian period, about 250 to 300 million years ago. These ecosystems were resilient enough to endure dramatic changes over millions of years. Image by Professor Mark A. Wilson/Wikimedia</em></div>
<div style="border: 0px; font-size: 15px; line-height: 21px; padding: 0px 0px 0.7em; vertical-align: baseline;">
Aside from a nice idea, what is resilience really, structurally speaking? What lessons can we as designers apply towards achieving it? In particular, what can we learn from the evident resilience of natural systems? Quite a lot, it turns out.</div>
<div style="border: 0px; font-size: 15px; line-height: 21px; padding: 0px 0px 0.7em; vertical-align: baseline;">
<strong style="font-family: 'DIN Next W01 Medium'; font-size: 17px; font-weight: normal; line-height: 22px;">Resilient and non-resilient systems</strong></div>
<div style="border: 0px; font-size: 15px; line-height: 21px; padding: 0px 0px 0.7em; vertical-align: baseline;">
Let’s start by recognizing that we have incredibly complex and sophisticated technologies today, from power plants, to building systems, to jet aircraft. These technologies are, generally speaking, marvelously stable within their design parameters. This is the kind of stability that C. H. Holling, the pioneer of resilience theory in ecology, called “engineered resilience.” But they are often <strong style="font-family: 'DIN Next W01 Medium'; font-size: 17px; font-weight: normal; line-height: 22px;"><em>not </em></strong>resilient outside of their designed operating systems. Trouble comes with the unintended consequences that occur as “externalities,” often with disastrous results.</div>
<div align="center" style="border: 0px; font-size: 15px; line-height: 21px; padding: 0px 0px 0.7em; text-align: center; vertical-align: baseline;">
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<a href="http://www.metropolismag.com/Point-of-View/March-2013/Toward-Resilient-Architectures-1-Biology-Lessons/Resilient-figure2-small-535x270.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="322" src="http://www.metropolismag.com/Point-of-View/March-2013/Toward-Resilient-Architectures-1-Biology-Lessons/Resilient-figure2-small-535x270.jpg" width="640" /></a></div>
<br /></div>
<div style="border: 0px; font-size: 15px; line-height: 21px; padding: 0px 0px 0.7em; text-align: center; vertical-align: baseline;">
<em>On the left, an over-concentration of large-sale components; on the right, a more resilient distributed network of nodes. Drawing by Nikos Salingaros.</em></div>
<div style="border: 0px; font-size: 15px; line-height: 21px; padding: 0px 0px 0.7em; vertical-align: baseline;">
A good example is the Fukushima nuclear reactor group in Japan. For years it functioned smoothly, producing reliable power for its region, and was a shining example of “engineered resilience.” But it did not have what Holling called “ecological resilience,” that is, the resilience to the often-chaotic disruptions that ecological systems have to endure. One of those chaotic disruptions was the earthquake and tsunami that engulfed the plant in 2010, causing a catastrophic meltdown. The Fukushima reactors are based on an antiquated U.S. design from the 1960s, dependent upon an electrical emergency cooling system. When the electricity failed, including the backup generators, the emergency control system became inoperative and the reactor cores melted. It was also a mistake (in retrospect) to centralize power production by placing six large nuclear reactors next to each other.</div>
<div style="border: 0px; font-size: 15px; line-height: 21px; padding: 0px 0px 0.7em; vertical-align: baseline;">
The trouble with chaotic disruptions is that they are inherently unpredictable. Actually we can predict (though poorly) the likelihood of an earthquake and tsunami relatively better compared to other natural phenomena. Think of how difficult it would be to predict the time and location of an asteroid collision, or more difficult yet, to prepare for the consequences. Physicists refer to this kind of chaos as a “far from equilibrium condition.” This is a problem that designers are beginning to take much more seriously, as we deal with more freakish events like Hurricane Sandy — actually a chaotic combination of three separate weather systems that devastated the Caribbean and the eastern coast of the U.S., in 2012.</div>
<div style="border: 0px; font-size: 15px; line-height: 21px; padding: 0px 0px 0.7em; text-align: center; vertical-align: baseline;">
</div>
<div style="border: 0px; font-size: 15px; line-height: 21px; padding: 0px 0px 0.7em; text-align: center; vertical-align: baseline;">
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<a href="http://www.metropolismag.com/Point-of-View/March-2013/Toward-Resilient-Architectures-1-Biology-Lessons/Resilient-figure3-Sandy-535x239.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="283" src="http://www.metropolismag.com/Point-of-View/March-2013/Toward-Resilient-Architectures-1-Biology-Lessons/Resilient-figure3-Sandy-535x239.jpg" width="640" /></a></div>
<em>Hurricane Sandy on 28 October 2012. NASA image courtesy LANCE MODIS Rapid Response Team at NASA GSFC</em></div>
<div style="border: 0px; font-size: 15px; line-height: 21px; padding: 0px 0px 0.7em; vertical-align: baseline;">
As if these unforeseen dangers were not enough, we humans are contributing to the instability. An added complication is that we ourselves are now responsible for much of the chaos, in the form of our increasingly complex technology and its unpredictable interactions and disruptions. Climate change is one consequence of such disruptions, along with the complex and unstable infrastructures we have placed in vulnerable coastal locations. (In fact, Japan’s technological infrastructure has been heavily damaged over a much wider area by the chaotic “domino” effects of the Fukushima disaster.) Our technological intrusion into the biosphere has pushed natural systems into conditions that are far from equilibrium — and as a result, catastrophic disruptions are closer than ever.</div>
<div style="border: 0px; font-size: 15px; line-height: 21px; padding: 0px 0px 0.7em; vertical-align: baseline;">
<strong style="font-family: 'DIN Next W01 Medium'; font-size: 17px; font-weight: normal; line-height: 22px;">Biology lessons</strong></div>
<div style="border: 0px; font-size: 15px; line-height: 21px; padding: 0px 0px 0.7em; vertical-align: baseline;">
So what can we learn from biological systems? They are incredibly complex. Take, for instance, the rich complexity of a rainforest. It too generates complicated interactions among many billions of components. Yet many rainforests manage to remain stable over many thousands of years, in spite of countless disruptions and “shocks to the system.” Can we understand and apply the lessons of their structural characteristics?</div>
<div style="border: 0px; font-size: 15px; line-height: 21px; padding: 0px 0px 0.7em; vertical-align: baseline;">
It seems we can. Here are four such lessons extracted from distributed (non-centralized) biological systems that we will discuss in more detail:</div>
<div style="border: 0px; font-size: 15px; line-height: 21px; padding: 0px 0px 0.7em; vertical-align: baseline;">
1) <strong style="font-family: 'DIN Next W01 Medium'; font-size: 17px; font-weight: normal; line-height: 22px;"><em>These systems have an inter-connected network structure</em></strong>.</div>
<div style="border: 0px; font-size: 15px; line-height: 21px; padding: 0px 0px 0.7em; vertical-align: baseline;">
2) <strong style="font-family: 'DIN Next W01 Medium'; font-size: 17px; font-weight: normal; line-height: 22px;"><em>They feature diversity and redundancy</em></strong> (a totally distinct notion of “efficiency”).</div>
<div style="border: 0px; font-size: 15px; line-height: 21px; padding: 0px 0px 0.7em; vertical-align: baseline;">
3) <strong style="font-family: 'DIN Next W01 Medium'; font-size: 17px; font-weight: normal; line-height: 22px;"><em>They display a wide distribution of structures across scales,</em></strong> including fine-grained scales.</div>
<div style="border: 0px; font-size: 15px; line-height: 21px; padding: 0px 0px 0.7em; vertical-align: baseline;">
4) <strong style="font-family: 'DIN Next W01 Medium'; font-size: 17px; font-weight: normal; line-height: 22px;"><em>They have the capacity to self-adapt and “self-organize.” </em></strong>This generally (though not always) is achieved through the use of genetic information.</div>
<div align="center" style="border: 0px; font-size: 15px; line-height: 21px; padding: 0px 0px 0.7em; text-align: center; vertical-align: baseline;">
</div>
<div style="border: 0px; font-size: 15px; line-height: 21px; padding: 0px 0px 0.7em; text-align: center; vertical-align: baseline;">
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<a href="http://www.metropolismag.com/Point-of-View/March-2013/Toward-Resilient-Architectures-1-Biology-Lessons/Resilient-figure4-Internet-535x271.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="324" src="http://www.metropolismag.com/Point-of-View/March-2013/Toward-Resilient-Architectures-1-Biology-Lessons/Resilient-figure4-Internet-535x271.jpg" width="640" /></a></div>
<em>Map of the Internet: a paradigmatic resilient network in part because it is scale-free and redundant. Image by The Opte Project/Wikimedia</em></div>
<div style="border: 0px; font-size: 15px; line-height: 21px; padding: 0px 0px 0.7em; vertical-align: baseline;">
The Internet is a familiar human example of an inter-connected network structure. It was invented by the U.S. military as a way of providing resilient data communications in the event of attack. Biological systems also have inter-connected network structures, as we can see for example in the body’s separate blood and hormone circulation systems, or the brain’s connected pattern of neurons. Tissue damaged up to a point is usually able to regenerate, and damaged brains are often able to re-learn lost knowledge and skills by building up new alternative neural pathways. The inter-connected, overlapping, and adaptable patterns of relationships of ecosystems and metabolisms seem to be key to their functioning.</div>
<div style="border: 0px; font-size: 15px; line-height: 21px; padding: 0px 0px 0.7em; vertical-align: baseline;">
Focusing upon redundancy, diversity, and plasticity, biological examples contradict the extremely limited notion of “efficiency” used in mechanistic thinking. Our bodies have two kidneys, two lungs, and two hemispheres of the brain, one of which can still function when the other is damaged or destroyed. An ecosystem typically has many diverse species, any one of which can be lost without destroying the entire ecosystem. By contrast, an agricultural monoculture is highly vulnerable to just a single pest or other threat. Monocultures are terribly fragile. They are efficient only as long as conditions are perfect, but liable to catastrophic failure in the long term. (That may be a pretty good description of our current general state!)</div>
<div style="border: 0px; font-size: 15px; line-height: 21px; padding: 0px 0px 0.7em; vertical-align: baseline;">
Why is the distribution of structures across scales so important? For one thing, it’s a form of diversity. By contrast, a concentration at just a few scales (especially large scales) is more vulnerable to shocks. For another thing, the smaller scales that make up and support the larger scales facilitate regeneration and adaptation. When the small cells of a larger organ are damaged, it’s easy for that damaged tissue to grow back — rather like repairing the small bricks of a damaged wall.</div>
<div align="center" style="border: 0px; font-size: 15px; line-height: 21px; padding: 0px 0px 0.7em; text-align: center; vertical-align: baseline;">
</div>
<div style="border: 0px; font-size: 15px; line-height: 21px; padding: 0px 0px 0.7em; text-align: center; vertical-align: baseline;">
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<a href="http://www.metropolismag.com/Point-of-View/March-2013/Toward-Resilient-Architectures-1-Biology-Lessons/Resilient-figure5-small-535x385.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="460" src="http://www.metropolismag.com/Point-of-View/March-2013/Toward-Resilient-Architectures-1-Biology-Lessons/Resilient-figure5-small-535x385.jpg" width="640" /></a></div>
<em>Distribution of inter-connected elements across several scales, drawing by Nikos Salingaros</em></div>
<div style="border: 0px; font-size: 15px; line-height: 21px; padding: 0px 0px 0.7em; vertical-align: baseline;">
Self-organization and self-adaptation are also central attributes of living systems, and of their evolution. Indeed, this astonishing self-structuring capacity is one of the most important of biological processes. How does it work? We know that it requires networks, diversity, and distribution of structures across scales. But it also requires the ability to retain and build upon existing patterns, so that those gradually build up into more complex patterns.</div>
<div style="border: 0px; font-size: 15px; line-height: 21px; padding: 0px 0px 0.7em; vertical-align: baseline;">
Often this is done through the use of genetic memory. Structures that code earlier patterns are re-used and re-incorporated later. The most familiar example of this is, of course, DNA. The evolutionary transformation of organisms using DNA gradually built up a world that transitioned from viruses and bacteria, to vastly more complex organisms.</div>
<div style="border: 0px; font-size: 15px; line-height: 21px; padding: 0px 0px 0.7em; vertical-align: baseline;">
<strong style="font-family: 'DIN Next W01 Medium'; font-size: 17px; font-weight: normal; line-height: 22px;">Applying the lessons to resilient human designs</strong></div>
<div style="border: 0px; font-size: 15px; line-height: 21px; padding: 0px 0px 0.7em; vertical-align: baseline;">
How can we apply these structural lessons to create resilient cities, and to improve smaller vulnerable parts of cities by making them resilient? Developing the ideas from our previous list, resilient cities have the following characteristics:</div>
<div style="border: 0px; font-size: 15px; line-height: 21px; padding: 0px 0px 0.7em; vertical-align: baseline;">
1) <strong style="font-family: 'DIN Next W01 Medium'; font-size: 17px; font-weight: normal; line-height: 22px;"><em>They have inter-connected networks of pathways and relationships.</em></strong>They are not segregated into neat categories of use, type, or pathway, which would make them vulnerable to failure.</div>
<div style="border: 0px; font-size: 15px; line-height: 21px; padding: 0px 0px 0.7em; vertical-align: baseline;">
2) <strong style="font-family: 'DIN Next W01 Medium'; font-size: 17px; font-weight: normal; line-height: 22px;"><em>They have diversity and redundancy of activities, types, objectives, and populations.</em></strong> There are many different kinds of people doing many different kinds of things, any one of which might provide the key to surviving a shock to the system (precisely which can never be known in advance).</div>
<div style="border: 0px; font-size: 15px; line-height: 21px; padding: 0px 0px 0.7em; vertical-align: baseline;">
3) <strong style="font-family: 'DIN Next W01 Medium'; font-size: 17px; font-weight: normal; line-height: 22px;"><em>They have a wide distribution of scales of structure,</em></strong> from the largest regional planning patterns to the most fine-grained details. Combining with (1) and (2) above, these structures are diverse, inter-connected, and can be changed relatively easily and locally (in response to changing needs). They are like the small bricks of a building, easily repaired when damaged. (The opposite would be large expensive pre-formed panels that have to be replaced in whole.)</div>
<div style="border: 0px; font-size: 15px; line-height: 21px; padding: 0px 0px 0.7em; vertical-align: baseline;">
4) Following from (3),<strong style="font-family: 'DIN Next W01 Medium'; font-size: 17px; font-weight: normal; line-height: 22px;"><em> they (and their parts) can adapt and organize in response to changing needs on different spatial and temporal scales, and in response to each other.</em></strong> That is, they can “self-organize.” This process can accelerate through the evolutionary exchange and transformation of traditional knowledge and concepts about what works to meet the needs of humans, and the natural environments on which they depend.</div>
<div style="border: 0px; font-size: 15px; line-height: 21px; padding: 0px 0px 0.7em; vertical-align: baseline;">
Resilient cities evolve in a very specific manner. They retain and build upon older patterns or information, at the same time that they respond to change by adding novel adaptations. They almost never create total novelty, and almost always create only very selective novelty as needed. Any change is tested via selection, just as changes in an evolving organism are selected by how well the organism performs in its environment. This mostly rules out drastic, discontinuous changes. Resilient cities are thus “structure-preserving” even as they make deep structural transformations.</div>
<div style="border: 0px; font-size: 15px; line-height: 21px; padding: 0px 0px 0.7em; vertical-align: baseline;">
How do these elements contribute to resilient cities in practice, in an age of resource depletion and climate change? It’s easy to see that a city with networked streets and sidewalks is going to be more walkable and less car-dependent than a city with a rigid top-down hierarchy of street types, funneling all traffic into a limited number of “collectors” and “arterials.” Similarly, a city designed to work with a mix of uses is going to be more diverse and be able to better adapt to change than a city with rigidly separated monocultures.</div>
<div align="center" style="border: 0px; font-size: 15px; line-height: 21px; padding: 0px 0px 0.7em; text-align: center; vertical-align: baseline;">
</div>
<div style="border: 0px; font-size: 15px; line-height: 21px; padding: 0px 0px 0.7em; text-align: center; vertical-align: baseline;">
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<a href="http://www.metropolismag.com/Point-of-View/March-2013/Toward-Resilient-Architectures-1-Biology-Lessons/Resilient-figure6-small-535x247.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="294" src="http://www.metropolismag.com/Point-of-View/March-2013/Toward-Resilient-Architectures-1-Biology-Lessons/Resilient-figure6-small-535x247.jpg" width="640" /></a></div>
<em>A complex resilient system coordinates its multi-scale response to a disturbance on any single scale. Drawing by Nikos Salingaros</em></div>
<div style="border: 0px; font-size: 15px; line-height: 21px; padding: 0px 0px 0.7em; vertical-align: baseline;">
A city with a rich and balanced diversity of scales, especially including and encouraging the most fine-grained scales, is going to be more easily repairable and adaptable to new uses. It can withstand disruptions better because its responses can occur on any and all different levels of scale. The city uses the disruption to define a “pivot” on a particular scale, around which to structure a complex multi-scale response. And it’s more likely to be able to self-organize around new economic activities and new resources, if and when the old resources come to be in short supply.</div>
<div style="border: 0px; font-size: 15px; line-height: 21px; padding: 0px 0px 0.7em; vertical-align: baseline;">
<strong style="font-family: 'DIN Next W01 Medium'; font-size: 17px; font-weight: normal; line-height: 22px;">The evolution of non-resilient cities</strong></div>
<div style="border: 0px; font-size: 15px; line-height: 21px; padding: 0px 0px 0.7em; vertical-align: baseline;">
So where are we today? Many of our cities were (and still are) shaped by a model of city planning that evolved in an era of cheap fossil-fuel energy and a zeal for the mechanistic segregation of parts. The result is that in many respects we have a rigid non-resilient kind of city; one that, at best, has some “engineered resilience” towards a single objective, but certainly no “ecological resilience.” Response is both limited and expensive. Consider how the pervasive model of 20<sup>th</sup> century city planning was defined by these non-resilient criteria:</div>
<div style="border: 0px; font-size: 15px; line-height: 21px; padding: 0px 0px 0.7em; vertical-align: baseline;">
1) <strong style="font-family: 'DIN Next W01 Medium'; font-size: 17px; font-weight: normal; line-height: 22px;"><em>Cities are “rational” tree-like (top-down “dendritic”) structures, </em></strong>not only in roads and pathways, but also in the distribution of functions.</div>
<div style="border: 0px; font-size: 15px; line-height: 21px; padding: 0px 0px 0.7em; vertical-align: baseline;">
2) <strong style="font-family: 'DIN Next W01 Medium'; font-size: 17px; font-weight: normal; line-height: 22px;"><em>“Efficiency” demands the elimination of redundancy.</em></strong> Diversity is conceptually messy. Modernism wants visually clean and orderly divisions and unified groupings, which privilege the largest scale.</div>
<div style="border: 0px; font-size: 15px; line-height: 21px; padding: 0px 0px 0.7em; vertical-align: baseline;">
3) <strong style="font-family: 'DIN Next W01 Medium'; font-size: 17px; font-weight: normal; line-height: 22px;"><em>The machine age dictates our structural and tectonic limitations.</em></strong>According to the most influential theorists of the modernist city, mechanization takes command (Giedion); ornament is a crime (Loos); and the most important buildings are large-scale sculptural expressions of fine art (Le Corbusier, Gropius, <em>et al.</em>).</div>
<div style="border: 0px; font-size: 15px; line-height: 21px; padding: 0px 0px 0.7em; vertical-align: baseline;">
4) <strong style="font-family: 'DIN Next W01 Medium'; font-size: 17px; font-weight: normal; line-height: 22px;"><em>Any use of “genetic material” from the past is a violation of the machine-age zeitgeist,</em></strong> and therefore can only be an expression of reactionary politics; it cannot be tolerated. Novelty and neophilia are to be elevated and privileged above all design considerations. Structural “evolution” can only be allowed to occur within the abstracted discourse of visual culture, as it evaluates and judges human need by its own (specialized, ideological, aestheticizing) standards.</div>
<div style="border: 0px; font-size: 15px; line-height: 21px; padding: 0px 0px 0.7em; vertical-align: baseline;">
From the perspective of resilience theory, this can be seen as an effective formula for generating non-resilient cities. It is not an accident that the pioneers of such cities were, in fact, evangelists for a high-resource dependent form of industrialization, at a time when the understanding of such matters was far more primitive than now.</div>
<div style="border: 0px; font-size: 15px; line-height: 21px; padding: 0px 0px 0.7em; vertical-align: baseline;">
Here, for example, is the architect Le Corbusier, one of the most influential thinkers in all of modern planning, writing in 1935, and providing a blueprint for modern sprawl:</div>
<div style="border: 0px; font-size: 15px; line-height: 21px; padding: 0px 0px 0.7em; vertical-align: baseline;">
“<em>The cities will be part of the country; I shall live 30 miles from my office in one direction, under a pine tree; my secretary will live 30 miles away from it too, in the other direction, under another pine tree. We shall both have our own car. We shall use up tires, wear out road surfaces and gears, consume oil and gasoline. All of which will necessitate a great deal of work … enough for all.</em>”</div>
<div style="border: 0px; font-size: 15px; line-height: 21px; padding: 0px 0px 0.7em; vertical-align: baseline;">
Sadly, there is no longer enough for all! This relatively brief age of abundant fossil fuels — and the non-resilient urban architecture that it has spawned all over the globe — is rapidly drawing to a close. We must be prepared for what has to come next. From the perspective of resilience theory, the solutions are not going to be simple techno-fixes, as so many naively believe. What is required is a deeper analysis and restructuring of the system structure: admittedly not an easy thing to achieve since it doesn’t make money short-term.</div>
<div style="border: 0px; font-size: 15px; line-height: 21px; padding: 0px 0px 0.7em; vertical-align: baseline;">
<strong style="font-family: 'DIN Next W01 Medium'; font-size: 17px; font-weight: normal; line-height: 22px;">Postscript: a lesson from our own evolution</strong></div>
<div style="border: 0px; font-size: 15px; line-height: 21px; padding: 0px 0px 0.7em; vertical-align: baseline;">
People tend to be carried along by the present, and put both past and future out of their mind. Even in our information-glutted age, the past is remote and abstract—just another set of images like any movie. And so we ignore where we have come from, and the path that brought us here to our marvelous technological culture. We are ill prepared to see where we must go next. For our techno-consumerist culture, tomorrow will bring no surprises.</div>
<div style="border: 0px; font-size: 15px; line-height: 21px; padding: 0px 0px 0.7em; vertical-align: baseline;">
But new research in anthropology, anthropogeny, and genetics suggests that we humans are, quite literally, creatures of climate change. Thanks to ingenious detective work, we now know that 195,000 years ago, our species very nearly became extinct — down to hardly more than 1,000 survivors clinging to the southern African coast, as a mega-drought swept that continent. Our evident response was to diversify, and to develop many new sources of food as well as new technologies for acquiring them: fishhooks, barbs, baskets, urns, and other innovations. More complex language probably followed, allowing us to coordinate more sophisticated strategies for hunting and gathering.</div>
<div style="border: 0px; font-size: 15px; line-height: 21px; padding: 0px 0px 0.7em; vertical-align: baseline;">
10,000 years ago, it now appears, we adapted once again to a mini-ice age, prompting us to innovate with new agricultural technologies, and new forms of settlement around them. These innovations arose more or less simultaneously in many parts of the then-disconnected world, suggesting that the trigger was very likely the climate.</div>
<div style="border: 0px; font-size: 15px; line-height: 21px; padding: 0px 0px 0.7em; vertical-align: baseline;">
Now we are facing the third great adaptation of our history to climate change. But this time it is we, ourselves, who have triggered it with our own technologies. If we are going to adapt successfully, we will need to understand the opportunities to innovate yet again, in the way we design and operate our technology. Our comfortable lifestyle (in the wealthy West, and among those socioeconomic classes that can afford to copy us) is significantly less resilient than most people would care to admit, or even dare think about. If we are going to continue our so-far remarkably successful run as a technological civilization, we had better take the lessons of resilience theory to heart.</div>
<div style="border: 0px; font-size: 15px; line-height: 21px; padding: 0px 0px 0.7em; vertical-align: baseline;">
<em>AUTHORS’ NOTE: With this post we begin a new five-part series on the concept of resilience, and how designers can apply its insights.</em></div>
<div style="border: 0px; font-size: 15px; line-height: 21px; padding: 0px 0px 0.7em; vertical-align: baseline;">
<strong style="font-family: 'DIN Next W01 Medium'; font-size: 17px; font-weight: normal; line-height: 22px;">Michael Mehaffy</strong><em> is an urbanist and critical thinker in complexity and the built environment. He is a practicing planner and builder, and is known for his many projects as well as his writings. He has been a close associate of the architect and software pioneer <a class="external" href="http://www.aboutus.org/Christopher_Alexander" style="border: 0px; color: #6d8d3b; font-family: inherit; font-style: inherit; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;" target="_blank">Christopher Alexander</a>. Currently he is a Sir David Anderson Fellow at the University of Strathclyde in Glasgow, a Visiting Faculty Associate at Arizona State University; a Research Associate with the Center for Environmental Structure, Chris Alexander’s research center founded in 1967; and a strategic consultant on international projects, currently in Europe, North America and South America.</em></div>
<div style="border: 0px; font-size: 15px; line-height: 21px; padding: 0px 0px 0.7em; vertical-align: baseline;">
<strong style="font-family: 'DIN Next W01 Medium'; font-size: 17px; font-weight: normal; line-height: 22px;"><em>Nikos A. Salingaros</em></strong><em> is a <a class="external" href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mathematician" style="border: 0px; color: #6d8d3b; font-family: inherit; font-style: inherit; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;" target="_blank">mathematician</a> and <a class="external" href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Polymath" style="border: 0px; color: #6d8d3b; font-family: inherit; font-style: inherit; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;" target="_blank">polymath</a> known for his work on<a class="external" href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Urban_theory" style="border: 0px; color: #6d8d3b; font-family: inherit; font-style: inherit; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;" target="_blank">urban theory</a>, architectural theory, complexity theory, and design philosophy. He has been a close collaborator of the architect and computer software pioneer Christopher Alexander. Salingaros published substantive research on Algebras, Mathematical Physics, Electromagnetic Fields, and Thermonuclear Fusion before turning his attention to Architecture and Urbanism. He still is Professor of Mathematics at the <a class="external" href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/University_of_Texas_at_San_Antonio" style="border: 0px; color: #6d8d3b; font-family: inherit; font-style: inherit; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;" target="_blank">University of Texas at San Antonio</a>and is also on the Architecture faculties of universities in <a class="external" href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Italy" style="border: 0px; color: #6d8d3b; font-family: inherit; font-style: inherit; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;" target="_blank">Italy</a>, <a class="external" href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mexico" style="border: 0px; color: #6d8d3b; font-family: inherit; font-style: inherit; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;" target="_blank">Mexico</a>, and <a class="external" href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Netherlands" style="border: 0px; color: #6d8d3b; font-family: inherit; font-style: inherit; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;" target="_blank">The Netherlands</a>.</em></div>
</div>
<div class="tags" style="border: 0px; color: #56575b; font-family: 'DIN Next W01 Regular', 'Helvetica Neue', Helvetica, Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 15.454545021057129px; line-height: 16.988636016845703px; margin: 20px 0px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;">
<div class="float_left" style="border: 0px; float: left; font-family: inherit; font-style: inherit; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;">
Tags: </div>
<div class="category" style="border-right-color: rgb(209, 211, 212); border-right-style: solid; border-width: 0px 1px 0px 0px; float: left; font-family: inherit; font-style: inherit; margin: 0px 10px 10px 0px; padding: 0px 10px 0px 0px; vertical-align: baseline;">
<a href="http://www.resilience.org/tag-search-results/91616-resilience/79236" style="border: 0px; color: #6d8d3b; font-family: inherit; font-style: inherit; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;">resilience</a></div>
<div class="category" style="border-right-color: rgb(209, 211, 212); border-right-style: solid; border-width: 0px 1px 0px 0px; float: left; font-family: inherit; font-style: inherit; margin: 0px 10px 10px 0px; padding: 0px 10px 0px 0px; vertical-align: baseline;">
<a href="http://www.resilience.org/tag-search-results/102619-resilient%20design/79236" style="border: 0px; color: #6d8d3b; font-family: inherit; font-style: inherit; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;">resilient design</a></div>
<div class="category" style="border-right-color: rgb(209, 211, 212); border-right-style: solid; border-width: 0px 1px 0px 0px; float: left; font-family: inherit; font-style: inherit; margin: 0px 10px 10px 0px; padding: 0px 10px 0px 0px; vertical-align: baseline;">
<a href="http://www.resilience.org/tag-search-results/102620-Christopher%20Alexander/79236" style="border: 0px; color: #6d8d3b; font-family: inherit; font-style: inherit; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;">Christopher Alexander</a></div>
<div style="border: 0px; font-family: inherit; font-style: inherit; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;">
<a href="http://www.resilience.org/tag-search-results/102621-resilient%20architecture/79236" style="border: 0px; color: #6d8d3b; font-family: inherit; font-style: inherit; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;">resilient architecture</a></div>
<div style="border: 0px; font-family: inherit; font-style: inherit; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;">
<span style="color: #888888; font-family: inherit; font-size: 14px; font-style: inherit;"><br /></span></div>
<div style="border: 0px; font-family: inherit; font-style: inherit; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;">
<span style="color: #888888; font-family: inherit; font-size: 14px; font-style: inherit;">About</span><span style="color: #888888; font-family: inherit; font-size: 14px; font-style: inherit;"> </span><a href="http://www.resilience.org/author-detail/1153282-nikos-a-salingaros" style="border: 0px; color: #6d8d3b; font-family: inherit; font-size: 14px; font-style: inherit; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;">Nikos A. Salingaros</a><span style="color: #888888; font-family: inherit; font-size: 14px; font-style: inherit;">: </span><span style="color: #888888; font-family: inherit; font-size: 14px; font-style: inherit;">About</span><span style="color: #888888; font-family: inherit; font-size: 14px; font-style: inherit;"> </span><a href="http://www.resilience.org/author-detail/1153102-michael-mehaffy" style="border: 0px; color: #6d8d3b; font-family: inherit; font-size: 14px; font-style: inherit; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;">Michael Mehaffy</a><span style="color: #888888; font-family: inherit; font-size: 14px; font-style: inherit;">: </span></div>
</div>
<div class="about_author" style="border-bottom-color: rgb(236, 233, 215); border-bottom-style: solid; border-top-color: rgb(236, 233, 215); border-top-style: solid; border-width: 1px 0px; color: #56575b; font-family: 'DIN Next W01 Regular', 'Helvetica Neue', Helvetica, Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 15.454545021057129px; line-height: 16.988636016845703px; margin: 0px; padding: 13px 0px; vertical-align: baseline;">
<div class="clear" style="border: 0px; clear: both; font-family: inherit; font-style: inherit; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;">
</div>
</div>
<div class="blogger-post-footer">http://kjpermaculture.blogspot.com/feeds/posts/default
<p id="blogfeeds"><$BlogFeedsVertical$></p>
<p id="postfeeds"><$BlogItemFeedLinks$></p></div>Anonymoushttp://www.blogger.com/profile/03009370115428649864noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-439180943121365896.post-71302017809491613772013-03-17T19:21:00.002-05:002013-11-26T22:19:33.464-05:00Three Lists: What Has Been Lost, What Has Been Given, and What Has Been Saved<br />
<div style="background-color: white; border: 0px; color: #333333; font-size: 15.454545021057129px; line-height: 20.99431800842285px; padding: 0px 0px 0.7em; vertical-align: baseline;">
<b style="font-size: 17px; font-weight: normal; line-height: 22px;"><span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Three Lists: What Has Been Lost, What Has Been Given, and What Has Been Saved</span></b></div>
<div style="background-color: white; border: 0px; color: #333333; font-size: 15.454545021057129px; line-height: 20.99431800842285px; padding: 0px 0px 0.7em; vertical-align: baseline;">
<i><span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">“Once I spoke the language of the flowers… / How did it go? / How did it go?” – Shel Silverstein</span></i></div>
<div style="background-color: white; border: 0px; color: #333333; font-size: 15.454545021057129px; line-height: 20.99431800842285px; padding: 0px 0px 0.7em; vertical-align: baseline;">
<b style="font-size: 17px; font-weight: normal; line-height: 22px;"><span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">I. </span></b></div>
<div style="background-color: white; border: 0px; color: #333333; font-size: 15.454545021057129px; line-height: 20.99431800842285px; padding: 0px 0px 0.7em; vertical-align: baseline;">
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">There is a list.</span></div>
<div style="background-color: white; border: 0px; color: #333333; font-size: 15.454545021057129px; line-height: 20.99431800842285px; padding: 0px 0px 0.7em; vertical-align: baseline;">
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">A dreadful list.</span></div>
<div style="background-color: white; border: 0px; color: #333333; font-size: 15.454545021057129px; line-height: 20.99431800842285px; padding: 0px 0px 0.7em; vertical-align: baseline;">
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">A list that will break your damn heart in half if you have the courage to look at it.</span></div>
<div style="background-color: white; border: 0px; color: #333333; font-size: 15.454545021057129px; line-height: 20.99431800842285px; padding: 0px 0px 0.7em; vertical-align: baseline;">
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">A list that will sap your strength.</span></div>
<div style="background-color: white; border: 0px; color: #333333; font-size: 15.454545021057129px; line-height: 20.99431800842285px; padding: 0px 0px 0.7em; vertical-align: baseline;">
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">It is a list so numbingly large</span></div>
<div style="background-color: white; border: 0px; color: #333333; font-size: 15.454545021057129px; line-height: 20.99431800842285px; padding: 0px 0px 0.7em; vertical-align: baseline;">
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">That nobody knows more than a tiny fraction of it.</span></div>
<div style="background-color: white; border: 0px; color: #333333; font-size: 15.454545021057129px; line-height: 20.99431800842285px; padding: 0px 0px 0.7em; vertical-align: baseline;">
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">A list that just keeps on growing.</span></div>
<div style="background-color: white; border: 0px; color: #333333; font-size: 15.454545021057129px; line-height: 20.99431800842285px; padding: 0px 0px 0.7em; vertical-align: baseline;">
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Faster and faster and faster and faster.</span></div>
<div style="background-color: white; border: 0px; color: #333333; font-size: 15.454545021057129px; line-height: 20.99431800842285px; padding: 0px 0px 0.7em; vertical-align: baseline;">
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">So fast that nobody could ever keep up.</span></div>
<div style="background-color: white; border: 0px; color: #333333; font-size: 15.454545021057129px; line-height: 20.99431800842285px; padding: 0px 0px 0.7em; vertical-align: baseline;">
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">-- It is a list of things that have been lost.</span></div>
<div style="background-color: white; border: 0px; color: #333333; font-size: 15.454545021057129px; line-height: 20.99431800842285px; padding: 0px 0px 0.7em; vertical-align: baseline;">
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Of things that have been broken, burnt, wasted, ruined, disappeared.</span></div>
<div style="background-color: white; border: 0px; color: #333333; font-size: 15.454545021057129px; line-height: 20.99431800842285px; padding: 0px 0px 0.7em; vertical-align: baseline;">
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Of things abused, eroded, corrupted, forgotten, sacrificed, discarded.</span></div>
<div style="background-color: white; border: 0px; color: #333333; font-size: 15.454545021057129px; line-height: 20.99431800842285px; padding: 0px 0px 0.7em; vertical-align: baseline;">
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Of things disfigured, suffocated, poisoned, fucked up, shattered, and killed.</span></div>
<div style="background-color: white; border: 0px; color: #333333; font-size: 15.454545021057129px; line-height: 20.99431800842285px; padding: 0px 0px 0.7em; vertical-align: baseline;">
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Things lost,</span></div>
<div style="background-color: white; border: 0px; color: #333333; font-size: 15.454545021057129px; line-height: 20.99431800842285px; padding: 0px 0px 0.7em; vertical-align: baseline;">
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Lost by a culture that would not acknowledge limits,</span></div>
<div style="background-color: white; border: 0px; color: #333333; font-size: 15.454545021057129px; line-height: 20.99431800842285px; padding: 0px 0px 0.7em; vertical-align: baseline;">
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">That would not acknowledge debts, dependencies, or connections.</span></div>
<div style="background-color: white; border: 0px; color: #333333; font-size: 15.454545021057129px; line-height: 20.99431800842285px; padding: 0px 0px 0.7em; vertical-align: baseline;">
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">A thankless culture.</span></div>
<div style="background-color: white; border: 0px; color: #333333; font-size: 15.454545021057129px; line-height: 20.99431800842285px; padding: 0px 0px 0.7em; vertical-align: baseline;">
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">A culture that arrogantly and violently refused to see, hear, feel, touch, or taste</span></div>
<div style="background-color: white; border: 0px; color: #333333; font-size: 15.454545021057129px; line-height: 20.99431800842285px; padding: 0px 0px 0.7em; vertical-align: baseline;">
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">The world that gave birth to it just yesterday.</span></div>
<div style="background-color: white; border: 0px; color: #333333; font-size: 15.454545021057129px; line-height: 20.99431800842285px; padding: 0px 0px 0.7em; vertical-align: baseline;">
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">-- It is a list that will sap your strength.</span></div>
<div style="background-color: white; border: 0px; color: #333333; font-size: 15.454545021057129px; line-height: 20.99431800842285px; padding: 0px 0px 0.7em; vertical-align: baseline;">
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">-- It is a list that will break your damn heart.</span></div>
<div style="background-color: white; border: 0px; color: #333333; font-size: 15.454545021057129px; line-height: 20.99431800842285px; padding: 0px 0px 0.7em; vertical-align: baseline;">
<b style="font-size: 17px; font-weight: normal; line-height: 22px;"><span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">II.</span></b></div>
<div style="background-color: white; border: 0px; color: #333333; font-size: 15.454545021057129px; line-height: 20.99431800842285px; padding: 0px 0px 0.7em; vertical-align: baseline;">
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">But there is also a second list.</span></div>
<div style="background-color: white; border: 0px; color: #333333; font-size: 15.454545021057129px; line-height: 20.99431800842285px; padding: 0px 0px 0.7em; vertical-align: baseline;">
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">A breathtakingly beautiful list.</span></div>
<div style="background-color: white; border: 0px; color: #333333; font-size: 15.454545021057129px; line-height: 20.99431800842285px; padding: 0px 0px 0.7em; vertical-align: baseline;">
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">A list that will heal your heart if you have the sense to look at it.</span></div>
<div style="background-color: white; border: 0px; color: #333333; font-size: 15.454545021057129px; line-height: 20.99431800842285px; padding: 0px 0px 0.7em; vertical-align: baseline;">
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">It is a list that has been getting smaller, smaller, smaller every year.</span></div>
<div style="background-color: white; border: 0px; color: #333333; font-size: 15.454545021057129px; line-height: 20.99431800842285px; padding: 0px 0px 0.7em; vertical-align: baseline;">
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">But a list still so gloriously large</span></div>
<div style="background-color: white; border: 0px; color: #333333; font-size: 15.454545021057129px; line-height: 20.99431800842285px; padding: 0px 0px 0.7em; vertical-align: baseline;">
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">That nobody knows more than a tiny fraction of it.</span></div>
<div style="background-color: white; border: 0px; color: #333333; font-size: 15.454545021057129px; line-height: 20.99431800842285px; padding: 0px 0px 0.7em; vertical-align: baseline;">
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">-- It is a list of things that have been given.</span></div>
<div style="background-color: white; border: 0px; color: #333333; font-size: 15.454545021057129px; line-height: 20.99431800842285px; padding: 0px 0px 0.7em; vertical-align: baseline;">
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Of things that grow, run, swim, eat, blow, wiggle, rustle, clack, flow, slide, and laugh.</span></div>
<div style="background-color: white; border: 0px; color: #333333; font-size: 15.454545021057129px; line-height: 20.99431800842285px; padding: 0px 0px 0.7em; vertical-align: baseline;">
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Of things that fly, cuddle, fight, howl, slither, hunt, hide, drift, ooze, sleep, and love.</span></div>
<div style="background-color: white; border: 0px; color: #333333; font-size: 15.454545021057129px; line-height: 20.99431800842285px; padding: 0px 0px 0.7em; vertical-align: baseline;">
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Of things that are strong, deep, soft, tiny, smooth, hot, playful, slow, and hungry.</span></div>
<div style="background-color: white; border: 0px; color: #333333; font-size: 15.454545021057129px; line-height: 20.99431800842285px; padding: 0px 0px 0.7em; vertical-align: baseline;">
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Of things that are green, brown, blue, thorny, large, dry, cold, fragile, wet, and fast.</span></div>
<div style="background-color: white; border: 0px; color: #333333; font-size: 15.454545021057129px; line-height: 20.99431800842285px; padding: 0px 0px 0.7em; vertical-align: baseline;">
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Things given,</span></div>
<div style="background-color: white; border: 0px; color: #333333; font-size: 15.454545021057129px; line-height: 20.99431800842285px; padding: 0px 0px 0.7em; vertical-align: baseline;">
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Given now to us, free</span></div>
<div style="background-color: white; border: 0px; color: #333333; font-size: 15.454545021057129px; line-height: 20.99431800842285px; padding: 0px 0px 0.7em; vertical-align: baseline;">
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">By a world that only asks us to see, hear, feel, touch, and taste them.</span></div>
<div style="background-color: white; border: 0px; color: #333333; font-size: 15.454545021057129px; line-height: 20.99431800842285px; padding: 0px 0px 0.7em; vertical-align: baseline;">
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">By a world that only asks us to take membership among that list.</span></div>
<div style="background-color: white; border: 0px; color: #333333; font-size: 15.454545021057129px; line-height: 20.99431800842285px; padding: 0px 0px 0.7em; vertical-align: baseline;">
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">A world that gave birth to us all, before time began.</span></div>
<div style="background-color: white; border: 0px; color: #333333; font-size: 15.454545021057129px; line-height: 20.99431800842285px; padding: 0px 0px 0.7em; vertical-align: baseline;">
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">-- It is a list that will heal your heart.</span></div>
<div style="background-color: white; border: 0px; color: #333333; font-size: 15.454545021057129px; line-height: 20.99431800842285px; padding: 0px 0px 0.7em; vertical-align: baseline;">
<b style="font-size: 17px; font-weight: normal; line-height: 22px;"><span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">III.</span></b></div>
<div style="background-color: white; border: 0px; color: #333333; font-size: 15.454545021057129px; line-height: 20.99431800842285px; padding: 0px 0px 0.7em; vertical-align: baseline;">
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">And there is a third list.</span></div>
<div style="background-color: white; border: 0px; color: #333333; font-size: 15.454545021057129px; line-height: 20.99431800842285px; padding: 0px 0px 0.7em; vertical-align: baseline;">
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">A much smaller list,</span></div>
<div style="background-color: white; border: 0px; color: #333333; font-size: 15.454545021057129px; line-height: 20.99431800842285px; padding: 0px 0px 0.7em; vertical-align: baseline;">
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">But a list that will give you strength if you have the wisdom</span></div>
<div style="background-color: white; border: 0px; color: #333333; font-size: 15.454545021057129px; line-height: 20.99431800842285px; padding: 0px 0px 0.7em; vertical-align: baseline;">
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">To look for it, to find it, to learn it, to live it.</span></div>
<div style="background-color: white; border: 0px; color: #333333; font-size: 15.454545021057129px; line-height: 20.99431800842285px; padding: 0px 0px 0.7em; vertical-align: baseline;">
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">It is a list dangerously small</span></div>
<div style="background-color: white; border: 0px; color: #333333; font-size: 15.454545021057129px; line-height: 20.99431800842285px; padding: 0px 0px 0.7em; vertical-align: baseline;">
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Because so much has been forgotten.</span></div>
<div style="background-color: white; border: 0px; color: #333333; font-size: 15.454545021057129px; line-height: 20.99431800842285px; padding: 0px 0px 0.7em; vertical-align: baseline;">
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">And because nobody anymore knows more than a tiny fraction of it.</span></div>
<div style="background-color: white; border: 0px; color: #333333; font-size: 15.454545021057129px; line-height: 20.99431800842285px; padding: 0px 0px 0.7em; vertical-align: baseline;">
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">And it is a list that is still shrinking.</span></div>
<div style="background-color: white; border: 0px; color: #333333; font-size: 15.454545021057129px; line-height: 20.99431800842285px; padding: 0px 0px 0.7em; vertical-align: baseline;">
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Faster and faster and faster.</span></div>
<div style="background-color: white; border: 0px; color: #333333; font-size: 15.454545021057129px; line-height: 20.99431800842285px; padding: 0px 0px 0.7em; vertical-align: baseline;">
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Until it is almost gone.</span></div>
<div style="background-color: white; border: 0px; color: #333333; font-size: 15.454545021057129px; line-height: 20.99431800842285px; padding: 0px 0px 0.7em; vertical-align: baseline;">
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">But it is not gone.</span></div>
<div style="background-color: white; border: 0px; color: #333333; font-size: 15.454545021057129px; line-height: 20.99431800842285px; padding: 0px 0px 0.7em; vertical-align: baseline;">
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">-- It is a list of things that have been saved.</span></div>
<div style="background-color: white; border: 0px; color: #333333; font-size: 15.454545021057129px; line-height: 20.99431800842285px; padding: 0px 0px 0.7em; vertical-align: baseline;">
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Of things that have been mended, nurtured, passed down, remembered</span></div>
<div style="background-color: white; border: 0px; color: #333333; font-size: 15.454545021057129px; line-height: 20.99431800842285px; padding: 0px 0px 0.7em; vertical-align: baseline;">
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Of things taken care of, tended, loved, watched over</span></div>
<div style="background-color: white; border: 0px; color: #333333; font-size: 15.454545021057129px; line-height: 20.99431800842285px; padding: 0px 0px 0.7em; vertical-align: baseline;">
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Of ways of talking, ways of knowing, ways of seeing, ways of feeling, and ways of loving</span></div>
<div style="background-color: white; border: 0px; color: #333333; font-size: 15.454545021057129px; line-height: 20.99431800842285px; padding: 0px 0px 0.7em; vertical-align: baseline;">
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Of customs, rituals, practices, seeds, breeds, tools, skills, and prayers.</span></div>
<div style="background-color: white; border: 0px; color: #333333; font-size: 15.454545021057129px; line-height: 20.99431800842285px; padding: 0px 0px 0.7em; vertical-align: baseline;">
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Things saved.</span></div>
<div style="background-color: white; border: 0px; color: #333333; font-size: 15.454545021057129px; line-height: 20.99431800842285px; padding: 0px 0px 0.7em; vertical-align: baseline;">
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">It is a list that teaches us how to belong to this world.</span></div>
<div style="background-color: white; border: 0px; color: #333333; font-size: 15.454545021057129px; line-height: 20.99431800842285px; padding: 0px 0px 0.7em; vertical-align: baseline;">
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">A list that teaches us how to live in this world without destroying it.</span></div>
<div style="background-color: white; border: 0px; color: #333333; font-size: 15.454545021057129px; line-height: 20.99431800842285px; padding: 0px 0px 0.7em; vertical-align: baseline;">
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">A list that teaches us how to live with each other without destroying ourselves.</span></div>
<div style="background-color: white; border: 0px; color: #333333; font-size: 15.454545021057129px; line-height: 20.99431800842285px; padding: 0px 0px 0.7em; vertical-align: baseline;">
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Passed down from cultures that celebrated limits, that worshipped them.</span></div>
<div style="background-color: white; border: 0px; color: #333333; font-size: 15.454545021057129px; line-height: 20.99431800842285px; padding: 0px 0px 0.7em; vertical-align: baseline;">
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Thankful cultures.</span></div>
<div style="background-color: white; border: 0px; color: #333333; font-size: 15.454545021057129px; line-height: 20.99431800842285px; padding: 0px 0px 0.7em; vertical-align: baseline;">
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Cultures that awoke each morning to see, hear, feel, touch, or taste</span></div>
<div style="background-color: white; border: 0px; color: #333333; font-size: 15.454545021057129px; line-height: 20.99431800842285px; padding: 0px 0px 0.7em; vertical-align: baseline;">
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">The world that gave birth to them.</span></div>
<div style="background-color: white; border: 0px; color: #333333; font-size: 15.454545021057129px; line-height: 20.99431800842285px; padding: 0px 0px 0.7em; vertical-align: baseline;">
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">A world that is now slipping away from us.</span></div>
<div style="background-color: white; border: 0px; color: #333333; font-size: 15.454545021057129px; line-height: 20.99431800842285px; padding: 0px 0px 0.7em; vertical-align: baseline;">
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">A world that <i>will</i> slip away from us if we don’t hold onto it</span></div>
<div style="background-color: white; border: 0px; color: #333333; font-size: 15.454545021057129px; line-height: 20.99431800842285px; padding: 0px 0px 0.7em; vertical-align: baseline;">
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">With all the strength we can summon</span></div>
<div style="background-color: white; border: 0px; color: #333333; font-size: 15.454545021057129px; line-height: 20.99431800842285px; padding: 0px 0px 0.7em; vertical-align: baseline;">
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">In our hearts, in our minds, and in our bodies.</span></div>
<div style="background-color: white; border: 0px; color: #333333; font-size: 15.454545021057129px; line-height: 20.99431800842285px; padding: 0px 0px 0.7em; vertical-align: baseline;">
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">It is a list that will give you this strength.</span></div>
<div style="background-color: white; border: 0px; color: #333333; font-size: 15.454545021057129px; line-height: 20.99431800842285px; padding: 0px 0px 0.7em; vertical-align: baseline;">
<b style="font-size: 17px; font-weight: normal; line-height: 22px;"><span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">IV.</span></b></div>
<div style="background-color: white; border: 0px; color: #333333; font-size: 15.454545021057129px; line-height: 20.99431800842285px; padding: 0px 0px 0.7em; vertical-align: baseline;">
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">So in this time of catastrophe,</span></div>
<div style="background-color: white; border: 0px; color: #333333; font-size: 15.454545021057129px; line-height: 20.99431800842285px; padding: 0px 0px 0.7em; vertical-align: baseline;">
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Perhaps we should turn to these lists.</span></div>
<div style="background-color: white; border: 0px; color: #333333; font-size: 15.454545021057129px; line-height: 20.99431800842285px; padding: 0px 0px 0.7em; vertical-align: baseline;">
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">And teach our children from them.</span></div>
<div style="background-color: white; border: 0px; color: #333333; font-size: 15.454545021057129px; line-height: 20.99431800842285px; padding: 0px 0px 0.7em; vertical-align: baseline;">
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">So that we may live.</span></div>
<div style="background-color: white; border: 0px; color: #333333; font-size: 15.454545021057129px; line-height: 20.99431800842285px; padding: 0px 0px 0.7em; vertical-align: baseline;">
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">[From <a href="http://www.resilience.org/stories/2013-03-13/when-agriculture-stops-working-ten-recommendations-for-growing-food-in-the-anthropocene">http://www.resilience.org/stories/2013-03-13/when-agriculture-stops-working-ten-recommendations-for-growing-food-in-the-anthropocene</a> ]</span></div>
<div class="blogger-post-footer">http://kjpermaculture.blogspot.com/feeds/posts/default
<p id="blogfeeds"><$BlogFeedsVertical$></p>
<p id="postfeeds"><$BlogItemFeedLinks$></p></div>Anonymoushttp://www.blogger.com/profile/03009370115428649864noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-439180943121365896.post-48738622715764869512013-03-17T19:13:00.001-05:002013-11-27T11:30:22.766-05:00When agriculture stops working<br />
<h1 class="item_detail" style="border: 0px; color: #231f20; font-family: 'Amasis MT W01 Medium', serif; font-size: 48px; font-weight: inherit; line-height: 50px; margin: 0px; padding: 0px 0px 0.5em; vertical-align: baseline; width: 560px;">
When agriculture stops working: A guide to growing food in the age of climate destabilization and civilization collapse</h1>
<div class="clear" style="border: 0px; clear: both; color: #56575b; font-family: 'DIN Next W01 Regular', 'Helvetica Neue', Helvetica, Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 15.454545021057129px; line-height: 16.988636016845703px; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;">
</div>
<div class="byline" style="border: 0px; color: #231f20; font-family: 'DIN Next W01 Regular', 'Helvetica Neue', Helvetica, Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 15.454545021057129px; line-height: 16.988636016845703px; margin: 0px 0px 12px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;">
by <a href="http://www.resilience.org/author-detail/1151372-dan-allen" style="border: 0px; color: #6d8d3b; font-family: inherit; font-style: inherit; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;">Dan Allen</a>, originally published by <a href="http://resilience.org/">Resilience.org</a> <span class="article_date" style="border: 0px; color: #b36529; font-family: inherit; font-size: 12px; font-style: inherit; line-height: 15px; margin: 0px 0px 2px; padding: 0px; text-transform: uppercase; vertical-align: baseline;"> | MAR 12, 2013</span></div>
<div class="clear" style="border: 0px; clear: both; color: #56575b; font-family: 'DIN Next W01 Regular', 'Helvetica Neue', Helvetica, Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 15.454545021057129px; line-height: 16.988636016845703px; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;">
</div>
<div class="article_body_detail dinNormal" style="border: 0px; color: #333333; font-family: 'DIN Next W01 Regular', serif; font-size: 15.454545021057129px; line-height: 21px; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;">
<div style="border: 0px; font-size: 15px; line-height: 21px; padding: 0px 0px 0.7em; vertical-align: baseline;">
<i>This is Part 1 of an essay in 2 parts. Part 1, below, outlines the issues. Part 2,<a href="http://www.resilience.org/stories/2013-03-13/when-agriculture-stops-working-ten-recommendations-for-growing-food-in-the-anthropocene" style="border: 0px; color: #6d8d3b; font-family: inherit; font-style: inherit; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;">offers 'Ten Recommendations for Growing Food in the Anthropocene</a></i></div>
<div align="center" style="border: 0px; font-family: inherit; font-style: inherit; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;">
<img alt="" src="http://www.resilience.org/articles/General/2013/03_Mar/Agriculture-stops/image001.jpg" style="border: 0px; font-family: inherit; font-style: inherit; margin: 10px 20px 10px 0px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;" /> </div>
<div align="center" style="border: 0px; font-family: inherit; font-style: inherit; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;">
<i>Source: <a class="external" href="http://photoblog.statesman.com/dry-season-the-texas-drought-of-2011" style="border: 0px; color: #6d8d3b; font-family: inherit; font-style: inherit; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;" target="_blank">photoblog.statesman.com/dry-season-the-texas-drought-of-2011</a></i></div>
<div style="border: 0px; font-family: inherit; font-style: inherit; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;">
</div>
<div style="border: 0px; font-size: 15px; line-height: 21px; padding: 0px 0px 0.7em; vertical-align: baseline;">
<i>“Well it's hotter 'n blazes and all the long faces / there'll be no oasis for a dry local grazier” – Tom Waits</i></div>
<div style="border: 0px; font-size: 15px; line-height: 21px; padding: 0px 0px 0.7em; vertical-align: baseline;">
<i>“What we’re seeing is stark evidence that the gradual temperature increase is not the important story related to climate change; it’s the rapid regional changes and increased frequency of extreme weather that global warming is causing. As the Arctic warms at twice the global rate, we expect an increased probability of extreme weather events across the temperate latitudes of the northern hemisphere, where billions of people live.” -- Jennifer Francis (<a class="external" href="http://thinkprogress.org/climate/2012/10/11/989231/noaa-bombshell-warming-driven-arctic-ice-loss-is-boosting-chance-of-extreme-us-weather/" style="border: 0px; color: #6d8d3b; font-family: inherit; font-style: inherit; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;" target="_blank">http://thinkprogress.org/climate/2012/10/11/989231/noaa-bombshell-warming-driven-arctic-ice-loss-is-boosting-chance-of-extreme-us-weather/</a>)</i></div>
<div style="border: 0px; font-size: 15px; line-height: 21px; padding: 0px 0px 0.7em; vertical-align: baseline;">
<i>“[W]hen we learn that in the collapse now underway resides the seeds of a different style of agriculture that does not carry all the historic baggage that burdens us, we may, with good justification, rejoice.” – Albert Bates (<a href="http://www.resilience.org/stories/2013-02-27/going-deep" style="border: 0px; color: #6d8d3b; font-family: inherit; font-style: inherit; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;">http://www.resilience.org/stories/2013-02-27/going-deep</a>)</i></div>
<div style="border: 0px; font-size: 15px; line-height: 21px; padding: 0px 0px 0.7em; vertical-align: baseline;">
<br /></div>
<div style="border: 0px; font-size: 15px; line-height: 21px; padding: 0px 0px 0.7em; vertical-align: baseline;">
<b style="font-family: 'DIN Next W01 Medium'; font-size: 17px; font-weight: normal; line-height: 22px;">Summary:</b> As the toxic trappings of industrial civilization crumble around us, agriculture is set to regain its place at the forefront of our daily American lives. …And won’t we be surprised to find out that it barely works anymore! Worsening climate destabilization, combined with the legacy of industrial ecosystem degradation and the loss of crucial pre-industrial agricultural genetics and knowledge, will severely challenge our ability to feed ourselves in the decades ahead. So perhaps it’s time we re-think our modern food-acquisition strategies in the face of the massive changes bearing down on us. …And I mean <i>REALLY</i> re-think them.</div>
<div style="border: 0px; font-size: 15px; line-height: 21px; padding: 0px 0px 0.7em; vertical-align: baseline;">
<b style="font-family: 'DIN Next W01 Medium'; font-size: 17px; font-weight: normal; line-height: 22px;">References</b></div>
<div style="border: 0px; font-size: 15px; line-height: 21px; padding: 0px 0px 0.7em; vertical-align: baseline;">
<a href="http://www.resilience.org/stories/2013-03-11/when-agriculture-stops-working-a-guide-to-growing-food-in-the-age-of-climate-destabilization-and-civilization-collapse#references" style="border: 0px; color: #6d8d3b; font-family: inherit; font-style: inherit; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;">Below</a> are some key resources to both back up the stuff I’m going to talk about and help people move ahead with the good work we need to do. </div>
<div style="border: 0px; font-size: 15px; line-height: 21px; padding: 0px 0px 0.7em; vertical-align: baseline;">
<b style="font-family: 'DIN Next W01 Medium'; font-size: 17px; font-weight: normal; line-height: 22px;">I. Ten Agricultural Premises</b></div>
<div style="border: 0px; font-size: 15px; line-height: 21px; padding: 0px 0px 0.7em; vertical-align: baseline;">
My main goal in this essay is to outline a suite of agricultural or food-acquisition strategies that might stand a chance in our climate-destabilized, civilization-collapsing future – and how we might go about laying the foundation for those strategies now. </div>
<div style="border: 0px; font-size: 15px; line-height: 21px; padding: 0px 0px 0.7em; vertical-align: baseline;">
But before getting into the essay-proper, I think it’s a good idea to lay out the basic agricultural premises that underlie these recommendations. For example, if I tell you it’s a really good idea to hone your hunting and gathering skills (as I will do), an acceptance of that message will only take if you’re fully aware of the reasoning that gave birth to such a wild suggestion (pun intended). So here they are:</div>
<div style="border: 0px; font-size: 15px; line-height: 21px; padding: 0px 0px 0.7em; vertical-align: baseline;">
<b style="font-family: 'DIN Next W01 Medium'; font-size: 17px; font-weight: normal; line-height: 22px;">Premise 1: The Earth’s climate is destabilizing. </b> Humans are forcing an unprecedented destabilization of the global climate with fossil fuel CO2 emissions. We are likely very close to (if not exactly at, or even past) a positive-feedback tipping point, beyond which most or all of the planet becomes uninhabitable to humans. Due to inertia in the climate system, even if CO2 emissions stopped tomorrow, the worst climatic disruptions are ahead of us and will continue at least for many centuries.</div>
<div style="border: 0px; font-size: 15px; line-height: 21px; padding: 0px 0px 0.7em; vertical-align: baseline;">
<b style="font-family: 'DIN Next W01 Medium'; font-size: 17px; font-weight: normal; line-height: 22px;">Premise 2:</b> <b style="font-family: 'DIN Next W01 Medium'; font-size: 17px; font-weight: normal; line-height: 22px;">Our agriculture is adapted to the stable Holocene climate.</b> Land-based human agriculture, the main source of bodily sustenance for North Americans, is adapted only to the stable Holocene climate of the past 10,000 years – the relatively predictable patterns (in both magnitude and timing) of temperature, rainfall, snowmelt, storm intensity, and pest densities in any given region. Unfortunately, this is a climate our species will likely never see again. </div>
<div style="border: 0px; font-size: 15px; line-height: 21px; padding: 0px 0px 0.7em; vertical-align: baseline;">
<b style="font-family: 'DIN Next W01 Medium'; font-size: 17px; font-weight: normal; line-height: 22px;">Premise 3:</b> <b style="font-family: 'DIN Next W01 Medium'; font-size: 17px; font-weight: normal; line-height: 22px;">Climate destabilization will severely stress agriculture.</b> Climatic destabilization will severely stress the viability of human agriculture via extremes in these traditional climatic patterns – e.g., extremes in the magnitude and timing of temperature, rainfall, snowmelt, storm intensity, and pests. Such stresses have indeed already begun, and will intensify over the coming years, decades, and centuries as the climate continues to destabilize.</div>
<div style="border: 0px; font-size: 15px; line-height: 21px; padding: 0px 0px 0.7em; vertical-align: baseline;">
<b style="font-family: 'DIN Next W01 Medium'; font-size: 17px; font-weight: normal; line-height: 22px;">Premise 4:</b> <b style="font-family: 'DIN Next W01 Medium'; font-size: 17px; font-weight: normal; line-height: 22px;">Collapse of industrial civilization will magnify the climatic stresses.</b> These already-severe agricultural stresses from a destabilizing climate will be magnified by industrial depredations (past, present, and future) and disruptions from the ongoing collapse of industrial civilization. Specifically, these magnifying factors include rapid disappearance of the fossil fuel platform for current agricultural practices, loss of pre-industrial agricultural technology and genetics, soil loss and degradation, bioaccumulation of toxins (metals, organics, and nuclear), depletion of fossil aquifers, as well as war and social strife. Post-industrial deforestation and mounting ocean acidification will also have deleterious indirect effects on terrestrial agriculture.</div>
<div style="border: 0px; font-size: 15px; line-height: 21px; padding: 0px 0px 0.7em; vertical-align: baseline;">
<b style="font-family: 'DIN Next W01 Medium'; font-size: 17px; font-weight: normal; line-height: 22px;">Premise 5:</b> <b style="font-family: 'DIN Next W01 Medium'; font-size: 17px; font-weight: normal; line-height: 22px;">Agriculture will unavoidably shrink in scale and technological complexity. </b>The combination of climatic destabilization, past/residual industrial depredations, and collapse of industrial civilization will unavoidably shrink the scale and technological complexity of human agriculture. Agriculture will quickly evolve from (1) today’s doomed, high-tech, huge-scale operations, to (2) still-fragile, large-scale, mechanized operations, to (3) a medium-scale, draft-animal-based agriculture, to (4) a small-scale, ‘primitive’ human-labor-based agriculture, to (5) increasing reliance on managed hunting and gathering, and perhaps finally to (6) regional extirpation. Different societies will differ in the rate and ultimate level of agricultural simplification based on geographical, ecological, and social factors -- but the general trends will be near-universal and undoubtedly severe.</div>
<div style="border: 0px; font-size: 15px; line-height: 21px; padding: 0px 0px 0.7em; vertical-align: baseline;">
<b style="font-family: 'DIN Next W01 Medium'; font-size: 17px; font-weight: normal; line-height: 22px;">Premise 6:</b> <b style="font-family: 'DIN Next W01 Medium'; font-size: 17px; font-weight: normal; line-height: 22px;">Ecological complexity in agriculture will necessarily replace technological complexity.</b> Challenged by (1) the disappearance of essentially all industrial agricultural technology, (2) the loss of much pre-industrial agricultural technology to cultural erosion, (3) severely degraded agricultural ecosystems, and (4) worsening climatic destabilization, successful human food acquisition will necessarily rely increasingly on ecological knowledge and assistance – what we can perhaps call ‘ecological technology’. We will need to return humbly, thankfully, and thoughtfully to ‘the tangled bank.’ And given the climatic, ecological, and social challenges bearing down on us, such an ecological awakening will not be optional for human survival.</div>
<div style="border: 0px; font-size: 15px; line-height: 21px; padding: 0px 0px 0.7em; vertical-align: baseline;">
<b style="font-family: 'DIN Next W01 Medium'; font-size: 17px; font-weight: normal; line-height: 22px;">Premise 7: A polyculture of perennial vegetation has the best chance of providing food for humans in the future. </b>In light of challenges outlined above, a diverse polyculture of perennial vegetation has many advantages over the largely-annual monocultures of traditional human agriculture: more robust structural integrity, improved soil-holding and building ability, superior nutrient and water gathering efficiency, decreased annual labor inputs, more efficient gathering of sunlight, longer annual period of active photosynthesis, and less reliance on precise rainfall and temperature patterns. As such, an agriculture based largely on a rich diversity of ecologically-managed, food and fiber-producing perennials embedded within diverse perennial-based wild ecosystems will exhibit maximum resilience and stand the best chance of providing food in our climate-destabilized, civilization-collapsing future.</div>
<div style="border: 0px; font-size: 15px; line-height: 21px; padding: 0px 0px 0.7em; vertical-align: baseline;">
<b style="font-family: 'DIN Next W01 Medium'; font-size: 17px; font-weight: normal; line-height: 22px;">Premise 8:</b> <b style="font-family: 'DIN Next W01 Medium'; font-size: 17px; font-weight: normal; line-height: 22px;">Our current ‘leaders’ will not aid the necessary transition to an ecologically-sound perennial agriculture – they will hinder it.</b> The crucial near-term response of the ‘powers that be’ (corporations, national governments) to the gathering existential agricultural emergencies will continue to be, perversely and suicidally, their exacerbation – e.g., trying to maximize carbon emissions (even as they fall), accelerating industrial depredations, and a desperate inflating of the industrial bubble via economic and public-relations chicanery, resulting in a more rapid and destructive collapse when the bubble inevitably pops. Lobbying of such ‘powers that be’ to change course has proven, at best, largely ineffectual – and perhaps even counter-productive, as it can perpetuate the illusion of ‘if only they understood’ and distract from constructive efforts possible at the local level.</div>
<div style="border: 0px; font-size: 15px; line-height: 21px; padding: 0px 0px 0.7em; vertical-align: baseline;">
<b style="font-family: 'DIN Next W01 Medium'; font-size: 17px; font-weight: normal; line-height: 22px;">Premise 9:</b> <b style="font-family: 'DIN Next W01 Medium'; font-size: 17px; font-weight: normal; line-height: 22px;">Local responses are possible, necessary, and should begin ASAP.</b> In this critical pre-collapse period, constructive responses to both our agricultural and broader predicaments will only be fashioned at the local and community level – a fact that is at once frightening, sad, embarrassing, and empowering. These responses involve efforts to learn, preserve, and disseminate (1) a more resilient, ecologically-attuned agriculture, (2) hunting and gathering skills, along with the accompanying ecological knowledge and sensitivity, (3) craftsmanship and artistry in the manufacturing of basic necessities (tools, shelter, water infrastructure, medicines), and (4) key social skills, such as conflict-resolution, cooperation, and collaboration, as well as the cultivation of beauty, joyfulness, and thankfulness in our everyday lives.</div>
<div style="border: 0px; font-size: 15px; line-height: 21px; padding: 0px 0px 0.7em; vertical-align: baseline;">
<b style="font-family: 'DIN Next W01 Medium'; font-size: 17px; font-weight: normal; line-height: 22px;">Premise 10: We</b> <b style="font-family: 'DIN Next W01 Medium'; font-size: 17px; font-weight: normal; line-height: 22px;">may not succeed, but we must try.</b> Livable outcomes in any given region are neither assured nor frankly probable at this point, but we must try – we have a moral, biological, and spiritual imperative to try. …Because what do you do when human civilization gives you global catastrophe? You make catastrophe-aid. J</div>
<div style="border: 0px; font-size: 15px; line-height: 21px; padding: 0px 0px 0.7em; vertical-align: baseline;">
<br /></div>
<div style="border: 0px; font-size: 15px; line-height: 21px; padding: 0px 0px 0.7em; vertical-align: baseline;">
…And now for the essay-proper:</div>
<div style="border: 0px; font-size: 15px; line-height: 21px; padding: 0px 0px 0.7em; vertical-align: baseline;">
<b style="font-family: 'DIN Next W01 Medium'; font-size: 17px; font-weight: normal; line-height: 22px;">II. Growing Food in a Funhouse</b></div>
<div style="border: 0px; font-size: 15px; line-height: 21px; padding: 0px 0px 0.7em; vertical-align: baseline;">
In that heady time before every American youth was enslaved by their portable electronics to the cold realm of cyberspace, end-of-summer fairs were the place to be. The gaudy lights, the blaring tinny music, the hormone-addled teens, the strung-out carnies, the crumbling nuclear families with double-wide strollers, the way-too-made-up tweens, the ever-changing ribbons of smells pummeling your nostrils: cotton candy, cigarette smoke, fried dough, cheap perfume, diesel fumes, oily dust, italian ice… </div>
<div style="border: 0px; font-size: 15px; line-height: 21px; padding: 0px 0px 0.7em; vertical-align: baseline;">
Ahhh...the (cough) memories! </div>
<div style="border: 0px; font-size: 15px; line-height: 21px; padding: 0px 0px 0.7em; vertical-align: baseline;">
<br /></div>
<div align="center" style="border: 0px; font-family: inherit; font-style: inherit; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;">
<img alt="" border="0" src="http://www.resilience.org/articles/General/2013/03_Mar/Agriculture-stops/image003.jpg" style="border: 0px; font-family: inherit; font-style: inherit; margin: 10px 20px 10px 0px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;" /></div>
<div align="center" style="border: 0px; font-family: inherit; font-style: inherit; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;">
<i>Flemington Fair</i><i>, NJ</i><i>, circa 1978.</i></div>
<div style="border: 0px; font-family: inherit; font-style: inherit; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;">
</div>
<div style="border: 0px; font-size: 15px; line-height: 21px; padding: 0px 0px 0.7em; vertical-align: baseline;">
But more than anything, I remember a haunting, fair-themed nightmare I had around the time I was ten: My friends and I were exploring a funhouse, but the place kept taking on a progressively more menacing vibe. The normal funhouse elements -- the amusing surprises, the pleasant distortions of normality, the benign helplessness – were becoming less amusing, pleasant, and benign by the second. At some point, after realizing that the funhouse was actually trying to kill us rather than fun us, I found myself alone in a barren field outside the funhouse, pock-marked with what appeared to be deep bomb craters. Descending into one such water-filled crater, an alien (?!) reached out of the water, grabbed my leg, and pulled me under. …And then I woke up. (cold shiver) </div>
<div style="border: 0px; font-size: 15px; line-height: 21px; padding: 0px 0px 0.7em; vertical-align: baseline;">
<br /></div>
<div align="center" style="border: 0px; font-family: inherit; font-style: inherit; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;">
<img alt="" border="0" src="http://www.resilience.org/articles/General/2013/03_Mar/Agriculture-stops/image004.png" style="border: 0px; font-family: inherit; font-style: inherit; margin: 10px 20px 10px 0px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;" /></div>
<div style="border: 0px; font-family: inherit; font-style: inherit; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;">
</div>
<div style="border: 0px; font-size: 15px; line-height: 21px; padding: 0px 0px 0.7em; vertical-align: baseline;">
Psychoanalyze away, but that dream still haunts me to this day. I can still see it, still feel it. It still scares the hell out of me. In fact, it’s starting to scare me more than ever these days. </div>
<div style="border: 0px; font-size: 15px; line-height: 21px; padding: 0px 0px 0.7em; vertical-align: baseline;">
…Because it’s coming true.</div>
<div style="border: 0px; font-size: 15px; line-height: 21px; padding: 0px 0px 0.7em; vertical-align: baseline;">
Earth’s climate, a key leg of the three-legged agro-ecological stool (climate, soil & ecosystem health, genetics), is taking on all the elements of that menacing funhouse from my nightmare – the increasingly-unpleasant surprises, the ominous distortions of normality, the growing feelings of helplessness among its victims. …It’s all coming true.</div>
<div style="border: 0px; font-size: 15px; line-height: 21px; padding: 0px 0px 0.7em; vertical-align: baseline;">
As David Korowicz warns of our collapsing civilization: we are going someplace we have never been before. This is true economically, socially, and politically – but, most frighteningly, it is also true climatically. We are in the process of forcing the climate into a state unlike anything our species, much less agriculture, has ever experienced. Given that, is it really wise to expect our Holocene-adapted agriculture to function adequately in this new ‘evil-funhouse’ climate we’re making? I would argue no.</div>
<div style="border: 0px; font-size: 15px; line-height: 21px; padding: 0px 0px 0.7em; vertical-align: baseline;">
So perhaps then we need to rethink our modern food-acquiring strategies in the face of the massive changes now bearing down upon us, with all their challenges and inherent uncertainties. </div>
<div style="border: 0px; font-size: 15px; line-height: 21px; padding: 0px 0px 0.7em; vertical-align: baseline;">
…And maybe we better start soon, no? </div>
<div style="border: 0px; font-size: 15px; line-height: 21px; padding: 0px 0px 0.7em; vertical-align: baseline;">
<br /></div>
<div style="border: 0px; font-size: 15px; line-height: 21px; padding: 0px 0px 0.7em; vertical-align: baseline;">
<b style="font-family: 'DIN Next W01 Medium'; font-size: 17px; font-weight: normal; line-height: 22px;">III. The Making of a Funhouse Climate</b></div>
<div style="border: 0px; font-size: 15px; line-height: 21px; padding: 0px 0px 0.7em; vertical-align: baseline;">
Let me be blunt here: We are wrecking the climate. Or I should say, we <i>have</i>wrecked the climate. Because by increasing the atmospheric CO2 from 280ppm to over 390ppm over the few hundred years of our industrial experiment, we have<i>already</i> wrenched the climate out of the relatively stable Holocene climate that gave birth to human agriculture. And we have likely even wrenched the climate out of its million year long glacial-interglacial dance (to a 100K year beat!) during which our species developed.</div>
<div style="border: 0px; font-size: 15px; line-height: 21px; padding: 0px 0px 0.7em; vertical-align: baseline;">
As UCLA climatologist Aradhna Tripati reported in Science in 2009, “The last time carbon dioxide levels were apparently as high as they are today…and were sustained at those levels…global temperatures were 5 to 10 degrees Fahrenheit higher than they are today, the sea level was approximately 75 to 120 feet higher than today, there was no permanent sea ice cap in the Arctic and very little ice on Antarctica and Greenland.” </div>
<div style="border: 0px; font-size: 15px; line-height: 21px; padding: 0px 0px 0.7em; vertical-align: baseline;">
…And that was 15 million years ago, by the way – well before our species existed.</div>
<div style="border: 0px; font-size: 15px; line-height: 21px; padding: 0px 0px 0.7em; vertical-align: baseline;">
We are stumbling suicidally into uncharted waters. The arctic, warming at over twice the global average, is melting rapidly. Summer arctic sea ice will likely be gone just a few years from now. (See Figure 1, below.) And with it will go the reflective albedo buffer to further rapid warming, as well as the regular weather patterns we count on for temperate Northern hemisphere agriculture. </div>
<div align="center" style="border: 0px; font-family: inherit; font-style: inherit; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;">
<img alt="" border="0" src="http://www.resilience.org/articles/General/2013/03_Mar/Agriculture-stops/image006.png" style="border: 0px; font-family: inherit; font-style: inherit; margin: 10px 20px 10px 0px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;" /></div>
<div align="center" style="border: 0px; font-family: inherit; font-style: inherit; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;">
<b style="font-family: 'DIN Next W01 Medium'; font-size: 17px; font-weight: normal; line-height: 22px;"><i>Figure 1.</i></b><i> Arctic sea ice collapse. Late summer sea ice volume has dropped over 80% in just the past 33 years. The arctic will likely be ice-free in summer in a few years, resulting in even more rapid warming. Source:<a class="external" href="http://thinkprogress.org/climate/2013/02/14/1594211/death-spiral-bombshell-cryosat-2-confirms-arctic-sea-ice-volume-has-collapsed/" style="border: 0px; color: #6d8d3b; font-family: inherit; font-style: inherit; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;" target="_blank">thinkprogress.org/climate/2013/02/14/1594211/death-spiral-bombshell-cryosat-2-confirms-arctic-sea-ice-volume-has-collapsed/</a></i></div>
<div style="border: 0px; font-family: inherit; font-style: inherit; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;">
</div>
<div style="border: 0px; font-size: 15px; line-height: 21px; padding: 0px 0px 0.7em; vertical-align: baseline;">
But how exactly do warmer temperatures disrupt regular weather patterns? Witness the ‘new, improved’ jet stream! The Northern hemisphere jet stream, that bringer of crop-friendly weather systems to US agriculture, is having some problems. Even the relatively meager warming to date of the arctic relative to the temperate latitudes appears to have <i>already</i> caused both a slowing and a more extreme meandering of the west-to-east winds of the jet stream. (See Figure 2, below.) </div>
<div align="center" style="border: 0px; font-family: inherit; font-style: inherit; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;">
<img alt="" border="0" src="http://www.resilience.org/articles/General/2013/03_Mar/Agriculture-stops/image008.jpg" style="border: 0px; font-family: inherit; font-style: inherit; margin: 10px 20px 10px 0px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;" /></div>
<div align="center" style="border: 0px; font-family: inherit; font-style: inherit; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;">
<b style="font-family: 'DIN Next W01 Medium'; font-size: 17px; font-weight: normal; line-height: 22px;"><i>Figure 2. </i></b><i>Extreme jet stream! This figure shows abnormally-meandering path of the jet stream on March 21, 2012 – an increasingly common occurrence as the arctic warms and the temperature differential between the arctic and temperate regions decrease. Source:<a class="external" href="http://thinkprogress.org/climate/2012/04/04/457823/arctic-warming-extreme-weather-events-drought-flooding-cold-spells-and-heat-waves/" style="border: 0px; color: #6d8d3b; font-family: inherit; font-style: inherit; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;" target="_blank">thinkprogress.org/climate/2012/04/04/457823/arctic-warming-extreme-weather-events-drought-flooding-cold-spells-and-heat-waves/</a></i></div>
<div style="border: 0px; font-family: inherit; font-style: inherit; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;">
</div>
<div style="border: 0px; font-size: 15px; line-height: 21px; padding: 0px 0px 0.7em; vertical-align: baseline;">
And a slower, more randomly-meandering jet stream brings with it some weird, unpleasant weather to the agricultural bread-baskets of the world. Larger-amplitude meanderings bring more extremes in hot and cold, often at rather odd times relative to what our crops and agricultural practices are adapted to. And the slower movement of the jet stream means that these wacky weather systems stick around longer. Often <i>way</i> too long. (See short video embedded in link for Figure 2.) Think of the brutal heat and dryness in the US 2011-12, Russia 2010, and France 2003. </div>
<div style="border: 0px; font-size: 15px; line-height: 21px; padding: 0px 0px 0.7em; vertical-align: baseline;">
Indeed, the relatively modest warming of land and ocean temperatures experienced so far has <i>already</i> resulted in a noticeable increase in extreme temperature and rainfall events. James Hansen has recently documented an alarming and steady shift in summer temperature extremes well beyond anything experienced even in recent times. (See Figure 3, below.) And similar upticks in frequencies of severe droughts and massive rainfall events have also been documented. (Follow all the action at Joe Romm’s http://thinkprogress.org/climate/issue/?mobile=nc.) </div>
<div style="border: 0px; font-size: 15px; line-height: 21px; padding: 0px 0px 0.7em; vertical-align: baseline;">
<br /></div>
<div align="center" style="border: 0px; font-family: inherit; font-style: inherit; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;">
<img alt="" border="0" src="http://www.resilience.org/articles/General/2013/03_Mar/Agriculture-stops/image010.gif" style="border: 0px; font-family: inherit; font-style: inherit; margin: 10px 20px 10px 0px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;" /></div>
<div style="border: 0px; font-size: 15px; line-height: 21px; padding: 0px 0px 0.7em; vertical-align: baseline;">
<b style="font-family: 'DIN Next W01 Medium'; font-size: 17px; font-weight: normal; line-height: 22px;"><i>Figure 3.</i></b><i> Shift in Northern hemisphere summer temperature extremes in recent decades. The bottom axis is in standard deviations (σ) above or below the 1951-1980 average summer temperature. Note the alarming increase in extreme temperature events in the maroon-colored +3σ to +5σ range -- crop-killing events with a vanishingly small probability prior to recent decades. Source:<a class="external" href="http://thinkprogress.org/climate/2012/08/09/666601/james-hansen-on-the-new-climate-dice-and-public-perception-of-climate-change/" style="border: 0px; color: #6d8d3b; font-family: inherit; font-style: inherit; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;" target="_blank">thinkprogress.org/climate/2012/08/09/666601/james-hansen-on-the-new-climate-dice-and-public-perception-of-climate-change/</a> </i></div>
<div style="border: 0px; font-size: 15px; line-height: 21px; padding: 0px 0px 0.7em; vertical-align: baseline;">
Oh, and did someone say ‘massively destructive storms’? Because as temperatures increase, so also do the strength of storms, with their eroding deluges, vast flooding, violent winds, and deadly storm surges. ‘Frankenstorms’ are indeed an apt term for these part-natural/part-human-caused monstrosities. Higher ocean, land, and air temperatures mean more water vapor pumped more rapidly into an atmosphere that can now hold that extra water. In turn, the extra water vapor in the atmosphere (+4-5%) provides both higher rainfall potential and more stored energy (‘latent heat’) to power the destructive winds. (See<a class="external" href="http://thinkprogress.org/climate/2012/10/28/1101241/cnn-bans-term-frankenstorm-but-its-a-good-metaphor-for-warming-driven-monster-largest-hurricane-in-atlantic-history/" style="border: 0px; color: #6d8d3b; font-family: inherit; font-style: inherit; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;" target="_blank">http://thinkprogress.org/climate/2012/10/28/1101241/cnn-bans-term-frankenstorm-but-its-a-good-metaphor-for-warming-driven-monster-largest-hurricane-in-atlantic-history/</a>) </div>
<div align="center" style="border: 0px; font-family: inherit; font-style: inherit; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;">
<img alt="" border="0" src="http://www.resilience.org/articles/General/2013/03_Mar/Agriculture-stops/image011.jpg" style="border: 0px; font-family: inherit; font-style: inherit; margin: 10px 20px 10px 0px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;" width="213" /></div>
<div align="center" style="border: 0px; font-family: inherit; font-style: inherit; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;">
<i>Frankenstorm Sandy, November 2012 (Source: <a class="external" href="http://topics.bloomberg.com/hurricane-sandy/" style="border: 0px; color: #6d8d3b; font-family: inherit; font-style: inherit; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;" target="_blank">topics.bloomberg.com/hurricane-sandy/</a>)</i></div>
<div style="border: 0px; font-family: inherit; font-style: inherit; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;">
</div>
<div style="border: 0px; font-size: 15px; line-height: 21px; padding: 0px 0px 0.7em; vertical-align: baseline;">
And bear in mind that, due to inertia in the climate system, even if we stopped emitting CO2 tomorrow, there is still more destabilization in the pipeline – warming and its resulting ‘wacky weather’ that will persist for centuries and even millennia. That means significantly <i>more</i> arctic melting, <i>more</i> sea-level rise,<i>more</i> jet stream convulsions, <i>more</i> extreme weather events – the heat-waves, the droughts, the deluges, the hurricanes, the derechos. </div>
<div style="border: 0px; font-size: 15px; line-height: 21px; padding: 0px 0px 0.7em; vertical-align: baseline;">
…And all the while, arctic methane feedbacks loom. If you have the stomach for it, watch this 20min video about the dire situation unfolding up North:<a class="external" href="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iSsPHytEnJM" style="border: 0px; color: #6d8d3b; font-family: inherit; font-style: inherit; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;" target="_blank">http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iSsPHytEnJM</a>. We are children with hammers, banging on armed thermonuclear warheads. Clink. Clink. Clink-clink. Clunk…uh oh.</div>
<div style="border: 0px; font-size: 15px; line-height: 21px; padding: 0px 0px 0.7em; vertical-align: baseline;">
In short, our sputtering fossil-fuel orgy is in the process of turning the stable Holocene into an ‘evil funhouse’ climate straight out of a nightmare – one where horrifying surprises pop up ever more frequently, where normal weather patterns are grotesquely and dangerously distorted, where we are increasingly helpless in our efforts to ‘adapt’ to a climate that appears more and more like it’s trying to kill us.</div>
<div style="border: 0px; font-size: 15px; line-height: 21px; padding: 0px 0px 0.7em; vertical-align: baseline;">
…And all of this, of course, does not bode well for human agriculture. </div>
<div align="center" style="border: 0px; font-family: inherit; font-style: inherit; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;">
<img alt="" border="0" src="http://www.resilience.org/articles/General/2013/03_Mar/Agriculture-stops/image013.jpg" style="border: 0px; font-family: inherit; font-style: inherit; margin: 10px 20px 10px 0px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;" /></div>
<div align="center" style="border: 0px; font-family: inherit; font-style: inherit; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;">
<i>Source: <a class="external" href="http://thinkprogress.org/climate/2012/03/23/450537/warming-fueled-texas-drought-cost-farmers-76-billion-no-one-alive-has-seen-drought-damage-this-extent/" style="border: 0px; color: #6d8d3b; font-family: inherit; font-style: inherit; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;" target="_blank">thinkprogress.org/climate/2012/03/23/450537/warming-fueled-texas-drought-cost-farmers-76-billion-no-one-alive-has-seen-drought-damage-this-extent/</a></i></div>
<div style="border: 0px; font-family: inherit; font-style: inherit; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;">
</div>
<div style="border: 0px; font-size: 15px; line-height: 21px; padding: 0px 0px 0.7em; vertical-align: baseline;">
<br /></div>
<div style="border: 0px; font-size: 15px; line-height: 21px; padding: 0px 0px 0.7em; vertical-align: baseline;">
<b style="font-family: 'DIN Next W01 Medium'; font-size: 17px; font-weight: normal; line-height: 22px;">IV. The Coming Failure of Holocene-adapted Agriculture</b></div>
<div style="border: 0px; font-size: 15px; line-height: 21px; padding: 0px 0px 0.7em; vertical-align: baseline;">
Let me tell you a secret: Human agriculture is no longer a given. This is, of course, only a ‘secret’ because so many people these days have so little knowledge of agriculture, climate, or ecology. …But it’s true: the 10,000 year-old agricultural experiment may soon be coming to an end.</div>
<div style="border: 0px; font-size: 15px; line-height: 21px; padding: 0px 0px 0.7em; vertical-align: baseline;">
Human agriculture is, despite our culture’s unthinking faith in its inevitability, an exceedingly-fragile, three-legged stool resting on the shaky legs of (1) Holocene-like climate stability, (2) culturally-preserved genetics and agricultural knowledge, and (3) the health of the soil and surrounding ecosystems. Knock out any one of those and the stool comes a-tumblin’ down. And a culture blinks out.</div>
<div style="border: 0px; font-size: 15px; line-height: 21px; padding: 0px 0px 0.7em; vertical-align: baseline;">
Because, contrary to popular opinion here in the spastic endgame of our death-dealing civilization, agriculture <i>doesn’t</i> come from shiny tractor dealerships, sacks of genetically-engineered ‘miracle’ seeds, heaping piles of fertilizer, tanks of [insert organism]icide, irrigation pipes, six-figure bank loans, and an ‘essentially-infinite’ torrent of fossil fuels. No -- it comes from the Earth, from the skies, from our bodies, and from a complex (and often heartbreakingly destructive) culture passed down from generation to generation . </div>
<div style="border: 0px; font-size: 15px; line-height: 21px; padding: 0px 0px 0.7em; vertical-align: baseline;">
...And without any thought to the consequences or to developing alternatives, we’re doing our damndest to snuff it out. Indeed, a lethal one-two-three punch of climate destabilization, accumulated/ongoing industrial depredations, and the chaos unleashed by a collapsing civilization will very likely bring human agriculture to its knees – possibly within the next few decades, and almost certainly within this century.</div>
<div style="border: 0px; font-size: 15px; line-height: 21px; padding: 0px 0px 0.7em; vertical-align: baseline;">
So here’s a quick anatomy of our agricultural train-wreck, already in progress: </div>
<div style="border: 0px; font-size: 15px; line-height: 21px; margin-left: 0.25in; padding: 0px 0px 0.7em; vertical-align: baseline;">
1. <b style="font-family: 'DIN Next W01 Medium'; font-size: 17px; font-weight: normal; line-height: 22px;">Climatic Destabilization:</b></div>
<div style="border: 0px; font-size: 15px; line-height: 21px; margin-left: 0.25in; padding: 0px 0px 0.7em; vertical-align: baseline;">
The climatic requirement for agricultural viability represents a relatively narrow range – in both magnitude and timing – of a number of key variables: temperature, water (in the form of both rainfall and snowmelt), wind, and climate-influenced pest/disease densities. </div>
<div style="border: 0px; font-size: 15px; line-height: 21px; margin-left: 0.25in; padding: 0px 0px 0.7em; vertical-align: baseline;">
Unfortunately, crops born of Holocene-era climate stability and further embrittled by industrial, fossil-fueled coddling and yield-maximization are sitting ducks for the kind of wacky, extreme weather they will increasingly face. Decade-long crippling droughts, weeks of ultra-extreme high temperatures, surprise late-Spring freezes from a tortured jet stream, erosive levee-bursting deluges, salinization of delta farmland from increasingly-common and severe coastal storm surges, brutal outbreaks of weather-influenced pests and disease, and violent storms with crop-flattening winds – these are the kinds of things we’ll be dealing with. And not once a decade, but likely <i>every</i> <i>year</i> – several <i>times</i> a year! </div>
<div style="border: 0px; font-size: 15px; line-height: 21px; margin-left: 0.25in; padding: 0px 0px 0.7em; vertical-align: baseline;">
That’s the climate we’re making -- and it’s simply not the one Holocene agriculture signed up for. And note again that this climate destabilization is not academic speculation or merely a reading of the climate-model tea leaves – it’s what we’re <i>already</i> seeing. It’s <i>already</i> bad and <i>already</i> worsening exponentially. (See<a class="external" href="http://thinkprogress.org/climate/2012/12/21/1278861/climate-story-of-the-year-extreme-weather-from-superstorms-to-drought-emerges-as-political-scientific-gamechanger/" style="border: 0px; color: #6d8d3b; font-family: inherit; font-style: inherit; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;" target="_blank">http://thinkprogress.org/climate/2012/12/21/1278861/climate-story-of-the-year-extreme-weather-from-superstorms-to-drought-emerges-as-political-scientific-gamechanger/</a>, as well as the climate references above.) </div>
<div style="border: 0px; font-size: 15px; line-height: 21px; margin-left: 0.25in; padding: 0px 0px 0.7em; vertical-align: baseline;">
<i>2. </i><b style="font-family: 'DIN Next W01 Medium'; font-size: 17px; font-weight: normal; line-height: 22px;">Loss of Agricultural Genetics, Technology, and Knowledge:</b></div>
<div style="border: 0px; font-size: 15px; line-height: 21px; margin-left: 0.25in; padding: 0px 0px 0.7em; vertical-align: baseline;">
The second key requirement for human agricultural is the suite of culturally-preserved genetics (plant & animal) and accumulated agricultural technology/knowledge available to farmers.</div>
<div style="border: 0px; font-size: 15px; line-height: 21px; margin-left: 0.25in; padding: 0px 0px 0.7em; vertical-align: baseline;">
I think it scarcely needs to be said here that virtually the entire toolkit of industrial agricultural technology -- the fossil-fuel powered machines, the industrial chemical-dependent crop varieties and animal breeds, and the knowledge of how to manage such technologies -- will be next to useless without fossil fuels. And sometime soon, we just won’t have fossil fuels to kick around anymore. Why not? Because the remaining ‘difficult half’ of fossil fuels – tricky enough to access with the industrial machine still humming along – will certainly remain in their dark geologic tombs once the economic wheels come off. (And just in case, it will be up to the post-collapse ‘monkey-wrench gangs’ to ensure they do. Long live Edward Abbey! Long live Derrick Jensen! Long live…you?)</div>
<div style="border: 0px; font-size: 15px; line-height: 21px; margin-left: 0.25in; padding: 0px 0px 0.7em; vertical-align: baseline;">
So where does that leave us? It leaves us depending on agricultural genetics, technology, and knowledge that served us in pre-industrial times. And unfortunately for human agriculture, a massive and mostly-unacknowledged loss of these resources has been occurring during the industrial era – a loss that has rapidly accelerated in recent decades. (Now, I fully realize the destructiveness of many pre-industrial annuals-based agricultural practices -- and one could well argue ‘good-riddance’ -- but I’ll address that later in the essay when I discuss recommendations for the future.) </div>
<div style="border: 0px; font-size: 15px; line-height: 21px; margin-left: 0.25in; padding: 0px 0px 0.7em; vertical-align: baseline;">
Diverse place-adapted pre-industrial varieties of crops and breeds of domesticated animals, each with their special attributes, have been increasingly sacrificed to a relative small number of industrial varieties and breeds with the narrowest of attributes: yield maximization in a high-input, fossil-fuel-drenched system. This is unfortunate, of course, because a wide genetic variety will be needed to handle the challenging, unpredictable, low-input conditions that Anthropocene (Funhousocene?) agriculture will certainly face. </div>
<div style="border: 0px; font-size: 15px; line-height: 21px; margin-left: 0.25in; padding: 0px 0px 0.7em; vertical-align: baseline;">
Need a chicken that doesn’t keel over in two weeks of 115 <sup>o</sup>F heat? Oh sorry, that breed was lost. Need a deeply-rooted, sprawling apple tree that can withstand 100 mph winds…twice a year? Sorry. Re-breeding will, of course, be possible and necessary (more on that later), but for some crops suffering significant genetic losses, breeding the required genetic varieties from the pathetically narrow set of genetics that ultimately squeeze through the bottleneck may be very slow. And in some cases, the genetic losses will be so extreme that re-breeding will be effectively impossible – like trying to re-breed a passenger pigeon.</div>
<div style="border: 0px; font-size: 15px; line-height: 21px; margin-left: 0.25in; padding: 0px 0px 0.7em; vertical-align: baseline;">
Likewise, pre-industrial agriculture technology and knowledge have also been hemorrhaging, especially since the industrial war machine turned its cold, metallic eyes towards agriculture after WWII. It’s a familiar story: old-time farmer with place-based knowledge dies, kids in city sell farm to industrial farmer, old-time technology rusts away beside the collapsing barn, many kinds of crucial knowledge blink out.</div>
<div style="border: 0px; font-size: 15px; line-height: 21px; margin-left: 0.25in; padding: 0px 0px 0.7em; vertical-align: baseline;">
How many people will remember <i>how</i> to grow, harvest, and process our crops without fossil fuels? How many people will remember how to propagate and breed all the new plant or animal varieties we’ll need? How many people will remember how to preserve and store the harvest for the lean early-Spring months? (How many people remember that there even <i>are</i>lean months of the year?) And how will we disperse our remaining fragmented knowledge and technology at a time when long-distance travel and communication for the spreading of these agricultural necessities will likely be close to nil? </div>
<div style="border: 0px; font-size: 15px; line-height: 21px; margin-left: 0.25in; padding: 0px 0px 0.7em; vertical-align: baseline;">
And then there’s the whole war thing. Namely, that the already-severe loss of the pre-industrial genetics, technology, and knowledge will be further exacerbated by the social strife, war, and population dislocations that will certainly accompany the unraveling of the industrial fabric and the climate catastrophes-to-come. Varieties, breeds, technology, and knowledge that have been carefully safeguarded from the industrial shredder for generations in back-yard gardens, small farms, and seed-banks can and will be lost in just a single ‘unfortunate incident’. …And there will certainly be no shortage of ‘unfortunate incidents’ to choose from as we careen onward and downward from here. </div>
<div style="border: 0px; font-size: 15px; line-height: 21px; margin-left: 0.25in; padding: 0px 0px 0.7em; vertical-align: baseline;">
So now close your eyes and mentally layer these lost genetics, technologies, and knowledge onto the toxic disruptions from climate destabilization. What do you get? Well, you get an agriculture that barely works. Hmmm…can’t wait! But, of course, we’re not even done yet: </div>
<div style="border: 0px; font-size: 15px; line-height: 21px; margin-left: 0.25in; padding: 0px 0px 0.7em; vertical-align: baseline;">
3. <b style="font-family: 'DIN Next W01 Medium'; font-size: 17px; font-weight: normal; line-height: 22px;">Ecosystem degradation:</b></div>
<div style="border: 0px; font-size: 15px; line-height: 21px; margin-left: 0.25in; padding: 0px 0px 0.7em; vertical-align: baseline;">
The third ‘key requirement’ for the viability of human agriculture is adequate health of the soil and surrounding ecosystems.</div>
<div style="border: 0px; font-size: 15px; line-height: 21px; margin-left: 0.25in; padding: 0px 0px 0.7em; vertical-align: baseline;">
Try this: Look around you. Marvel at the deep rich topsoil outside your door – fertile topsoil that runs deep right up to the top of the nearby mountain. And at the foot of the mountain, refresh yourself from the cold, gushing spring that pours out from beneath the boulder. And now follow the stream down to the crystal-clear river under the cool shade of the huge old-growth trees – now walk across. That’s right, walk across on the backs of the fish, so thick in the water that the surface boils.</div>
<div style="border: 0px; font-size: 15px; line-height: 21px; margin-left: 0.25in; padding: 0px 0px 0.7em; vertical-align: baseline;">
…Now snap out of it. …Sorry about that. It hurts, doesn’t it? As the great tracker/teacher Jon Young has said, “We have lost <i>so</i> much.” It breaks your heart. But even beyond the deflating spiritual implications, all our ecosystem degradations are certainly going to come back to bite us physically, as we stumble into the gathering train-wreck of Anthropocene agriculture. …And they <i>will</i> bite us hard.</div>
<div style="border: 0px; font-size: 15px; line-height: 21px; margin-left: 0.25in; padding: 0px 0px 0.7em; vertical-align: baseline;">
Why? Because as the fossil fuel platform of industrial agriculture blinks out, we’ll need to rely on these ecosystems more than ever (the soil nutrients and communities, the groundwater, the streams and rivers, the pollinators and the other ‘beneficial’ insects, birds, and amphibians, etc.) to furnish all the agricultural services that fossil fuels once myopically provided for us. And perversely, these are the very treasures that fossil-fueled agriculture was so good at destroying – to the point that many currently-‘productive’ agricultural regions are so ecologically-denuded that we’re in for a very rude awakening once the fossil fuel spigot runs dry and we try in vain to coax food from them. </div>
<div style="border: 0px; font-size: 15px; line-height: 21px; margin-left: 0.25in; padding: 0px 0px 0.7em; vertical-align: baseline;">
For example, take the Central Valley, California, post-collapse: Soil fertility? Gone. Soil communities? Gone. Aquifers and springs? Gone. Pollinators? Gone. Mountain snowmelt? Gone. Rainfall? Wacky. Agricultural potential? Gone. …Now try this exercise in the long-abused-but-now-fossil-fuel-deprived heartlands of Texas, Illinois, etc. Now try it at home. <i>Fun!</i></div>
<div style="border: 0px; font-size: 15px; line-height: 21px; margin-left: 0.25in; padding: 0px 0px 0.7em; vertical-align: baseline;">
And don’t forget to layer on that additional legacy of our modern insanity: the persistent toxins that lie as industrial booby traps all over this great land of ours – in the aging nuclear reactors, in the brimming industrial ‘retention’ ponds, in the soils, the water, the animals, our bodies. Think of the bio-accumulating heavy metals, the PCBs, the radioactive ‘hot particles’ – health-compromising poisons that are both already present in excessive amounts and ready to flood over our communities en masse from their temporary repositories once the feeble industrial safeguards melt away with collapse. …So like the present-day farmers of Fukushima, many of us will indeed be raising radioactive cesium from the soil along with our post-collapse fruits, nuts, and veggies. Yum. ...Hey, what’s this lump? </div>
<div style="border: 0px; font-size: 15px; line-height: 21px; margin-left: 0.25in; padding: 0px 0px 0.7em; vertical-align: baseline;">
So we are about to ‘discover’ (surprise!) that human agriculture indeed has an ecological foundation – and that this foundation is either severely eroded, toxic, or just plain gone. …All of which sort of sucks if your goal is to feed yourself, your family, and your community. </div>
<div style="border: 0px; font-size: 15px; line-height: 21px; padding: 0px 0px 0.7em; vertical-align: baseline;">
…But hey, no worries – human agriculture’s a given, right? </div>
<div style="border: 0px; font-size: 15px; line-height: 21px; margin-left: 0.25in; padding: 0px 0px 0.7em; vertical-align: baseline;">
</div>
<div style="border: 0px; font-size: 15px; line-height: 21px; padding: 0px 0px 0.7em; vertical-align: baseline;">
<b style="font-family: 'DIN Next W01 Medium'; font-size: 17px; font-weight: normal; line-height: 22px;">V. The Hazy Future of Human Food</b></div>
<div style="border: 0px; font-size: 15px; line-height: 21px; padding: 0px 0px 0.7em; vertical-align: baseline;">
Now, I find no joy in being a ‘Danny Downer’ here, but there just seems to be an awful lot conspiring against our ability to grow food in the decades ahead. And I<i>do</i> realize I have no divine knowledge; I fully understand that these are complex systems interlinked in complex ways, resulting in an awful lot of possible futures. But when you start to weight those futures based on the apparent biophysical trajectories of all-things-agricultural (climate change, loss of genetics, soil degradation, economic collapse, etc.), it just doesn’t look too promising.</div>
<div style="border: 0px; font-size: 15px; line-height: 21px; padding: 0px 0px 0.7em; vertical-align: baseline;">
So as a way to visualize where we may be headed, I made a little chart plotting the possible climate destabilization versus the possible loss of agricultural genetics/technology/knowledge. I’m holding the degree of ecosystem degradation as a constant here – an approximation, of course, since it <i>is</i> linked to the other variables. I do this because I suspect that such degradation is (sadly) the most predictable of the three key factors discussed in the last section.</div>
<div style="border: 0px; font-size: 15px; line-height: 21px; padding: 0px 0px 0.7em; vertical-align: baseline;">
<br /></div>
<div align="center" style="border: 0px; font-family: inherit; font-style: inherit; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;">
<i><img alt="" border="0" src="http://www.resilience.org/articles/General/2013/03_Mar/Agriculture-stops/image015.gif" style="border: 0px; font-family: inherit; font-style: inherit; margin: 10px 20px 10px 0px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;" /></i></div>
<div align="center" style="border: 0px; font-family: inherit; font-style: inherit; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;">
<b style="font-family: 'DIN Next W01 Medium'; font-size: 17px; font-weight: normal; line-height: 22px;"><i>Figure 4.</i></b><i> Human food-acquisition in the Anthropocene. Different food acquisition strategies will be possible based on different (as-yet-to-be-determined) degrees of climate destabilization and loss of agricultural genetics/technology/knowledge. Both scale and technological complexity decrease upwards and to the right – as each of the variables becomes more degraded. </i></div>
<div style="border: 0px; font-family: inherit; font-style: inherit; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;">
</div>
<div style="border: 0px; font-size: 15px; line-height: 21px; padding: 0px 0px 0.7em; vertical-align: baseline;">
So how do we interpret this graph? Different regions of the graph correspond to different food acquisition strategies that may be possible under various (as-yet-to-be-determined…but looking worse every day) combinations of climate destabilization and genetics/technology/knowledge-losses. </div>
<div style="border: 0px; font-size: 15px; line-height: 21px; padding: 0px 0px 0.7em; vertical-align: baseline;">
My (not-exactly-earth-shattering) thesis here is that increased climate destabilization and increased genetics/technology/knowledge-losses will necessarily reduce both the scale and technological complexity of human agriculture. They will simply reduce what is possible. First fossil fuel agriculture blinks out. Then progressively simpler forms of agriculture blink out. And at some point, <i>any</i> form of agriculture becomes non-viable as a sole provider of food and must be supplemented with hunting and gathering. Beyond that, only hunting and gathering become viable. And beyond that, no food acquisition strategies are effective, and the population blinks out.</div>
<div style="border: 0px; font-size: 15px; line-height: 21px; padding: 0px 0px 0.7em; vertical-align: baseline;">
What I think <i>is</i> vital about the graph is that it’s a conversation we are <i>not</i> having -- and one that we really need to <i>start </i>having. We need to stop pretending human agriculture is a given – and especially to stop pretending that we will be able to feed ourselves using the same fragile, annuals-based, fossil-energy-dependent agriculture we now employ. …Because we certainly won’t. And heck, we might not be able to employ any agriculture <i>at all</i> – at least not as it’s now recognized.</div>
<div style="border: 0px; font-size: 15px; line-height: 21px; padding: 0px 0px 0.7em; vertical-align: baseline;">
And beyond that, we need to start saying that, yea, the stakes of our industrial depredations are rising <i>so</i> high that we actually need to invoke the dreaded “E” words here – extirpation and extinction. We need to stop telling ourselves that, by continuing our wicked industrial ways, we’re only endangering ‘the economy’ or ‘growth’ or ‘prosperity’ or ‘our standing as a nation.’ <i>Fuck</i> that. …We’re endangering our <i>lives</i>. We’re endangering the lives of our <i>children</i>. We’re endangering the lives of every living <i>being</i> on the planet. <i>Those</i> are the stakes here, and if we’re hell-bent on offing ourselves for the sake of double-caramel lattes, we should at least have the pseudo-dignity to acknowledge it and maybe sort of apologize to everything we’re taking down with us.</div>
<div style="border: 0px; font-size: 15px; line-height: 21px; padding: 0px 0px 0.7em; vertical-align: baseline;">
(deep breath)</div>
<div style="border: 0px; font-size: 15px; line-height: 21px; padding: 0px 0px 0.7em; vertical-align: baseline;">
So there. And aside from just being kind of scary (or inspiring, I suppose, if you rejoice at the demise of ecosystem-degrading human agriculture), the graph above does have practical implications, which I’ll discuss in the next section.</div>
<div style="border: 0px; font-size: 15px; line-height: 21px; padding: 0px 0px 0.7em; vertical-align: baseline;">
<br /></div>
<div style="border: 0px; font-size: 15px; line-height: 21px; padding: 0px 0px 0.7em; vertical-align: baseline;">
<a href="http://www.blogger.com/blogger.g?blogID=439180943121365896" name="references" style="border: 0px; color: #6d8d3b; font-family: inherit; font-style: inherit; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; text-decoration: underline; vertical-align: baseline;"><b style="font-family: 'DIN Next W01 Medium'; font-size: 17px; font-weight: normal; line-height: 22px;">References</b></a></div>
<div style="border: 0px; font-size: 15px; line-height: 21px; padding: 0px 0px 0.7em; vertical-align: baseline;">
Here are some key resources to both back up the stuff I’m going to talk about and help people move ahead with the good work we need to do. </div>
<div style="border: 0px; font-size: 15px; line-height: 21px; padding: 0px 0px 0.7em; vertical-align: baseline;">
<b style="font-family: 'DIN Next W01 Medium'; font-size: 17px; font-weight: normal; line-height: 22px;">A. Climate</b></div>
<ul style="border: 0px; font-family: inherit; font-style: inherit; margin: 0px 0px 0px 15px; padding: 0px 0px 0.7em; vertical-align: baseline;">
<li style="border: 0px; font-family: inherit; font-style: inherit; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;">Joe Romm: <a class="external" href="http://thinkprogress.org/climate/2012/10/14/1009121/science-of-global-warming-impacts-guide/" style="border: 0px; color: #6d8d3b; font-family: inherit; font-style: inherit; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;" target="_blank">http://thinkprogress.org/climate/2012/10/14/1009121/science-of-global-warming-impacts-guide/</a></li>
<li style="border: 0px; font-family: inherit; font-style: inherit; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;"><a class="external" href="http://thinkprogress.org/climate/2012/12/21/1278861/climate-story-of-the-year-extreme-weather-from-superstorms-to-drought-emerges-as-political-scientific-gamechanger/" style="border: 0px; color: #6d8d3b; font-family: inherit; font-style: inherit; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;" target="_blank">http://thinkprogress.org/climate/2012/12/21/1278861/climate-story-of-the-year-extreme-weather-from-superstorms-to-drought-emerges-as-political-scientific-gamechanger/</a></li>
<li style="border: 0px; font-family: inherit; font-style: inherit; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;"><a class="external" href="http://thinkprogress.org/climate/2012/11/26/1219981/new-scientist-7-reasons-climate-change-is-even-worse-than-we-thought/" style="border: 0px; color: #6d8d3b; font-family: inherit; font-style: inherit; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;" target="_blank">http://thinkprogress.org/climate/2012/11/26/1219981/new-scientist-7-reasons-climate-change-is-even-worse-than-we-thought/</a></li>
<li style="border: 0px; font-family: inherit; font-style: inherit; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;">James Hansen: <a class="external" href="http://www.columbia.edu/~jeh1/" style="border: 0px; color: #6d8d3b; font-family: inherit; font-style: inherit; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;" target="_blank">http://www.columbia.edu/~jeh1/</a>, and<a class="external" href="http://www.columbia.edu/~mhs119/" style="border: 0px; color: #6d8d3b; font-family: inherit; font-style: inherit; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;" target="_blank">http://www.columbia.edu/~mhs119/</a></li>
<li style="border: 0px; font-family: inherit; font-style: inherit; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;">Guy McPherson: <a class="external" href="http://guymcpherson.com/2013/01/climate-change-summary-and-update/" style="border: 0px; color: #6d8d3b; font-family: inherit; font-style: inherit; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;" target="_blank">http://guymcpherson.com/2013/01/climate-change-summary-and-update/</a>; <a class="external" href="http://guymcpherson.com/2012/11/speaking-in-louisville-and-a-couple-essays/" style="border: 0px; color: #6d8d3b; font-family: inherit; font-style: inherit; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;" target="_blank">http://guymcpherson.com/2012/11/speaking-in-louisville-and-a-couple-essays/</a> </li>
</ul>
<div style="border: 0px; font-size: 15px; line-height: 21px; padding: 0px 0px 0.7em; vertical-align: baseline;">
<b style="font-family: 'DIN Next W01 Medium'; font-size: 17px; font-weight: normal; line-height: 22px;">B. Collapse</b></div>
<ul style="border: 0px; font-family: inherit; font-style: inherit; margin: 0px 0px 0px 15px; padding: 0px 0px 0.7em; vertical-align: baseline;">
<li style="border: 0px; font-family: inherit; font-style: inherit; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;">Richard Heinberg: <i>The End of Growth: Adapting to Our New Economic Reality</i>(2011); plus the three-part 2012 update,<a href="http://www.resilience.org/stories/2012-06-11/end-growth-update-neither-borrower-nor-lender-be" style="border: 0px; color: #6d8d3b; font-family: inherit; font-style: inherit; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;">http://www.resilience.org/stories/2012-06-11/end-growth-update-neither-borrower-nor-lender-be</a></li>
<li style="border: 0px; font-family: inherit; font-style: inherit; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;">Chris Martenson: <i>The Crash Course: The Unsustainable Future of Our Economy, Energy, and Environment</i> (2011); <a class="external" href="http://www.peakprosperity.com/" style="border: 0px; color: #6d8d3b; font-family: inherit; font-style: inherit; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;" target="_blank">http://www.peakprosperity.com/</a></li>
<li style="border: 0px; font-family: inherit; font-style: inherit; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;">David Korowicz: <a class="external" href="http://www.feasta.org/wp-content/uploads/2012/06/Trade-Off1.pdf" style="border: 0px; color: #6d8d3b; font-family: inherit; font-style: inherit; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;" target="_blank">http://www.feasta.org/wp-content/uploads/2012/06/Trade-Off1.pdf</a> (2012), <a href="http://www.resilience.org/stories/2011-05-27/world-limits-growth" style="border: 0px; color: #6d8d3b; font-family: inherit; font-style: inherit; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;">http://www.resilience.org/stories/2011-05-27/world-limits-growth</a> (2011), <a class="external" href="http://www.theoildrum.com/files/Tipping%20Point.pdf" style="border: 0px; color: #6d8d3b; font-family: inherit; font-style: inherit; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;" target="_blank">http://www.theoildrum.com/files/Tipping%20Point.pdf</a> (2010), and <a class="external" href="http://www.feasta.org/2009/06/11/david-korowicz-complexity-economy-civilisation-collapse/" style="border: 0px; color: #6d8d3b; font-family: inherit; font-style: inherit; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;" target="_blank">http://www.feasta.org/2009/06/11/david-korowicz-complexity-economy-civilisation-collapse/</a> (2009 video).</li>
</ul>
<div style="border: 0px; font-size: 15px; line-height: 21px; padding: 0px 0px 0.7em; vertical-align: baseline;">
<b style="font-family: 'DIN Next W01 Medium'; font-size: 17px; font-weight: normal; line-height: 22px;">C. Agriculture</b></div>
<ul style="border: 0px; font-family: inherit; font-style: inherit; margin: 0px 0px 0px 15px; padding: 0px 0px 0.7em; vertical-align: baseline;">
<li style="border: 0px; font-family: inherit; font-style: inherit; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;">Mark Shepard: <i>Restoration Agriculture: Real-World Permaculture for Farmers</i>(2013) …VERY HIGHLY RECOMMENDED!</li>
<li style="border: 0px; font-family: inherit; font-style: inherit; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;">Dave Jacke & Eric Toensmeier: <i>Edible</i><i> Forest Gardens</i> (2005)</li>
<li style="border: 0px; font-family: inherit; font-style: inherit; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;">Bill Mollison: <i>Permaculture: A Designer’s Manual</i> (1988)</li>
<li style="border: 0px; font-family: inherit; font-style: inherit; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;">David Holmgren: <i>Permaculture: Principles and Pathways Beyond Sustainability</i>(2002)</li>
<li style="border: 0px; font-family: inherit; font-style: inherit; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;">Permaculture videos: <a href="http://www.resilience.org/resource-detail/1470432-7-food-forests-in-7-minutes" style="border: 0px; color: #6d8d3b; font-family: inherit; font-style: inherit; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;">http://www.resilience.org/resource-detail/1470432-7-food-forests-in-7-minutes</a> and <a href="http://www.resilience.org/resource-detail/1527704-kramerterhof-a-tour-of-sepp-holzer-s" style="border: 0px; color: #6d8d3b; font-family: inherit; font-style: inherit; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;">http://www.resilience.org/resource-detail/1527704-kramerterhof-a-tour-of-sepp-holzer-s</a></li>
<li style="border: 0px; font-family: inherit; font-style: inherit; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;">Eric Toensmeier: <i>Perennial Vegetables</i> (2007)</li>
<li style="border: 0px; font-family: inherit; font-style: inherit; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;">Joseph Jenkins: <i>The Humanure Handbook: A Guide to Composting Human Manure</i> (2005)</li>
<li style="border: 0px; font-family: inherit; font-style: inherit; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;">P.A. Yeomans: <i>Water For Every Farm: Yeoman’s Keyline Plan</i> (2008)</li>
<li style="border: 0px; font-family: inherit; font-style: inherit; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;">Janisse Ray: <i>The Seed Underground: A Growing Revolution to Save Food</i>(2012)</li>
<li style="border: 0px; font-family: inherit; font-style: inherit; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;">Carol Deppe: <i>The Resilient Gardener: Food Production and Self-Reliance in Uncertain Times</i> (2010)</li>
<li style="border: 0px; font-family: inherit; font-style: inherit; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;">Sandor Katz: <i>The Art of Fermentation: An In-Depth Exploration of Essential Concepts and Processes from Around the World</i> (2012)</li>
<li style="border: 0px; font-family: inherit; font-style: inherit; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;">Mike & Nancy Bubel: <i>Root Cellaring: Natural Cold Storage of Fruits & Vegetables</i> (1991)</li>
</ul>
<div style="border: 0px; font-size: 15px; line-height: 21px; padding: 0px 0px 0.7em; vertical-align: baseline;">
<b style="font-family: 'DIN Next W01 Medium'; font-size: 17px; font-weight: normal; line-height: 22px;">D. Hunting and Gathering</b></div>
<ul style="border: 0px; font-family: inherit; font-style: inherit; margin: 0px 0px 0px 15px; padding: 0px 0px 0.7em; vertical-align: baseline;">
<li style="border: 0px; font-family: inherit; font-style: inherit; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;">Samuel Thayer: <i>Natures</i><i> Garden</i><i>: A guide to Identifying, Harvesting, and Preparing Wild Plants</i> (2010); <i>The Forager’s Harvest: A guide to Identifying, Harvesting, and Preparing Wild Plants</i> (2006)</li>
<li style="border: 0px; font-family: inherit; font-style: inherit; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;">Richo Cech: <i>Making Plant Medicine</i> (2000)</li>
<li style="border: 0px; font-family: inherit; font-style: inherit; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;">Jon Young: <i>Animal Tracking Basics</i> (2007); <i>What the Robin Knows: How Birds Reveal the Secrets of the Natural World</i> (2012)</li>
<li style="border: 0px; font-family: inherit; font-style: inherit; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;">Paul Rezendes: <i>Tracking and the Art of Seeing: How to Read Animal Tracks and Sign</i> (1999)</li>
<li style="border: 0px; font-family: inherit; font-style: inherit; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;">Tom Brown: <i>Tom Brown’s Field Guide to Wilderness Survival</i> (1987);<i>Grandfather: A Native American’s Lifelong Search for Truth and Harmony with Nature</i> (2001)</li>
</ul>
</div>
<div class="blogger-post-footer">http://kjpermaculture.blogspot.com/feeds/posts/default
<p id="blogfeeds"><$BlogFeedsVertical$></p>
<p id="postfeeds"><$BlogItemFeedLinks$></p></div>Anonymoushttp://www.blogger.com/profile/03009370115428649864noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-439180943121365896.post-77318092364256047852013-03-05T15:12:00.000-05:002013-03-05T23:00:02.679-05:00Redesigning Agriculture in Nature's Image<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
</div>
<div style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;">
<img src="http://www.forestag.com/uploads/3/4/5/4/3454670/7381128.jpg" /></div>
<div style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;">
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Mark Shepard of Viola, Wisconsin speaks to organic farmers about his permaculture farm, his experiences and techniques in modeling agriculture after natural, 3-dimensional ecosystems using tree and shrub agroforestry, keyline water management, rotational grazing, and more.<br /><br /> He also explains why it is imperative that we take up these techniques immediately and on a large scale in order to sequester carbon, combat climate change, stop soil erosion, deal with peak oil, improve our air, water, and wildlife habitat, all while being more resilient and financially-viable than conventional monoculture farming.</span><span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><span style="background-color: white; color: #333333;"><a href="http://www.forestag.com/index.html">http://www.forestag.com/index.html</a></span>
<br /><span style="background-color: white; color: #333333; line-height: 17px;"><br /></span>
<iframe allowfullscreen="" frameborder="0" height="315" src="http://www.youtube.com/embed/kb_t-sVVzF0" width="420"></iframe></span></div>
<br />
<br />
<span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;">[Thank you PJ Chmiel for creating this video. (You can subscribe to <a href="https://www.youtube.com/user/pjchmiel?feature=watch">his YouTube videos</a>)]</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><br /></span>
<br />
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><b>Redesigning Agriculture in Nature's Image</b></span><br />
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Annual monocropping produces nearly all of the grain, meat, vegetables, and processed foods consumed today. These practices require giant machinery, tilling, and the application of chemical pesticides and fertilizers, resulting in the eradication of biodiversity, the erosion of topsoil, and contributes 30% of global carbon emissions - more than from any other source. </span><br />
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Despite the massive human efforts applied to farming, we are woefully short of the inherent resilience, stability, and outright beauty of natural ecosystems. We need look no further than native ecosystems for a template of how to move forward from the many woes of annual monocropping. This is our goal and mission: Redesigning Agriculture in Nature's Image. </span><br />
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">By intentionally designing and planting perennial ecosystems, we remove carbon dioxide from the air, provide habitat for wildlife, produce food, prevent soil erosion, and begin the creation of ecologically sustainable human habitats. Whether you call it Permaculture, Agroforestry, Eco-Agriculture, Agroecology, or Restoration Agriculture; Forest Agriculture Enterprises is here to provide the <a href="http://www.forestag.com/trees.html">plants</a>, <a href="http://www.forestag.com/consulting.html">technical assistance</a>, and <a href="http://www.forestag.com/processing.html">equipment</a> to help create a healthier, more ecologically sustainable world.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Does this actually work in reality? Will it really produce enough, food, fuel, timber and human necessities to economically viable? We firmly believe the answer is yes, and are working on providing demonstration sites, and economic farming models to answer that question with more certainty. New Forest Farm is perhaps the most complete of such demonstrations sites. It is a farm in SW wisconsin that was founded in 1994 by Mark and Jen Shepard. New Forest Farm has in many ways proven the concept successful. It is a living, breathing, productive 110 acre restored savanna farm that produces abundant food, fiber, and fuels.</span><br />
<br />
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Get a copy of Mark's new book <i>Restoration Agriculture</i>: <a href="http://www.forestag.com/book.html">http://www.forestag.com/book.html</a></span><div class="blogger-post-footer">http://kjpermaculture.blogspot.com/feeds/posts/default
<p id="blogfeeds"><$BlogFeedsVertical$></p>
<p id="postfeeds"><$BlogItemFeedLinks$></p></div>Anonymoushttp://www.blogger.com/profile/03009370115428649864noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-439180943121365896.post-61264097745581692192013-02-18T21:02:00.002-05:002013-03-12T18:20:12.492-05:00What Permaculture Isn’t—and Is<br />
<div class="headline_area" style="margin: 0px 0px 2.2em; padding: 0px;">
<h1 class="entry-title" style="background-color: white; color: #111111; font-family: Arial, 'Helvetica Neue', Helvetica, sans-serif; font-weight: normal; line-height: 1.364em; margin: 0px; padding: 0px;">
<span style="clear: left; float: left; font-size: small; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"></span></h1>
<h1 class="entry-title" style="background-color: white; margin: 0px; padding: 0px;">
<span style="color: #111111; font-family: Arial, 'Helvetica Neue', Helvetica, sans-serif; line-height: 1.364em;"><a href="http://www.patternliteracy.com/668-what-permaculture-isnt-and-is"><span style="font-size: large;">What Permaculture Isn’t—and Is</span></a><br /><span style="font-size: small;">by Toby Hemenway</span></span></h1>
<a href="http://www.patternliteracy.com/files/2011/09/Hemenway_Vargas-240x300.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="200" src="http://www.patternliteracy.com/files/2011/09/Hemenway_Vargas-240x300.jpg" style="color: #313131;" width="160" /></a><span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Permaculture is notoriously hard to define. A <a href="http://liberationecology.org/2012/11/14/wait-youre-studying-what-again-part-2/">recent survey</a> shows that people simultaneously believe it is a design approach, a philosophy, a movement, and a set of practices. This broad and contradiction-laden brush doesn't just make permaculture hard to describe. It can be off-putting, too. Let’s say you first encounter permaculture as a potent method of food production and are just starting to grasp that it is more than that, when someone tells you that it also includes goddess spirituality, and anti-GMO activism, and barefoot living. What would you make of that? And how many people think they've finally got the politics of permaculturists all figured out, and assume that we would logically also be vegetarians, only to find militant meat-eaters in the ranks? What kind of philosophy could possibly umbrella all those divergent views? Or is it a philosophy at all? I’m going to argue here that the most accurate and least muddled way to think of permaculture is as a design approach, and that we are often misdirected by the fact that it fits into a larger philosophy and movement which it supports. But it is not that philosophy or movement. It is a design approach for realizing a new paradigm. And we’ll find that this way of defining it is also a balm to those in other ecological design fields and technologies who get annoyed, understandably, when permaculturists tell them, “Oh, yes, your work is part of permaculture, too.”</span></div>
<div class="format_text entry-content" style="background-color: white; margin: 0px; padding: 0px;">
<div style="color: #313131; font-family: Arial, 'Helvetica Neue', Helvetica, sans-serif; line-height: 1.571em; margin-bottom: 1.571em; padding: 0px;">
Humans are a problem-solving species. We uncover challenges—How do we get food? How do we make shelter? How do we stay healthy?—and then we develop tools to solve those problems. Permaculture is one of those tools. For the last 10,000 years, agriculture and the civilization it built have been the way humans attacked the problems of meeting basic needs. Because we live on a planet that for millennia was large compared to the human population and its needs and impact, our species could focus on expanding and improving agriculture’s immense power to convert wild ecosystems into food and habitat for people, and we could ignore ecosystem health. But our industrial civilization of seven billion is chewing up ecosystems relentlessly. We are learning that without healthy ecosystems, humans—and everything else—suffer. So we cannot focus solely on the problem, “How do we meet human needs?” but must now add the words, “while preserving ecosystem health.” <a href="http://liberationecology.org/">Rafter Ferguson</a> has offered that question as a definition of permaculture. He’s onto something, though I think that “meeting human needs while preserving and increasing ecosystem health” is the <em style="margin: 0px; padding: 0px;">goal</em> of permaculture, and not its definition. But it gives some clues toward defining it, and helps untangle the knots wrapped around “What is permaculture?” It names and clarifies the problem that permaculture is trying to solve.</div>
<div style="color: #313131; font-family: Arial, 'Helvetica Neue', Helvetica, sans-serif; line-height: 1.571em; margin-bottom: 1.571em; padding: 0px;">
Thomas Kuhn, in his masterwork, <em style="margin: 0px; padding: 0px;">The Structure of Scientific Revolutions,</em> uses the word “paradigm” to mean the viewpoint that defines the problems to be solved in a particular field. Kuhn explains that the proper framing of a paradigm reduces the number of blind alleys that researchers go down by re-stating a problem in clearer terms. New paradigms usually require—and spur the development of—new tools to solve the now-reframed problem.</div>
<div style="color: #313131; font-family: Arial, 'Helvetica Neue', Helvetica, sans-serif; line-height: 1.571em; margin-bottom: 1.571em; padding: 0px;">
“Paradigm” has been trivialized through overuse and I’m sure that Kuhn is spinning in his grave. But I don’t think it’s abusing the term to view the change in humanity’s principal goal from “meeting human needs” to “meeting human needs while preserving ecosystem health” as a paradigm shift. It changes the tools that we use, and the mindset required to develop and use new, appropriate tools. It restores a relationship between people and nature that agriculture, by treating nature like a mere resource to be subjugated and consumed, had severed. Suddenly, agriculture and industrial society look like scourges and technologies of destruction, rather than the saviors of humanity that we’ve regarded them. That’s quite a shift.</div>
<div style="color: #313131; font-family: Arial, 'Helvetica Neue', Helvetica, sans-serif; line-height: 1.571em; margin-bottom: 1.571em; padding: 0px;">
Permaculture and other ecological approaches are attempts to articulate this new paradigm, by framing the problem and offering tools and strategies to pursue its solution. When the larger problem is framed so that it reveals the interdependent relationship between human needs and ecosystem health, we can more clearly see the steps to the solution. Now we can ask, what are human needs, and how can each of them be met while retaining, restoring, and improving ecosystem health? We know how to articulate human needs, and we have metrics to gauge ecosystem health. Our problem now is to reach this twinned goal, and permaculture offers us hope.</div>
<div style="color: #313131; font-family: Arial, 'Helvetica Neue', Helvetica, sans-serif; line-height: 1.571em; margin-bottom: 1.571em; padding: 0px;">
So, why, then, is permaculture so confusing to define? I think it is because in the early days of any new paradigm, the boundary between the new paradigm and the tools—mental and physical—needed to articulate and solve it is blurry. We’re confusing the mindset required to do permaculture effectively with the work of doing it. Let me give a historical example to show what I mean.</div>
<div style="color: #313131; font-family: Arial, 'Helvetica Neue', Helvetica, sans-serif; line-height: 1.571em; margin-bottom: 1.571em; padding: 0px;">
In the 18th Century, combustion was explained by something called phlogiston. Matter was thought to be composed of elements plus principles, and phlogiston was the principle of combustibility. When an element burned, it released phlogiston, and burning stopped when all was released. The residue contained the principle of calx, the true elemental substance. The theory was backed by the fact that many things, such as wood and other fuels, lose weight when they burn.</div>
<div style="color: #313131; font-family: Arial, 'Helvetica Neue', Helvetica, sans-serif; line-height: 1.571em; margin-bottom: 1.571em; padding: 0px;">
In the 1770s, cracks began to appear in phlogiston theory. Antoine Lavoisier, using careful experiments and new, accurate balances, found that many substances gained—not lost—weight when they burned. In 1771, Carl Scheele, and later Joseph Priestley and others, produced samples of a gas (the yet-unnamed oxygen) that made flames burn more brightly and longer. They called this “dephlogistonated air,” since, to fit into the theory, it had to be able to accept more phlogiston from burning substances than air could. This sort of stop-gap, convoluted reasoning is one of the first signs that a theory is failing. By 1777, Lavoisier was sure this gas was a pure element that combined with others to support burning, and began to reject phlogiston theory. Priestley and others objected; the were simply not able to recognize oxygen for what it was. They <em style="margin: 0px; padding: 0px;">knew</em> that elements contained principles, like phlogiston and calx, and these principles combined with elements, were hidden or revealed through processes such as burning, and were emitted, unchanged. The idea that a substance could chemically bond with another and be transformed did not fit their paradigm of matter. It was, literally, inconceivable. But phlogiston theory was doomed by the piling up of inconvenient facts, and by 1800, what is now called the chemical revolution had swept it away.</div>
<div style="color: #313131; font-family: Arial, 'Helvetica Neue', Helvetica, sans-serif; line-height: 1.571em; margin-bottom: 1.571em; padding: 0px;">
The rejection of phlogiston and the acceptance of the chemical revolution was logically simple—the oxygen theory of combustion snuffed out the contradictions of phlogiston—but it was cognitively difficult because of the mental barrier created by phlogiston thinking. It took a revolution in thought to see oxygen.</div>
<div style="color: #313131; font-family: Arial, 'Helvetica Neue', Helvetica, sans-serif; line-height: 1.571em; margin-bottom: 1.571em; padding: 0px;">
Many of the pioneers of this revolution called themselves natural philosophers, and they led an enormous shift in worldview that required and prompted a new way of thinking about nearly every natural phenomena and event. From the 1500s to the early 1800s, the new astronomers, chemists, and physicists were seen as radicals and a threat to the social order. They often were: Thomas Jefferson, Benjamin Franklin, and other revolutionaries were promoters of this new scientific approach based on measurement and experiment. The philosophy that guided their work was, at that time, hard to distinguish from their work itself. Nowadays we view chemistry and the other sciences bred during this tumultuous era as settled disciplines that are neatly split from politics and philosophy, but in those days, to practice chemistry or astronomy was part of a radically new worldview, and the boundaries between the scientists’ radical philosophy, the problems that it set for them to work on, and their experimental approach to those problems were not distinct.</div>
<div style="color: #313131; font-family: Arial, 'Helvetica Neue', Helvetica, sans-serif; line-height: 1.571em; margin-bottom: 1.571em; padding: 0px;">
Permaculture, like phlogiston-cramped chemistry, can’t be understood well under the old paradigm, and I think this is why it is often regarded as a movement and philosophy as well as a problem-solving approach. To grasp permaculture fully, we need to have made the shift to the new paradigm.</div>
<div style="color: #313131; font-family: Arial, 'Helvetica Neue', Helvetica, sans-serif; line-height: 1.571em; margin-bottom: 1.571em; padding: 0px;">
New tools and new paradigms mutually reinforce and strengthen one another, and permaculture is one of many examples of this. Lavoisier’s improved balances exposed inconsistencies that toppled phlogiston theory from its perch, and demanded a new way of thinking about gases and matter. In a similar vein, permaculture’s design methods such as zones, sectors, and needs-and-yields, by emphasizing relationships and consequences, reveal the weaknesses of thinking in terms of isolated events and static objects. The flaws in old-paradigm concepts like infinite growth, waste, and “externalities” become glaringly obvious under a whole-systems view. The tools encourage the new thinking, and the new paradigm helps create the appropriate tools.</div>
<div style="color: #313131; font-family: Arial, 'Helvetica Neue', Helvetica, sans-serif; line-height: 1.571em; margin-bottom: 1.571em; padding: 0px;">
Many people come to permaculture knowing that there is something wrong with the old worldview, but they don’t yet have a new paradigm to replace it. They are attracted to permaculture as better gardening or as a means of social change, and gradually adopt the new worldview as they see it overcoming the flaws and damage of the old. Others come to permaculture after shifting to this holistic paradigm because permaculture supports it and offers an approach to working within it. In both cases, it takes time to fully grasp the depth of permaculture in part because nearly all of us were raised in the old paradigm. After twenty years of practicing permaculture design, I still have trouble defining it.</div>
<div style="color: #313131; font-family: Arial, 'Helvetica Neue', Helvetica, sans-serif; line-height: 1.571em; margin-bottom: 1.571em; padding: 0px;">
Permaculture, then, is not a philosophy or worldview, and it is not a single tool, either. But to use permaculture well requires adopting a new worldview and new tools. Like the early chemists who called themselves philosophers, right now the boundary between the tools, the approach to using them, and the worldview that makes their effective use possible are blurry.</div>
<div style="color: #313131; font-family: Arial, 'Helvetica Neue', Helvetica, sans-serif; line-height: 1.571em; margin-bottom: 1.571em; padding: 0px;">
In some ways permaculture is in a class similar to the problem-solving approach called the scientific method, the experimentalist view developed by Lavoisier, Boyle, and their peers. It is not the paradigm, it is not the tools. It is the approach for using the tools—a way of working that is guided by the paradigm. So of course this is confusing. People have been arguing over what “the scientific method” is for centuries: is it deductive or inductive, does the hypothesis or the data come first? Most scientists can’t tell you. They learn the scientific method by using it, and it’s devilishly hard to explain what it is. Sound familiar?</div>
<div style="color: #313131; font-family: Arial, 'Helvetica Neue', Helvetica, sans-serif; line-height: 1.571em; margin-bottom: 1.571em; padding: 0px;">
With all this in mind, I think the definition of permaculture that must rise to the top is that it is a design approach to arrive at solutions, just as the scientific method is an experimental approach. In more concrete terms, permaculture tells how to choose from a dauntingly large toolkit—all the human technologies and strategies for living—to solve the new problem of sustainability. It is an instruction manual for solving the challenges laid out by the new paradigm of meeting human needs while enhancing ecosystem health. The relationship explicitly spelled out in that view, which connects humans to the larger, dynamic environment, forces us to think in relational terms, which is a key element of permaculture. The two sides of the relationship are explicitly named in two permaculture ethics: care for the Earth, and care for people. And knowing we need both sides of that relationship is immensely helpful in identifying the problems we need to solve. First, what are human needs? The version of the permaculture flower that I work with names some important ones: food, shelter, water, waste recycling, energy, community, health, spiritual fulfillment, justice, and livelihood. The task set out by permaculture, in the new paradigm, is to meet those needs while preserving ecosystem health, and we have metrics for assessing the latter. The way those needs are met will vary by place and culture, but the metrics of ecosystem health can be applied fairly universally.</div>
<div style="color: #313131; font-family: Arial, 'Helvetica Neue', Helvetica, sans-serif; line-height: 1.571em; margin-bottom: 1.571em; padding: 0px;">
This clarifies the task set by permaculture, and I think it also distinguishes permaculture from the philosophy—the paradigm—required to use it effectively and helps us understand why permaculture is often called a movement. Permaculturists make common cause with all the other millions of people who are shifting to the new paradigm, and it is that shift—not the design approach of permaculture that supports it—that is worthy of being called a movement. Permaculture is one approach used by this movement to solve the problems identified by the new paradigm. To do this, it operates on the level of strategies rather than techniques, but that is a subject for another essay. Because we are, in a way, still in the phlogiston era of our ecological awareness, we don’t know how to categorize permaculture, and we can confuse it with the paradigm that it helps us explore. Permaculture is not the movement of sustainability and it is not the philosophy behind it; it is the problem-solving approach the movement and the philosophy can use to meet their goals and design a world in which human needs are met while enhancing the health of this miraculous planet that supports us.</div>
<div style="color: #313131; font-family: Arial, 'Helvetica Neue', Helvetica, sans-serif; line-height: 1.571em; margin-bottom: 1.571em; padding: 0px;">
<a href="http://www.patternliteracy.com/668-what-permaculture-isnt-and-is/pc-flower-th-2" rel="attachment wp-att-671" style="color: #814c08; margin: 0px; padding: 0px;"><img alt="" class="size-large wp-image-671" height="350" src="http://www.patternliteracy.com/files/2012/11/Pc-Flower-TH1-500x350.jpg" style="border: none; margin: 0px; padding: 0px;" title="Pc Flower TH" width="500" /></a></div>
<div style="margin-bottom: 1.571em; padding: 0px;">
<span style="color: #313131; font-family: Arial, 'Helvetica Neue', Helvetica, sans-serif; line-height: 1.571em; margin: 0px; padding: 0px;">The Permaculture Flower, modified from Holmgren.</span><span style="color: #313131; font-family: Arial, Helvetica Neue, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><span style="line-height: 1.571em;"> The petals represent the basic human needs, and we work to meet them sustainably on the personal, local, and regional levels.</span></span><br />
<span style="color: #313131; font-family: Arial, Helvetica Neue, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><a href="http://www.patternliteracy.com/668-what-permaculture-isnt-and-is" style="line-height: 25.127840042114258px;">http://www.patternliteracy.com/668-what-permaculture-isnt-and-is</a><br /><br /><span style="line-height: 25.127840042114258px;">If you got some time to read more very thoughtful essays from Toby, check out: </span></span><br />
<ul style="color: #313131; font-family: Arial, 'Helvetica Neue', Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 12.727272033691406px; line-height: 17.99715805053711px; list-style: none; margin: 0px; padding: 0px;">
<li style="margin: 0px 0px 0.692em; padding: 0px;"><a href="http://www.patternliteracy.com/697-the-last-nomads-and-the-culture-of-fear" rel="bookmark" style="color: #814c08; margin: 0px; padding: 0px;" title="Click to read The Last Nomads and the Culture of Fear">The Last Nomads and the Culture of Fear</a></li>
<li style="margin: 0px 0px 0.692em; padding: 0px;"><a href="http://www.patternliteracy.com/644-saving-native-wildlife-with-invasive-plants" rel="bookmark" style="color: #814c08; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; text-decoration: initial;" title="Click to read Saving Native Wildlife with “Invasive” Plants">Saving Native Wildlife with “Invasive” Plants</a></li>
<li style="margin: 0px 0px 0.692em; padding: 0px;"><a href="http://www.patternliteracy.com/655-redistributing-wealth-upwards" rel="bookmark" style="color: #814c08; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; text-decoration: initial;" title="Click to read Redistributing Wealth—Upwards">Redistributing Wealth—Upwards</a></li>
<li style="margin: 0px 0px 0.692em; padding: 0px;"><a href="http://www.patternliteracy.com/419-fear-and-the-three-day-food-supply-3" rel="bookmark" style="color: #814c08; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; text-decoration: initial;" title="Click to read Fear and the Three-Day Food Supply">Fear and the Three-Day Food Supply</a></li>
<li style="margin: 0px 0px 0.692em; padding: 0px;"><a href="http://www.patternliteracy.com/155-ecological-patterns-land-use-and-right-livelihood" rel="bookmark" style="color: #814c08; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; text-decoration: initial;" title="Click to read Ecological Patterns, Land Use, and Right Livelihood">Ecological Patterns, Land Use, and Right Livelihood</a></li>
<li style="margin: 0px 0px 0.692em; padding: 0px;"><a href="http://www.patternliteracy.com/103-is-food-the-last-thing-to-worry-about" rel="bookmark" style="color: #814c08; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; text-decoration: initial;" title="Click to read Is Food the Last Thing to Worry About?">Is Food the Last Thing to Worry About?</a></li>
<li style="margin: 0px 0px 0.692em; padding: 0px;"><a href="http://www.patternliteracy.com/107-the-myth-of-self-reliance" rel="bookmark" style="color: #814c08; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; text-decoration: initial;" title="Click to read The Myth of Self Reliance">The Myth of Self Reliance</a></li>
<li style="margin: 0px 0px 0.692em; padding: 0px;"><a href="http://www.patternliteracy.com/116-native-plants-restoring-to-an-idea" rel="bookmark" style="color: #814c08; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; text-decoration: initial;" title="Click to read Native Plants: Restoring to an Idea">Native Plants: Restoring to an Idea</a></li>
<li style="margin: 0px 0px 0.692em; padding: 0px;"><a href="http://www.patternliteracy.com/203-is-sustainable-agriculture-an-oxymoron" rel="bookmark" style="color: #814c08; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; text-decoration: initial;" title="Click to read Is Sustainable Agriculture an Oxymoron?">Is Sustainable Agriculture an Oxymoron?</a></li>
</ul>
</div>
</div>
<div class="blogger-post-footer">http://kjpermaculture.blogspot.com/feeds/posts/default
<p id="blogfeeds"><$BlogFeedsVertical$></p>
<p id="postfeeds"><$BlogItemFeedLinks$></p></div>Anonymoushttp://www.blogger.com/profile/03009370115428649864noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-439180943121365896.post-83906908682724342152013-02-09T22:49:00.002-05:002013-02-09T22:51:15.211-05:00The perennial imperative: Breaking the land-abuse spiral of annual agriculture<br />
<h1 class="item_detail" style="border: 0px; color: #231f20; font-family: 'Amasis MT W01 Medium', serif; font-size: 48px; font-weight: inherit; line-height: 50px; margin: 0px; padding: 0px 0px 0.5em; vertical-align: baseline; width: 560px;">
The perennial imperative: Breaking the land-abuse spiral of annual agriculture</h1>
<div class="clear" style="border: 0px; clear: both; color: #56575b; font-family: 'DIN Next W01 Regular', 'Helvetica Neue', Helvetica, Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 15.454545021057129px; line-height: 16.988636016845703px; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;">
</div>
<div class="byline" style="border: 0px; color: #231f20; font-family: 'DIN Next W01 Regular', 'Helvetica Neue', Helvetica, Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 15.454545021057129px; line-height: 16.988636016845703px; margin: 0px 0px 12px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;">
by <a href="http://www.resilience.org/author-detail/1151372-dan-allen" style="border: 0px; color: #6d8d3b; font-family: inherit; font-style: inherit; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;">Dan Allen</a>, originally published by Energy Bulletin <span class="article_date" style="border: 0px; font-family: inherit; font-size: 12px; font-style: inherit; line-height: 15px; margin: 0px 0px 2px; padding: 0px; text-transform: uppercase; vertical-align: baseline;"> | MAY 31, 2011</span></div>
<div class="clear" style="border: 0px; clear: both; color: #56575b; font-family: 'DIN Next W01 Regular', 'Helvetica Neue', Helvetica, Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 15.454545021057129px; line-height: 16.988636016845703px; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;">
</div>
<div class="article_body_detail dinNormal" style="border: 0px; color: #333333; font-family: 'DIN Next W01 Regular', serif; font-size: 15.454545021057129px; line-height: 21px; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;">
<div style="border: 0px; font-size: 15px; line-height: 21px; padding: 0px 0px 0.7em; vertical-align: baseline;">
<i>“Was there ever a time since our gathering and hunting days that the planet’s capital stock has not been drawn down to support agriculture and civilization? …[A] hypothesis: Since agriculture began, humans have produced no technological product or process – including our crops and livestock – without drawing down the earth’s capital stock and, thereby, reducing the overall net primary production of its ecosystems using only contemporary sunlight.”</i> – Wes Jackson, in “The Virtues of Ignorance” (2008)</div>
<div style="border: 0px; font-size: 15px; line-height: 21px; padding: 0px 0px 0.7em; vertical-align: baseline;">
<i>“In the broadest sense, the life span of a civilization is limited by the time needed for agricultural production to occupy the available arable land and then erode through the topsoil. How long it takes to regenerate the soil…defines the time required to reestablish an agricultural civilization – providing of course that the soil is allowed to rebuild.”</i> – David R. Montgomery, in “Dirt” (2007)</div>
<div style="border: 0px; font-size: 15px; line-height: 21px; padding: 0px 0px 0.7em; vertical-align: baseline;">
<i>“What must we do? …[W]e must not work or think on a heroic scale. …We must work on a scale proper to our limited abilities. We must not break things we cannot fix. There is no justification ever for permanent ecological damage. If this imposes the verdict of guilt upon us all, so be it.”</i> – Wendell Berry,<a class="external" href="http://energybulletin.net/stories/2011-05-05/what-must-we-do" style="border: 0px; color: #6d8d3b; font-family: inherit; font-style: inherit; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;" target="_blank" title="http://energybulletin.net/stories/2011-05-05/what-must-we-do">http://energybulletin.net/stories/2011-05-05/what-must-we-do</a></div>
<div style="border: 0px; font-size: 15px; line-height: 21px; padding: 0px 0px 0.7em; vertical-align: baseline;">
SUMMARY: It’s time to admit that annual crops are an inappropriate technology. We can’t HELP but misuse them, and the consequences of their inevitable misuse are dreadful, essentially permanent, and morally unforgivable. Their use must be strictly controlled and viewed as potentially dangerous to our well-being. We must find a better way.</div>
<div style="border: 0px; font-size: 15px; line-height: 21px; padding: 0px 0px 0.7em; vertical-align: baseline;">
<b>A TEACHABLE MOMENT ON 'ADVENTURE CREEK'</b></div>
<div style="border: 0px; font-size: 15px; line-height: 21px; padding: 0px 0px 0.7em; vertical-align: baseline;">
Will it ever be possible for us to tread more carefully upon this Earth? -- To wield our clumsy power with an appropriate caution? To acknowledge and respect our unavoidable ignorance? To strop thrashing about carelessly and, in the end, diminishing all that we touch?</div>
<div style="border: 0px; font-size: 15px; line-height: 21px; padding: 0px 0px 0.7em; vertical-align: baseline;">
On bad days, I’d say no. On good days, like today, I’d say maybe.</div>
<div style="border: 0px; font-size: 15px; line-height: 21px; padding: 0px 0px 0.7em; vertical-align: baseline;">
…Listen to this:</div>
<div style="border: 0px; font-size: 15px; line-height: 21px; padding: 0px 0px 0.7em; vertical-align: baseline;">
Lately, after my daughter & nephew (6 & 7 years-old) help out in the community garden on Saturday mornings, I’ve been taking them down to a nearby wooded creek for an ‘adventure.’</div>
<div style="border: 0px; font-size: 15px; line-height: 21px; padding: 0px 0px 0.7em; vertical-align: baseline;">
Our latest quest brought us to an exposed stream-bank that featured a pretty perfect soil profile – plants in the thin dark organic O-horizon, 8-inch root-filled A-horizon, and then a thick lower layer of dense clay. While we sat there making a small arsenal of gooey clay balls with which to pelt a nearby tree (-- OK, I indulged them), I had a good opportunity to see if it was possible for little kids to grasp one of the most important earthly ideas of our species – what Wes Jackson calls, “the problem of agriculture.”</div>
<div style="border: 0px; font-size: 15px; line-height: 21px; padding: 0px 0px 0.7em; vertical-align: baseline;">
I pointed out the difference in qualities between the topsoil and the subsoil -- they got it. I showed them how plants have an easy time growing in the topsoil, but would have a tough time growing in the dense, clayey subsoil – no problem. I told them that if you plowed-up the soil surface or let the plants get eaten down too much, it was pretty easy for the topsoil to wash away – understood. I amazed them with the outrageously long time it took to build up just an inch of topsoil & thus how precious and vital it was – got it. I pointed to the mud-colored stream and asked them where the mud came from and what would be the result of it going bye-bye – they nailed it. And finally I offered them the example of my sheep-pasture/mixed-fruit-nut-orchard as an alternative form of agriculture that would hold onto the precious topsoil – slam dunk.</div>
<div style="border: 0px; font-size: 15px; line-height: 21px; padding: 0px 0px 0.7em; vertical-align: baseline;">
Two converts. OK…so that’s two down, 7 billion to go.</div>
<div style="border: 0px; font-size: 15px; line-height: 21px; padding: 0px 0px 0.7em; vertical-align: baseline;">
The key points here, and ones I hope I can drive home a bit more in this essay, are this: (1) healthy, living topsoil is THE foundation of all human life and is essentially non-renewable on human time-scales, (2) annuals-based agriculture – even almost all non-industrial versions – is inherently/inevitably wasteful of topsoil, (3) there is another type of agriculture (perennial polyculture) that inherently/inevitably BUILDS topsoil, and (4) we have not only the knowledge and opportunity to make a transition to a smarter, saner form of agriculture over the next several decades, we have a moral obligation to do so.</div>
<div style="border: 0px; font-size: 15px; line-height: 21px; padding: 0px 0px 0.7em; vertical-align: baseline;">
So yea, the three of us tackled ‘the problem of agriculture,’ pelted a silver maple with some clay balls (to the admonishment of a resident chipmunk), and went on to have, in the words of my nephew, “the best adventure ever!”</div>
<div style="border: 0px; font-size: 15px; line-height: 21px; padding: 0px 0px 0.7em; vertical-align: baseline;">
…So then how DO we stop ourselves from thrashing about so destructively? How DO we learn to be careful and respectful of our ignorance? To stop wrecking the joint? Well…maybe we just need to start teaching the right things – the important things. And then we need to start DOING the right things – the important things.</div>
<div style="border: 0px; font-size: 15px; line-height: 21px; padding: 0px 0px 0.7em; vertical-align: baseline;">
And maybe then we have a chance. …Maybe.</div>
<div style="border: 0px; font-size: 15px; line-height: 21px; padding: 0px 0px 0.7em; vertical-align: baseline;">
<b>ENTER ANNUALS, EXIT SOIL, EXIT HUMANS</b></div>
<div style="border: 0px; font-size: 15px; line-height: 21px; padding: 0px 0px 0.7em; vertical-align: baseline;">
If you have not read geomorphologist David R. Montgomery’s book “Dirt” (2007), you need to (1) find a copy, (2) brew a strong pot of tea, (3) sit down, and (4) spend a few hours staring the stark-naked truth of our species’ 10,000-year agricultural experiment dead in the face – the whole shockingly-terrible, pathetically-repetitive, tragically-avoidable truth.</div>
<div style="border: 0px; font-size: 15px; line-height: 21px; padding: 0px 0px 0.7em; vertical-align: baseline;">
(See also this interview: <a class="external" href="http://www.energybulletin.net/media/2010-08-05/deconstructing-dinner-erosion-civilizations-wdavid-montgomery-and-ronald-wright" style="border: 0px; color: #6d8d3b; font-family: inherit; font-style: inherit; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;" target="_blank" title="http://www.energybulletin.net/media/2010-08-05/deconstructing-dinner-erosion-civilizations-wdavid-montgomery-and-ronald-wright">http://www.energybulletin.net/media/2010-08-05/deconstructing-dinner-ero...</a>)</div>
<div style="border: 0px; font-size: 15px; line-height: 21px; padding: 0px 0px 0.7em; vertical-align: baseline;">
If Montgomery’s book does not horrify, shame, humble, anger, and sadden you, you have not understood it -- repeat steps 2 to 4 until you do. If it does not fundamentally change the way you think about the future of annuals-based agriculture in this country, you need to start thinking a little more seriously about agriculture.</div>
<div style="border: 0px; font-size: 15px; line-height: 21px; padding: 0px 0px 0.7em; vertical-align: baseline;">
A main theme of Montgomery’s “Soil” is this: the massive soil loss/degradation associated with annuals-based agriculture is not just an artifact of just our irresponsible 500-year colonial period, or even the frenzied industrial orgy of the past 150 years – it is an inevitable result. i.e., Wherever humans have tilled the soil and sown annuals, destruction of the soil and essentially permanent reduction of biotic potential followed – sometimes over centuries, sometimes decades, sometimes in a few disastrous years, but ALWAYS eventually.</div>
<div style="border: 0px; font-size: 15px; line-height: 21px; padding: 0px 0px 0.7em; vertical-align: baseline;">
And as soil is the foundation of every civilization, the inevitable degradation of soil subjected to annual tillage presages the end of every civilization that has chosen the annuals-based path. Because as a civilization becomes soil-challenged, the pace of soil degradation inevitably increases (for reasons I’ll go into shortly), and the civilization becomes increasingly vulnerable to a host of civilization-ending ailments on every front – agricultural, social, economic, political, and climatic/environmental.</div>
<div style="border: 0px; font-size: 15px; line-height: 21px; padding: 0px 0px 0.7em; vertical-align: baseline;">
In fact, given the preponderance of historical evidence we now have, it is not unreasonable, I think, to summarize our 10,000-year experiment with annual agriculture in the form of a general principle: Enter annuals, exit soil, exit humans.</div>
<div style="border: 0px; font-size: 15px; line-height: 21px; padding: 0px 0px 0.7em; vertical-align: baseline;">
So as a country enthusiastically washing away our top-soil as we speak – and likely set to embark on another massive erosive assault on marginal lands as industrial agriculture falters – is this not something we should maybe address like grownups at some point?</div>
<div style="border: 0px; font-size: 15px; line-height: 21px; padding: 0px 0px 0.7em; vertical-align: baseline;">
<b>THE LAND-ABUSE SPIRAL OF ANNUALS-BASED AGRICULTURE</b></div>
<div style="border: 0px; font-size: 15px; line-height: 21px; padding: 0px 0px 0.7em; vertical-align: baseline;">
So, let’s get down to the nuts and bolts of this land degradation business.</div>
<div style="border: 0px; font-size: 15px; line-height: 21px; padding: 0px 0px 0.7em; vertical-align: baseline;">
Now, it is one thing to make the cogent historical observation that annuals-based agriculture has weakened and destroyed civilizations, but it is another task to show why this end result is so inevitable – i.e. why annuals-based agriculture, for all its seductively bounteous yields, cannot HELP but self-destruct in the end. Montgomery develops this theme nicely in ‘Dirt’, but I’d like to formalize it here as a sort of general algorithm: the Land Abuse Spiral of Annuals-based Agriculture (LASAA, for you fans of annoying agricultural acronyms – AAA’s).</div>
<div style="border: 0px; font-size: 15px; line-height: 21px; padding: 0px 0px 0.7em; vertical-align: baseline;">
In a nutshell, the ‘spiral’ goes like this: (1) a few years of low agricultural yield leads to (2) economic stress in the agricultural sector, which leads to (3) the initiation or expansion of poor land-use practices, which leads to (4) soil-loss and degradation, which leads back to (1) again – lower agricultural yields. The cycle continues to spiral downward in a positive-feedback loop generating ever more soil loss/degradation and ever lower yields.</div>
<div style="border: 0px; font-size: 15px; line-height: 21px; padding: 0px 0px 0.7em; vertical-align: baseline;">
The end result, after a few years/decades/centuries of this land degradation, is a host of nasty consequences (for those living it) that go by some rather innocuous-sounding names (by those recounting or predicting it): agricultural failure, civilization collapse, rapid depopulation, and abandonment of the land. Human abandonment (or extreme population reduction) is then followed by a loooooonnnng period (hundreds or, more typically, thousands of years) of biotic impoverishment, as the geologically-slow processes of soil re-accumulation and ecosystem rebuilding occur – often from near-primary succession.</div>
<div style="border: 0px; font-size: 15px; line-height: 21px; padding: 0px 0px 0.7em; vertical-align: baseline;">
…Oh those barren, rocky hillsides of our soil-denuded homeland – land where the scrawny, rock-lickin’ goats roam!</div>
<div style="border: 0px; font-size: 15px; line-height: 21px; padding: 0px 0px 0.7em; vertical-align: baseline;">
<b>THE SPIRAL OF CERTAIN DOOM: FLESHING IT OUT A BIT</b></div>
<div style="border: 0px; font-size: 15px; line-height: 21px; padding: 0px 0px 0.7em; vertical-align: baseline;">
In the interest of space, I won’t go through the relentless, grisly accounting of historical examples of this land abuse spiral. For those of you interested (or skeptical), take a look at Montgomery’s book. He presents a veritable silted-in-dam-load of detailed examples ranging from the dawn of agriculture to the present day – from Mesopotamia to Manaus.</div>
<div style="border: 0px; font-size: 15px; line-height: 21px; padding: 0px 0px 0.7em; vertical-align: baseline;">
But in order to flesh it out the destructive spiral a bit more, consider the following slightly-more-detailed scenario. And note here that we could start at any of the four cornerstones of the land-abuse spiral of annual agriculture (LASAA!) -- but for the sake of example, let’s begin with this:</div>
<div style="border: 0px; font-size: 15px; line-height: 21px; padding: 0px 0px 0.7em; vertical-align: baseline;">
(1) Some inevitable climatic stress (severe drought, series of intense storms, extended temperature extremes) causes a reduction of agricultural yield -- e.g., lower yield per acre, per input cost, per energy input, and/or per capita.</div>
<div style="border: 0px; font-size: 15px; line-height: 21px; padding: 0px 0px 0.7em; vertical-align: baseline;">
(2) This reduction in yield contributes to stresses in the agricultural economy -- e.g., financial trouble & bankruptcies of smaller farms, loss of skilled farmers and farm-culture to cities, consolidation of small farms to absentee owners and salaried tenant farmers, increases in population as a response to social breakdown and/or economic needs of subsistence farmers, decreases of small-farm size below subsistence-level.</div>
<div style="border: 0px; font-size: 15px; line-height: 21px; padding: 0px 0px 0.7em; vertical-align: baseline;">
(3) These economic stresses contribute to poor land-care practices -- e.g., deforestation & cultivation of marginal lands (semi-arid, hillsides, drained wetlands) previously under perennial vegetation, overstocking & over-grazing of livestock, abandonment of soil-conserving techniques (berms, contour-plowing, fallowing, windbreaks, crop-rotations, and legume cover-crops), increase of farm-size above internal nutrient-cycling capacity, increased use of herbicides & pesticides, over-use of slow-recharge aquifers, and the use of ‘one-size-fits-all’ farming practices not suited to a particular field/farm/region (e.g., plowing Great Plains, irrigating deserts).</div>
<div style="border: 0px; font-size: 15px; line-height: 21px; padding: 0px 0px 0.7em; vertical-align: baseline;">
(4) These poor land-use practices contribute to soil loss & degradation – e.g., storm-water erosion from tilled fields, wind erosion, land-slides from deforested slopes, nutrient depletion, organic-matter depletion & decreased water-holding capacity, stream & riverbank erosion from more rapid storm run-off, salinization from over-irrigation of semi-arid soils, build-up of toxins in soil, and collapse of ecosystems within agricultural soils.</div>
<div style="border: 0px; font-size: 15px; line-height: 21px; padding: 0px 0px 0.7em; vertical-align: baseline;">
…and then we (tragically) return back to the start of the cycle as soil loss & degradation leads to even (1) lower yields. And on and on and on, in a positive feedback loop -- to the part where scrawny goats are licking barren rocks.</div>
<div style="border: 0px; font-size: 15px; line-height: 21px; padding: 0px 0px 0.7em; vertical-align: baseline;">
There are, of course, additional feedbacks and interconnections conceivable in real life. A fully fleshed-out diagram of the cycle could get VERY messy.</div>
<div style="border: 0px; font-size: 15px; line-height: 21px; padding: 0px 0px 0.7em; vertical-align: baseline;">
One example: Reduced agricultural yields (and the resulting high prices and scarcity) can lead to general economic/social/political stresses (e.g., failure of credit systems, rioting & social upheaval, war, breaking of supply chains) that can cascade back to economically stress the agricultural sector and accelerate the overall cycle.</div>
<div style="border: 0px; font-size: 15px; line-height: 21px; padding: 0px 0px 0.7em; vertical-align: baseline;">
Another example: Poor land-care practices can lead to a host of more general biotic-impoverishing (and food-reducing) environmental degradations in addition to soil-loss – e.g., species extinctions from agricultural expansion, siltation of rivers, dams, and estuaries, chemical contamination of drinking water, dead zones off the coasts.</div>
<div style="border: 0px; font-size: 15px; line-height: 21px; padding: 0px 0px 0.7em; vertical-align: baseline;">
And there are many other ways to get on the spiral in first place, aside from just a climate disruption. Indeed, you can hop on the spiral at any of the four ‘stops.’ For example, unwise political decisions can initiate unwise land-use practices (see Dust-Bowl era US, 1960’s-era USSR, present-day Brazil, etc.) and the ensuing spiral.</div>
<div style="border: 0px; font-size: 15px; line-height: 21px; padding: 0px 0px 0.7em; vertical-align: baseline;">
And so on.</div>
<div style="border: 0px; font-size: 15px; line-height: 21px; padding: 0px 0px 0.7em; vertical-align: baseline;">
<b>THE WORLD WILL BE A WORSE PLACE ONCE YOU HAVE PASSED ON</b></div>
<div style="border: 0px; font-size: 15px; line-height: 21px; padding: 0px 0px 0.7em; vertical-align: baseline;">
So while the web of social/political/economic/environmental/agricultural interactions is mind-numbingly messy in real life, I think the integrity of the general model holds. The positive-feedback, land-abuse cycle of annual agriculture (described above) seems to be a valid model for explaining why our annuals-based agricultural adventures (a.k.a. civilizations) have ALWAYS ended tragically. Every…single…one.</div>
<div style="border: 0px; font-size: 15px; line-height: 21px; padding: 0px 0px 0.7em; vertical-align: baseline;">
In fact, the inevitable implosion of annuals-based agriculture is as close to a universal principle as you’ll ever see in the messy chronicles of human history.</div>
<div style="border: 0px; font-size: 15px; line-height: 21px; padding: 0px 0px 0.7em; vertical-align: baseline;">
Of course, it doesn’t happen the exact same way every time. Depending on various factors (technology used, soil type, climate, socio-economic pressures, etc.), it may take anywhere from a few years to many centuries for the land to be exhausted to the point of human extirpation – but again, degradation, eventual mass-abandonment of the land, and long-term biotic impoverishment is guaranteed EVERY TIME a civilization goes down the annuals-based road.</div>
<div style="border: 0px; font-size: 15px; line-height: 21px; padding: 0px 0px 0.7em; vertical-align: baseline;">
The bottom line is this: You start down the road of annuals-based agriculture and the gradual wasting of life-giving biological capital has begun. Your days as a civilization are numbered and the world will be a worse place once you have passed on.</div>
<div style="border: 0px; font-size: 15px; line-height: 21px; padding: 0px 0px 0.7em; vertical-align: baseline;">
How’s that for an epitaph? Not exactly inspiring, huh?</div>
<div style="border: 0px; font-size: 15px; line-height: 21px; padding: 0px 0px 0.7em; vertical-align: baseline;">
<b>ANNUALS ON THE RAZOR'S EDGE</b></div>
<div style="border: 0px; font-size: 15px; line-height: 21px; padding: 0px 0px 0.7em; vertical-align: baseline;">
So having savagely excoriated the growing of annual crops, I think I should at least briefly address the times and places where annual agriculture has NOT been destructive – where it has even (for a time at least) helped to BUILD biological capital.</div>
<div style="border: 0px; font-size: 15px; line-height: 21px; padding: 0px 0px 0.7em; vertical-align: baseline;">
Because there are scores of historical (and current) examples of people NOT screwing up the Earth with annuals. Witness the skillfully tended Far-East landscapes of F.H. King’s ‘Farmers of Forty Centuries’, the mixed annual-perennial “cultura promiscua” of the early Roman era, Gene Logsdon’s small-scale grain raising, Carol Deppe’s ‘resilient gardening’, Eliot Coleman’s intensive organic production, my annual veggie garden (<a class="external" href="http://www.misty-acres-farm.com/" style="border: 0px; color: #6d8d3b; font-family: inherit; font-style: inherit; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;" target="_blank" title="http://www.misty-acres-farm.com/">http://www.misty-acres-farm.com/</a>), etc., etc.</div>
<div style="border: 0px; font-size: 15px; line-height: 21px; padding: 0px 0px 0.7em; vertical-align: baseline;">
In other words, it IS possible to do annuals right. It’s not easy, but it’s possible. The problem here is that it’s MUCH easier to do it wrong. And the consequences of doing it wrong are both dire and essentially permanent on the human civilization time-scale.</div>
<div style="border: 0px; font-size: 15px; line-height: 21px; padding: 0px 0px 0.7em; vertical-align: baseline;">
“Doing it right” requires a tenuous combination of skill, self-discipline, long-term economic/political/social stability, and maintaining the proper smallness of scale to ensure essentially closed nutrient cycling. Consider a partial list of “inconvenient” things you need to keep doing year-in and year-out to avoid slipping into the land-abuse spiral with annuals: locally-adapted crop-rotations with legumes, regular manuring, strict maintenance of berms and terraces on even mildly-sloped land, extended fallowing periods, alternating relatively thin strips of annuals with perennials, a strict avoidance of deforesting the seductively-beckoning hillsides.</div>
<div style="border: 0px; font-size: 15px; line-height: 21px; padding: 0px 0px 0.7em; vertical-align: baseline;">
Such sound and virtuous measures can and have been implemented for years, decades, and even centuries. But…then they broke down. Every time. It’s just TOO easy to fall off the good-practices wagon in this crazy mixed-up world. Humans are too fallible. The weather (increasingly) is too uncertain. Gravity is too universal. The Second Law is too relentless and unforgiving.</div>
<div style="border: 0px; font-size: 15px; line-height: 21px; padding: 0px 0px 0.7em; vertical-align: baseline;">
Once you drop it, an egg doesn’t un-break. Once you fall off the ‘good-practices’ wagon of annuals-based agriculture, topsoil doesn’t pick itself up off the sea floor and scamper back up to your cornfield in time for planting season. It’s gone.</div>
<div style="border: 0px; font-size: 15px; line-height: 21px; padding: 0px 0px 0.7em; vertical-align: baseline;">
In this sense, any civilization following the annuals-based path is very much walking on the razor’s edge of non-reversible disaster. Once the path of soil tillage and annuals-based agriculture is chosen by a civilization, it is only a matter of time before ‘something goes wrong’ and the land-abuse spiral is initiated – e.g., enter severe economic down-turn, drought, war, chaotic revolution, wave of migration & social upheaval, unwise national agricultural policies, natural disaster, industrial disaster, etc., etc., etc. Take your pick.</div>
<div style="border: 0px; font-size: 15px; line-height: 21px; padding: 0px 0px 0.7em; vertical-align: baseline;">
Every year is a roll of the dice. Every growing season. Every storm. Every drought. Every recession. Every regime change.</div>
<div style="border: 0px; font-size: 15px; line-height: 21px; padding: 0px 0px 0.7em; vertical-align: baseline;">
…And we have a winner! …Or rather, a loser!</div>
<div style="border: 0px; font-size: 15px; line-height: 21px; padding: 0px 0px 0.7em; vertical-align: baseline;">
<b>A MOST INAPPROPRIATE TECHNOLOGY</b></div>
<div style="border: 0px; font-size: 15px; line-height: 21px; padding: 0px 0px 0.7em; vertical-align: baseline;">
So I think, at this point, we’re forced to make a pretty darn uncomfortable admission (a la Wes Jackson): The suite of technologies that comprises annuals-based agriculture – that crown-jewel of human ingenuity, those strokes of genius that separated us from the beasts – was, is, and forever will be just a flat-out bad idea as the main food source for a civilization.</div>
<div style="border: 0px; font-size: 15px; line-height: 21px; padding: 0px 0px 0.7em; vertical-align: baseline;">
Ouch.</div>
<div style="border: 0px; font-size: 15px; line-height: 21px; padding: 0px 0px 0.7em; vertical-align: baseline;">
The plow, the disc, the harrow. Those rolling fields of corn, beans, wheat, and rice. -- Bad ideas, all of them.</div>
<div style="border: 0px; font-size: 15px; line-height: 21px; padding: 0px 0px 0.7em; vertical-align: baseline;">
Ouch.</div>
<div style="border: 0px; font-size: 15px; line-height: 21px; padding: 0px 0px 0.7em; vertical-align: baseline;">
And now consider this: Technologies that are just flat-out inappropriate for the human species on this planet tend to have some things in common – they’re fast, they’re powerful, they initially seem to be almost magical in the “making life easier” department, …and they all release seven kinds of hell on us when the biophysical-consequence chickens come home to roost.</div>
<div style="border: 0px; font-size: 15px; line-height: 21px; padding: 0px 0px 0.7em; vertical-align: baseline;">
Witness fossil fuels. Witness nuclear power. Witness annuals-based agriculture.</div>
<div style="border: 0px; font-size: 15px; line-height: 21px; padding: 0px 0px 0.7em; vertical-align: baseline;">
Our ignorance is too great, our inherent weaknesses and flaws as a species too numerous, and the workings of the world too complex for technologies that work too fast on too big of a scale. Mistakes happen…and then they compound. Such technologies turn us, effectively, into toddlers with loaded machine guns.</div>
<div style="border: 0px; font-size: 15px; line-height: 21px; padding: 0px 0px 0.7em; vertical-align: baseline;">
Rat-a-tat-tat…Hey, gimme that!!...Rat-a-tat-tat-tat…Good lord!!....Rat-a-tat-tat-tat-tat….Oh, the humanity!!!!...</div>
<div style="border: 0px; font-size: 15px; line-height: 21px; padding: 0px 0px 0.7em; vertical-align: baseline;">
In this vein, permit me to raise one more objection to annuals-based agriculture: In addition to the locked-in fate of annuals-based agriculture to degrade the land (via the heretofore-discussed Land Abuse Spiral), there is something about the “speed” of annuals-based agriculture that introduces another unfortunate side-effect for our species. -- Namely, annuals are just too darn FAST.</div>
<div style="border: 0px; font-size: 15px; line-height: 21px; padding: 0px 0px 0.7em; vertical-align: baseline;">
Cut the trees, plant the crops amongst the stumps, and collect the bounty. A one-year agricultural yield increase of many, many fold over the hunting and gathering yield of the same land. Instant energy = instant population explosion. Sound familiar? It should. It’s the 10,000-year story of our species’ experiment with annual agriculture.</div>
<div style="border: 0px; font-size: 15px; line-height: 21px; padding: 0px 0px 0.7em; vertical-align: baseline;">
The phenomenally fast rate-of-return – one season and you get a yield – has certainly been a significant driver in our yeast-like population explosion over the past 10,000 years. It’s just too darn EASY to grow human population when you get this sort of rapid energy-increase feedback from annual crops. It takes too much discipline and luck for us NOT to screw up eventually – for us NOT to overpopulate like yeast in a bottle.</div>
<div style="border: 0px; font-size: 15px; line-height: 21px; padding: 0px 0px 0.7em; vertical-align: baseline;">
So permit me this analogy: Annuals are the original ‘fast-food’ -- seductive, immediately-rewarding, and prone to both degrade and rapidly expand your biomass. The short-term payback of actual ‘fast foods’ trick us into eating too much. The short payback time for the annual crops tricks us into f***ing too much – bringing on overpopulation and the ensuing land-abuse spiral before you can say, “Hey, just LOOK at all these kids!”</div>
<div style="border: 0px; font-size: 15px; line-height: 21px; padding: 0px 0px 0.7em; vertical-align: baseline;">
Lacking the consistently-engaged, higher-order mental capabilities that humans do not (and will never) possess, it’s just too easy to overshoot carrying capacity on a diet of fast-return (but ecosphere-diminishing) annual crops. So we overshoot. …Time and time and time and time again.</div>
<div style="border: 0px; font-size: 15px; line-height: 21px; padding: 0px 0px 0.7em; vertical-align: baseline;">
I suppose this theme could be developed more, but I think I’ve made a sufficient case for the following general statement: Annual crops are an inappropriate technology. We can’t HELP but misuse them, and the consequences of their misuse are both dreadful and unforgivable. Their use must be strictly controlled and viewed as potentially dangerous to our well-being. We must find a better way.</div>
<div style="border: 0px; font-size: 15px; line-height: 21px; padding: 0px 0px 0.7em; vertical-align: baseline;">
Ouch.</div>
<div style="border: 0px; font-size: 15px; line-height: 21px; padding: 0px 0px 0.7em; vertical-align: baseline;">
<b>THE PERENNIAL IMPERATIVE</b></div>
<div style="border: 0px; font-size: 15px; line-height: 21px; padding: 0px 0px 0.7em; vertical-align: baseline;">
Now, I say ‘ouch’ here because, to most people, saying that the widespread use of annuals is bad for us and we need to find a better way is like saying, “Oxygen is bad for us. We must find a better way.” In other words, it’s inconceivable to most people – even many ‘progressives’ in the alternative agriculture movement – that we could or should ever move to something beyond an annuals-based agriculture. Amber waves of (annual) grains foreva!</div>
<div style="border: 0px; font-size: 15px; line-height: 21px; padding: 0px 0px 0.7em; vertical-align: baseline;">
“…But, but, but …we just need to do annuals RIGHT!” “The change you advocate is too radical! “The consumers won’t go for it!”</div>
<div style="border: 0px; font-size: 15px; line-height: 21px; padding: 0px 0px 0.7em; vertical-align: baseline;">
But looking ‘big-picture’ here, we really have no choice -- especially if we introduce morality into the equation.</div>
<div style="border: 0px; font-size: 15px; line-height: 21px; padding: 0px 0px 0.7em; vertical-align: baseline;">
Because, if the biological potential of the Earth inevitably becomes degraded with each go-round of the annual-agriculture carousel, can we maybe see where this is eventually going? Can we extrapolate the trend-line here – even tentatively?</div>
<div style="border: 0px; font-size: 15px; line-height: 21px; padding: 0px 0px 0.7em; vertical-align: baseline;">
And are we really OK resigning ourselves to the inevitable diminishment of the planet? Is that the only moral and physical legacy we can hope to achieve? Are starving, rock-licking goats forever to be the final stage of human succession?</div>
<div style="border: 0px; font-size: 15px; line-height: 21px; padding: 0px 0px 0.7em; vertical-align: baseline;">
I propose that – in the spirit of Wendell Berry’s agrarian sensibilities, Wes Jackson’s “nature as measure”, Aldo Leopold’s “Land Ethic”, and Dan Allen’s “I Want My Daughter to Have a Life Worth Living Ethic” – maybe we should try something else.</div>
<div style="border: 0px; font-size: 15px; line-height: 21px; padding: 0px 0px 0.7em; vertical-align: baseline;">
And that something else, of course, is the perennial-based agriculture conceived, advocated and enacted by the permaculture movement, Wes Jackson’s The Land Institute, Wendell Berry, Sir Albert Howard, J. Russell Smith, Liberty Hyde Bailey, and scores of historical experiments in perennials that were snuffed out by the seductive poison of the annual-crop expansion.</div>
<div style="border: 0px; font-size: 15px; line-height: 21px; padding: 0px 0px 0.7em; vertical-align: baseline;">
Why is it so hard for us to renounce agricultural suicide?</div>
<div style="border: 0px; font-size: 15px; line-height: 21px; padding: 0px 0px 0.7em; vertical-align: baseline;">
When will we let ourselves learn from the people who already have renounced it and want to show us how?</div>
<div style="border: 0px; font-size: 15px; line-height: 21px; padding: 0px 0px 0.7em; vertical-align: baseline;">
When will it be too late?</div>
<div style="border: 0px; font-size: 15px; line-height: 21px; padding: 0px 0px 0.7em; vertical-align: baseline;">
<b>THE PERENNIAL TRANSITION: JUST PLANT IT!!</b></div>
<div style="border: 0px; font-size: 15px; line-height: 21px; padding: 0px 0px 0.7em; vertical-align: baseline;">
Now, this has been a rather long essay and you’ve all been very patient with me. Thank you. So here’s the part you’ve been waiting for: Let me now describe exactly how the perennial transition will work.</div>
<div style="border: 0px; font-size: 15px; line-height: 21px; padding: 0px 0px 0.7em; vertical-align: baseline;">
It’s simple, we just need to…ummm...we need to…well...hmmmm…maybe…</div>
<div style="border: 0px; font-size: 15px; line-height: 21px; padding: 0px 0px 0.7em; vertical-align: baseline;">
OK, I don’t know -- I admit it. …Well, at least not the details.</div>
<div style="border: 0px; font-size: 15px; line-height: 21px; padding: 0px 0px 0.7em; vertical-align: baseline;">
But for the host of physical and moral reasons discussed so far, we MUST make the transition -- and I can guarantee that we WON’T make the transition at all it if we don’t try. And so, despite our ignorance, we need to try. So let’s try. …Fine details be damned at this point!</div>
<div style="border: 0px; font-size: 15px; line-height: 21px; padding: 0px 0px 0.7em; vertical-align: baseline;">
…But we’re not totally in the dark, of course -- there ARE some ideas out there already.</div>
<div style="border: 0px; font-size: 15px; line-height: 21px; padding: 0px 0px 0.7em; vertical-align: baseline;">
For a long-term strategy at the national level, I suggest you take a look at The Land Institute’s “A 50-Year Farm Bill” (<a class="external" href="http://www.landinstitute.org/pages/50yrfb-booklet_7-29-09.pdf" style="border: 0px; color: #6d8d3b; font-family: inherit; font-style: inherit; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;" target="_blank" title="http://www.landinstitute.org/pages/50yrfb-booklet_7-29-09.pdf">http://www.landinstitute.org/pages/50yrfb-booklet_7-29-09.pdf</a>). They present a well-reasoned plan for transforming the current 20:80 perennial:annual mix of US agriculture to an 80:20 perennial:annual mix over the next 50 years. And while you’re at it, check out ALL the publications at The Land Institute’s website (<a class="external" href="http://www.landinstitute.org/" style="border: 0px; color: #6d8d3b; font-family: inherit; font-style: inherit; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;" target="_blank" title="http://www.landinstitute.org/">http://www.landinstitute.org/</a>).</div>
<div style="border: 0px; font-size: 15px; line-height: 21px; padding: 0px 0px 0.7em; vertical-align: baseline;">
The only thing I’d advocate for in regards to their plan is the possible expansion of already-existing perennial tree crops and vegetables for the more well-watered regions of the US. As just one example among many, chinese chestnuts have a nutritional composition very similar to corn, and when a FULL accounting of energy, resource, and environmental costs are included the carbohydrate yields may be comparable. And of course, as discussed previously in this essay, from a long-term physical and moral standpoint, there is no comparison at all.</div>
<div style="border: 0px; font-size: 15px; line-height: 21px; padding: 0px 0px 0.7em; vertical-align: baseline;">
I’ve written previously on what might be required to transition to a perennials-based agriculture in my essay, “An Agriculture that Stands a Chance” (<a class="external" href="http://www.energybulletin.net/stories/2010-12-13/agriculture-stands-chance-perennial-polyculture-hard-limits-post-carbon-farming" style="border: 0px; color: #6d8d3b; font-family: inherit; font-style: inherit; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;" target="_blank" title="http://www.energybulletin.net/stories/2010-12-13/agriculture-stands-chance-perennial-polyculture-hard-limits-post-carbon-farming">http://www.energybulletin.net/stories/2010-12-13/agriculture-stands-chan...</a>).</div>
<div style="border: 0px; font-size: 15px; line-height: 21px; padding: 0px 0px 0.7em; vertical-align: baseline;">
Check out this essay for someone who’s doing some pretty cool perennial stuff on a farm-sized scale: <a class="external" href="http://www.energybulletin.net/stories/2010-11-12/mark-shepherds-106-acre-permaculture-farm-viola-wisconsin" style="border: 0px; color: #6d8d3b; font-family: inherit; font-style: inherit; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;" target="_blank" title="http://www.energybulletin.net/stories/2010-11-12/mark-shepherds-106-acre-permaculture-farm-viola-wisconsin">http://www.energybulletin.net/stories/2010-11-12/mark-shepherds-106-acre...</a>.</div>
<div style="border: 0px; font-size: 15px; line-height: 21px; padding: 0px 0px 0.7em; vertical-align: baseline;">
And check out another large-scale perennial operation from Greg Miller’s Empire Chestnut website: <a class="external" href="http://empirechestnut.com/aboutus.htm" style="border: 0px; color: #6d8d3b; font-family: inherit; font-style: inherit; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;" target="_blank" title="http://empirechestnut.com/aboutus.htm">http://empirechestnut.com/aboutus.htm</a>.</div>
<div style="border: 0px; font-size: 15px; line-height: 21px; padding: 0px 0px 0.7em; vertical-align: baseline;">
And of course, I’d highly recommend exploring the complete works of both Wes Jackson and Wendell Berry -- as well as the now-voluminous permaculture literature (maybe start with <a class="external" href="http://www.chelseagreen.com/bookstore" style="border: 0px; color: #6d8d3b; font-family: inherit; font-style: inherit; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;" target="_blank" title="http://www.chelseagreen.com/bookstore">http://www.chelseagreen.com/bookstore</a>). Learn the science and art of perennial crops. Learn the ecological principles and practical considerations of planting a food forest (or food prairie…or food savannah…) in your back yard (or back 40).</div>
<div style="border: 0px; font-size: 15px; line-height: 21px; padding: 0px 0px 0.7em; vertical-align: baseline;">
But more than anything else, you just need to start DOING it. Start planting perennial food crops wherever and whenever you can. For the past ten years, I’ve been experimenting by planting dozens of types fruit and nut perennials – hundreds of trees/bushes/vines in total – to find out what sorts of things work in my area. I plant them in my yard, in my sheep pasture, in the yards of near-by relatives, in my annual-veggie garden, on township-owned land (via the community garden) – wherever I can! And in the past few years I’ve been experimenting with a dozen or so species (and counting) of perennial vegetables. Again, wherever I can!</div>
<div style="border: 0px; font-size: 15px; line-height: 21px; padding: 0px 0px 0.7em; vertical-align: baseline;">
As noted previously, perennial crops are the original ‘slow food’, so you’ll need to start your experimenting NOW. i.e. Don’t wait until you have a masters degree in permaculture design and have memorized the genus and species of each perennial crop. – Just learn some basics about your soil and the plants’ natural histories and toss those babies in the ground to see what you get. Watch them closely. If it doesn’t work, try something else.</div>
<div style="border: 0px; font-size: 15px; line-height: 21px; padding: 0px 0px 0.7em; vertical-align: baseline;">
But try SOMETHING.</div>
<div style="border: 0px; font-size: 15px; line-height: 21px; padding: 0px 0px 0.7em; vertical-align: baseline;">
And let’s try to get off this land-abuse spiral. I think this whole planet’s getting’ a little dizzy, no?</div>
<div class="image-clear" style="border: 0px; font-family: inherit; font-style: inherit; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;">
</div>
<div class="editor_notes" style="border-top-color: rgb(236, 233, 215); border-top-style: solid; border-width: 1px 0px 0px; font-family: inherit; font-style: italic; margin: 0px; padding: 20px 0px; vertical-align: baseline;">
<span style="border: 0px; font-family: inherit; font-style: inherit; font-weight: bold; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;">Editorial Notes:</span> From the author: I'm a high school Chemistry teacher in NJ. I'm also a concerned father, organic farmer, and community garden organizer. You can contact me at danallen1968@yahoo.com. </div>
</div>
<div class="blogger-post-footer">http://kjpermaculture.blogspot.com/feeds/posts/default
<p id="blogfeeds"><$BlogFeedsVertical$></p>
<p id="postfeeds"><$BlogItemFeedLinks$></p></div>Anonymoushttp://www.blogger.com/profile/03009370115428649864noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-439180943121365896.post-81020538238025412812013-02-09T22:08:00.003-05:002013-02-12T12:57:13.290-05:00Time to Garden the Planet<table align="center" border="0" cellpadding="4" cellspacing="0" hspace="0" name="index" style="background-color: white; width: 100%px;" vspace="0"><tbody>
<tr><td align="center" bgcolor="#000000" bordercolor="#FFFFFF" height="144" valign="middle" width="214"><span style="font-family: Arial;"><img align="middle" border="0" height="258" hspace="5" src="http://permacultureactivist.net/PeterBane/Peter2.jpg" vspace="5" width="200" /></span></td><td align="center" bgcolor="#CCFF99" bordercolor="#CCFF99" valign="middle" width="650"><span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: large;"><b>Time to Garden the Planet</b></span><span style="color: #003300; font-family: Arial; font-size: large;"><strong></strong><br />by Peter Bane</span><br />
<div align="center">
<span style="color: #003300; font-family: Arial;"><strong> <a href="http://www.permacultureactivist.net/">Permaculture Activist Magazine</a><br /><br /><span style="font-family: Arial; font-size: x-small;"></span></strong></span></div>
</td></tr>
<tr><td align="left" bgcolor="#FFFFFF" bordercolor="#FFFFFF" colspan="2" valign="top"><div align="justify">
<br /></div>
<div align="justify">
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: x-small;"> </span><span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">This is a season (Dec.2006) for talking truth about the world. Americans do elections and feasting in the same month and for good reason: All politics hinges on the question, "Who eats?"</span></div>
<div align="justify">
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><br /></span></div>
<div align="justify">
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"> When we shifted our economy from the wild harvesting of nature's surpluses to the cultivation of cereal crops at the end of the last ice age, we started on a course of collective self-discovery: Will the clever monkeys solve the puzzle in time? Can they figure out how to grow enough food to keep up with their sex drive?</span></div>
<div align="justify">
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><br /></span></div>
<div align="justify">
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"> So far, the answer is no. The Agricultural Revolution, sparked in the semi-arid regions of the Near East about 10,000 years ago, has been a failure. The production of surplus grains has always led to increases in population that outstrip the productive capacity of their regions, leading to war, empire, destruction of forests, and migrations. On a shrinking planet, there's nowhere else to go.</span></div>
<div align="justify">
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><br /></span></div>
<div align="justify">
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"> To get to the root of politics we have to talk and act on food. Freedom isn't just "nothin' left to</span><span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"> lose," rather it's an abundant supply of locally grown food for every household. Our current food system, and with it the entire economy of the now hyperlinked world is balanced precariously on a dwindling supply of fossil oil and gas, controlled by a tiny elite of mostly foreign powers.This is not a temporary problem to be solved by technology or better management. It is a structural problem of geological limits and burgeoning population that will never go away until we break our addiction to oil.</span></div>
<div align="justify">
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><br /></span></div>
<div align="justify">
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"> Thirty years ago, two Australians, David Holmgren and Bill Mollison discovered in their conversation about energy and equity that they had something to say about this problem. They described their response to global limits and the failure of central authority with the made-up word, "Permaculture," or "permanent agriculture."</span></div>
<div align="justify">
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><br /></span></div>
<div align="justify">
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"> In the generation since "Permaculture I" was published, a hundred thousand others have joined this conversation around the world and Permaculture has come to mean "permanent culture," because, of course, no system of farming can exist without a just and stable society to support it.</span></div>
<div align="justify">
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><br /></span></div>
<div align="justify">
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"> Besides being a paradox ("permanent" means long-lasting while "culture" is about continuous change and adaptation"), Permaculture is a way of seeing the world that emphasizes context and processes. It requires a shift of focus from objects and actors—which is the cultural bias of western civilization and of our English language in particular—to relationships. Whether seen as feminine or right-brained or Eastern because these qualities have been suppressed in our culture, the capacity for holistic thinking is really about balance —drawing on both sides of the brain and emphasizing the connections between them.</span></div>
<div align="justify">
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><br /></span></div>
<div align="justify">
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"> Permaculture is also a design system, based on ecology and taught by grassroots networks, for creating human habitats—homes, neighborhoods, towns, and the countryside—that capture energy, grow food, and recycle wastes, as they grow ever more diverse and abundant. The principles are simple but not trivial:</span></div>
<blockquote>
<div align="justify">
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">• Humans must be engaged interactively with the natural world around us;<br />• Our chief task is to capture and cycle solar energy, using it to meet our needs;<br />• We have to feed ourselves and regulate our behaviors to fit in with nature;<br />• Biological systems work best;<br />• Waste equals food;<br />• The patterns of natural systems show us how to create cultivated ones;<br />• Combine top-down thinking with bottom-up action;<br />• Always integrate elements and systems for mutual support;<br />• Choose small and slow means;<br />• Cultivate diversity and look to the margins for action;<br />• Be prepared for change.</span><span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">These have endless ramifications.</span></div>
</blockquote>
<div align="justify">
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"> And out of these networks of "each one, teach one," has grown a social movement for people-centered development and grassroots scientific research that has successfully demonstrated pathways for a low-energy future in 100 countries. The abundance of cheap fossil fuel and the material excesses of USA culture have retarded Americans' awareness of Permaculture, but the rise of energy prices and the continued contraction of the global economy are helping awaken more people to the need for which Permaculture was created.</span></div>
<div align="justify">
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><br /></span></div>
<div align="justify">
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"> Permaculture has a great analysis of the world—Energy comes from the sun, therefore it's time to reorganize our economy and technology to recognize that (Think biology.); The Earth has limits, of which energy, water, tree cover, and soil minerals are especially critical to life; People, once educated, are best able solve their own problems and meet their own needs locally, so teach them to teach others. The household, not the factory, is the source of prosperity, so create edible landscapes everywhere people live. But the Permaculture story would be empty theory if it didn't lead to positive action for change.</span></div>
<div align="justify">
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><br /></span></div>
<div align="justify">
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"> If you want to turn the world on its head, it takes a really good idea and a lot of practice. And that's where the design system comes in. You apply these principles to your own life, your own household, your own economy to make permaculture happen where you live. And every one is different. Starting at the back door, permaculture designers and activists have created city farms, food forests, solar homes, living roofs, edible parks and schoolgrounds, backyard fish ponds, community health centers, water gardens, local currencies and credit unions, farmers markets, ecovillages, and a worldwide university.</span></div>
<div align="justify">
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><br /></span></div>
<div align="justify">
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><b>What will be your part of this story?</b></span></div>
<div align="justify">
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><br /></span></div>
<div align="justify">
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"> The true test of permanent agriculture is whether it builds and maintains carbon (organic matter) levels in soil. This takes trees, animals, careful observation, persistence, and a new worldview. No mechanized agriculture can do it, only people who understand their kinship with all of life can. The land needs people. At the same time, there can never be enough "stuff" in the marketplace to satisfy our profound need for love and meaning. These can only come from relationship—people need the land and each other. In a world of diminishing resources, the only inexhaustible resource is our creativity and our undying connection with the Earth. These come together in the garden, and while Permaculture is much more than can be imagined by one person or captured in an essay, it is most often and truly associated with the garden, our deepest image of connectedness with the original source and of a world filled with pleasure and delight.</span></div>
<div align="justify">
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><br /></span></div>
<div align="justify">
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"> Politics has captured the attention of Americans again after a generation of lethargy because the world's problems are growing more complex with each passing day. We face endless war over oil, rampant consumerism, a hollow economy and a crumbling dollar, an epidemic of obesity, toxicity and illness, and a medical system out of control. Hunger and plague stalk the global South. At the risk of being thought romantic or utopian, I assert that the solutions to these and most of the world's dramatic crises rests in a rather simple shift of our awareness and our behavior. We must care for the Earth and for people, and share that which is surplus to our needs so that others may meet their own. We must also consciously limit our consumption and population. These ethics are central to permaculture: they belong to no nation or creed but to all of humanity. It's time to garden the planet.</span></div>
<div align="justify">
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><br /></span></div>
<div align="left">
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><em>Peter Bane is the publisher of Permaculture Activist.</em><span style="color: black;"> Please <a href="mailto:infoatpermacultureactivist.net">contact us</a> if you wish to reprint this article in any format, virtual or hardcopy.</span></span></div>
</td></tr>
</tbody></table>
<div class="blogger-post-footer">http://kjpermaculture.blogspot.com/feeds/posts/default
<p id="blogfeeds"><$BlogFeedsVertical$></p>
<p id="postfeeds"><$BlogItemFeedLinks$></p></div>Anonymoushttp://www.blogger.com/profile/03009370115428649864noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-439180943121365896.post-15845770448693533242013-02-09T22:04:00.002-05:002013-02-14T23:36:05.867-05:00Who Am I to Farm?<span style="background-color: #ccff99; color: #003333; font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: large; text-align: -webkit-center;"><b><span style="font-size: small;"><a href="http://permacultureactivist.net/PeterBane/Who-am-I-to-farm.htm">Who Am I to Farm?</a></span></b></span><span style="background-color: #ccff99; color: #003333; font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; text-align: -webkit-center;"><b><span style="color: #003300; font-size: small;"><br />by Peter Bane, Permaculture Activist, </span><span style="font-size: small;">Issue #82, GROWING STAPLE CROPS • NOV 2011, excerpted from Peter Bane's new book: <a href="http://permaculturehandbook.com/">The Permaculture Handbook</a></span></b></span><br />
<span style="background-color: #ccff99; color: #003333; font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; text-align: -webkit-center;"><b><br /></b></span>
<br />
<div align="left" style="color: #003300;">
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Today only 0.3% of Americans and 2.2% of Canadians derive their primary income from farming.(1) This is the smallest proportion of the population devoted to farming in the history of either nation or in the history of the world. No other societies have made our basic connection to the earth and the garnering of sustenance such a marginal specialty. Are we, as economists and prophets of progress proclaim, more evolved and more efficient, freeing up labor from the drudgery of farming to perform more complex and rewarding tasks in industry or the creative professions? Or have we so lost ourselves in thrall to the logic of the machine, that we will sacrifice everything to it, the quality of our food, our health, the land, even our very souls?</span></div>
<div align="left" style="color: #003300;">
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">The dynamic of the modern economy, by which large-scale production became dominant through the subsidy of fossil energy, has indeed made farming a marginal occupation at the bottom fringe of the system—a dirty and dangerous primary industry, akin to mining, logging or fishing. The vast prairie expanses of the United States and Canada have lent themselves to mechanized farming so that only a few individuals are needed to manage holdings of hundreds or thousands of acres.</span></div>
<div align="left" style="color: #003300;">
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Of course the statistics about farming as an occupation mask many ways in which the work of millions of people is hidden, so the “efficiency” and “progress” of our high-tech societies may be seen as an artifact of ideology as much as a sign of social evolution. More and more food is imported to North America from elsewhere in the world, where it is grown by Asian, African, Latin American, Caribbean or European farmers, usually on smaller farms and with more labor input. Even within our borders, the real food grown here, that is, the nutrient-dense food that sustains our health, such as fruits and vegetables, is picked and processed by an immigrant labor force of Mexicans, Jamaicans, Salvadorans, Haitians and other dispossessed farmers from the South. Many of these are undocumented workers whose labor and whose lives don’t officially exist. Even in our wealthy societies, we have many millions more farmers today than we acknowledge.</span></div>
<div align="left" style="color: #003300;">
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">But what about most North Americans? Are we happy to be eating industrial food? Are we flourishing in our post-agricultural careers? Do we gladly forsake the countryside for city culture?</span></div>
<div align="center" style="color: #003300;">
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><img height="400" src="http://permacultureactivist.net/PeterBane/suburbs.gif" width="393" /></span></div>
<div align="center" style="color: #003300;">
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><i>North American suburbs occupy some very good agricultural land. The land is irrigated; labor and markets are near at hand.</i></span></div>
<div align="left" style="color: #003300;">
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><b>Back to the land?</b></span></div>
<div align="left" style="color: #003300;">
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Certainly millions seem content or may never dream of asking these questions. But there is ample evidence that many of us have never completely relinquished our attachments to a more agrarian way of life. The American Frontier, and the opportunity for anyone to claim a piece of land from the government and homestead it, closed in 1890. Yet every wave of urbanization since World War I has been accompanied or followed by the resurgence of agrarian ideals. Thomas Jefferson’s vision of the United States as a nation of yeoman farmers continues to echo down the ages. In the 1930s, M.G. Kains wrote a manual for erstwhile farmers, Five Acres and Independence. He introduced the book with a quotation from Henry Ford extolling the virtues of the land—which may be more than ironic.(2) Already by 1935, the manic ups and downs of the capitalist business cycle were familiar enough that “return to the land” was a recurrent and well-recognized impulse in society.</span></div>
<div align="left" style="color: #003300;">
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Even after microbiology and engineering made cities less acutely unhealthy, industrial production, with coal as a primary fuel, made them dirty and often noisome places from which the better heeled residents sought relief at summer resorts and in “garden suburbs” where the amenities of a quasi-rural settlement could be combined with the convenience of swift rail transit to the centers of commerce. Long before use-based zoning began to sort out industrial from residential sectors within the city, the dream of the suburbs had taken root.</span></div>
<div align="left" style="color: #003300;">
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">An even more radical critique of industrial civilization arose from the lives and writing of Helen and Scott Nearing. Their 1954 book Living the Good Life and subsequent titles extolled the virtues of simple living close to the land. The Nearings not only turned away from the hubbub and clamor of city life but proposed an unconventional response to economics as well. After Scott, who was trained as an engineer and an economist, was blacklisted from academia after World War I for his socialist and antiwar views, the couple retired to the Vermont frontier, reduced their consumption of industrial goods, and adopted a vegetarian diet based on home-grown food. They built their own house from local materials and disciplined themselves to divide their days equally between “bread labor”—or work for sustenance, intellectual pursuits, and socializing. Working six weeks a year in the late winter to make maple syrup and sugar afforded them enough cash income to pay taxes and even to travel. Not only did their forest farming and designed approach to living inspire a whole generation in the 1970s seeking a way back to the land, but they appear to have lived healthy, principled, and successful lives without compromising their values. Scott lived to 100 years of age and ended his life by fasting in 1983, while Helen, a generation younger, survived him some 12 years in their second homestead on the Maine coast, surrounded by friends and admirers. Their legacy is perpetuated in part by their writings and in the dreams of millions of their readers, and also through the work of the Good Life Institute in Harborside, Maine. (3)</span></div>
<div align="left" style="color: #003300;">
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><b>A pastoral ideal</b></span></div>
<div align="left" style="color: #003300;">
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">While not agrarian by design, the post-World War II suburban boom appealed to the unrealized dreams of millions who left the countryside for war and better wages, but from whom the pull of a pastoral life had never entirely vanished. Men continued to enact, in mechanical and often neurotic ways, the rituals of making hay as they cut lawns into perfect green squares every weekend. Women organized ice cream socials and birthday parties like the collective celebrations of harvest that had ennobled the hard lives of their ancestors. Children were the real crop here. During the 1950s this patchwork of farm fields, forest remnants, and village-scale neighborhoods, peopled by the children and grandchildren of factory workers, immigrants, ex-farmers and other groups newly enriched by the war economy, became the dream landscape of the boomer generation, the largest in history. Small herds of children roamed this bucolic terrain, secure in the privilege their parents extracted as world conquerors until, of course, the next development took down a totemic patch of woods or replaced a mysterious meadow with a cul-de-sac of new houses. Perhaps it should come as no surprise that as it reached adulthood this age cohort sought meaning in nature amidst a world seemingly mad with the designs of human dominance: corporate conformity and mutually assured destruction from nuclear weapons.</span></div>
<div align="left" style="color: #003300;">
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Well into the 1970s, when energy crises began to call into question the wisdom of a commuting way of life, the suburbs continued to afford a new generation of children the same glimpses of a comfortable life embedded in nature. But the suburbs were changing too, as they grew to become the dominant habitat for North American societies. (4) City centers and their surrounding neighborhoods, under assault by highway builders, redlining, and white flight born of racism, hollowed as their outer fringes spread.</span></div>
<div align="left" style="color: #003300;">
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">The agrarian way of life found its greatest contemporary philosopher in Wendell Berry whose political views on farming, land use, and culture reshaped the national debate. If the Nearings had offered moral inspiration and economic guidance, Berry’s critique of urban civilization provided an intellectual foundation for the Vietnam-era pulse of return-to-the-land. Driven less by economics than it had been during the 1930s and more by cultural alienation from the turmoil of decaying cities and a general rejection of the values of industrial capitalism and war born of empire, this broad wave of hippie communes and homesteaders brought lifestyle issues into public consciousness. Vegetarianism and concern for wholesome food free of chemicals grew in direct proportion to the expansion of “get big or get out” agriculture with its emphasis on vast grain monocultures and the feedlot finishing of livestock.</span></div>
<div align="center" style="color: #003300;">
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><img height="286" src="http://permacultureactivist.net/PeterBane/workers.gif" width="400" /></span></div>
<div align="center" style="color: #003300;">
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><i>Migrants harvest and process most of the real food eaten in the US and Canada.</i></span></div>
<div align="left" style="color: #003300;">
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><b>A perfect storm</b></span></div>
<div align="left" style="color: #003300;">
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Economic opportunities in the countryside continued to be constrained, however. The agrarian ideal struggled against industrial consolidation. The US economy began its long-term contraction about 1973 following the peak of national oil extraction. Farmers continued to be squeezed by the relentless logic of the market—overproduction leading to large surpluses and low prices—while input costs rose with the inflationary price of oil, now set in the international markets and no longer by the Texas Railroad Commission. A second oil shock and double-digit inflation piled on top of too much farm debt led to a severe depression in rural America in the early 1980s. The traditional household pattern of life eroded as millions of women moved into the workforce in the 1970s and beyond, largely to compensate for falling incomes and inflating costs of living. While energy concerns and economic hardship during the 1970s put a temporary brake on the expansion of suburban housing, military Keynesianism under Reagan combined with loose banking laws led to a glut of suburban housing and office developments occupying the new niches created by the federally-funded interstate highway system. Flight from center cities, which had begun as a backlash against racial integration in the 1960s and 1970s, accelerated. A generation of sprawl had begun whose end we viewed in 2008 and 2009 as the so-called “sub-prime mortgage crisis.” In truth, the near collapse of the nation’s banking, automobile, and housing industries is tied directly to the energy excesses of the preceding 30 years.</span></div>
<div align="left" style="color: #003300;">
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">The depression of the 21st century, outwardly visible from 2008 onward, has been the occasion of much writing on the link between energy supply, settlement patterns, and the shaky basis of the American economy. Social critic and geographer James Howard Kunstler has called the suburbs, “the greatest misallocation of resources in the history of the world.” (6) There can be little doubt that paving over much of the nation’s best agricultural land and cutting old growth forests to frame shoddily-built McMansions was a tragedy of epic proportions, but the question is not whom to hang but what can be done with it now? However disreputable its causes, the emptying out of many American cities and the spreading of the population over broad metropolitan regions marks a necessary and inevitable turn toward a state of lower social and technological complexity that will develop progressively as energy supplies decline.</span></div>
<div align="center" style="color: #003300;">
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><img height="300" src="http://permacultureactivist.net/PeterBane/foreclosure.gif" width="400" /></span></div>
<div align="center" style="color: #003300;">
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><i>Crisis is also opportunity to re-envision and give a new purpose to land and housing within and around our cities.</i></span></div>
<div align="left" style="color: #003300;">
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><b>Creating a new yeomanry</b></span></div>
<div align="left" style="color: #003300;">
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">The contraction of oil and other fossil fuel supplies must translate into a contraction of the economy and of industrial food production. We cannot expect to see a sustained increase in economic output ever again. Indeed, sustaining present levels of output may be barely possible with a full-scale national mobilization of resources to transform energy systems, transport, and other infrastructure. This is, frankly, unlikely to be achieved. Many workers in the developed world will become permanently unemployed as farmers in the developing world have been in the past generation with the growth of global trade; food prices will rise with transport and energy costs. The stage is set for a new Agrarian Revolution, though whether this turns into a fulfillment of Jefferson’s vision or a new feudalism depends on how we the people respond.</span></div>
<div align="left" style="color: #003300;">
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">It turns out that land ownership patterns matter a great deal, not only to the structure of society, but to the economy’s ability to create wealth. The stars of the post-World War II economic boom were the east Asian Tigers: Japan, South Korea, and Taiwan. Each of them either had land reform imposed upon it (in the case of Japan by the American occupying administration of General MacArthur), or adopted it early on in their rise to prosperity, and economists generally acknowledge that redistribution of land to many millions of farmers was essential in providing the broad-based access to wealth that sustained each nation’s rise to the first ranks of the international economy. (7)</span></div>
<div align="left" style="color: #003300;">
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><b>A new vision is needed</b></span></div>
<div align="left" style="color: #003300;">
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">The epic “misallocation of resources” created in North American suburbia a fabric of many small land holdings packed close around our centers of population. In a clumsy, expensive, and still incomplete way, we have created a pattern for a democratic yeomanry. Many potential garden farms are located on some very fine former farmland: northern New Jersey, northern Illinois, the south end of San Francisco Bay and the Lake Ontario lowlands. And even where the soil was not originally well developed, the land is usually flat to rolling. These territories have been supplied with extensive road and water networks, and both labor and a rich array of resources, biological and industrial, lie all around. The largish houses, especially those built after 1980, may be poorly configured at present, but they could accommodate the extended families and larger households that will be needed to grow food and manage land with lower energy resources and technologies.</span></div>
<div align="left" style="color: #003300;">
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">The emergence of garden farms is at hand. Under the pressure of necessity as unemployment rippled through the economy, millions of North Americans turned to gardening or expanded their gardens in 2009 as evidenced by a 40% increase in vegetable seed sales. (8) Urban homesteading is spawning its own literature as energy descent forces more and more households to adapt in place. With income constrained and energy and materials shortages looming, the only resources capable of filling the gap in livelihood are imagination, information, and knowledge, in particular a deeper understanding of the material cycles and energy flows of nature. For that understanding, we look to permaculture, a language derived from the patterns of the world around us.</span></div>
<div align="left" style="color: #003300;">
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><b>Notes</b></span></div>
<div align="left" style="color: #003300;">
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">1. EPA [online] Citing 1997 USDA Census of Agriculture, “…less than 1% claim farming as an occupation (and about 2% actually live on farms.” <a href="http://www.epa.gov/agriculture/ag101/demographics.html">www.epa.gov/agriculture/ag101/demographics.html</a> or<a href="http://www.agcensus.usda.gov/Publications/2007/Online_Highlights/Fact_Sheets/demographics.pdf">www.agcensus.usda.gov/Publications/2007/Online_Highlights/Fact_Sheets/demographics.pdf</a>. The U.S. had 2.2 million farms in 2007. Counting one principal operator per farm (and most did not make their principal living from farming) that constitutes about 0.7% of the US population. And also, <a href="http://www.statcan.gc.ca/ca-ra2011/index-eng.htm">www.statcan.gc.ca/ca-ra2011/index-eng.htm</a>, “In 2006, Canada’s agriculture industry has (sic) 2.2% of Canada’s total population…,” both cited September 7, 2011.</span></div>
<div align="left" style="color: #003300;">
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">2. M.G. Kains. Five Acres and Independence, 2d. ed. revised. Garden City, 1940. Kains quotes Henry Ford: “The land! That is where our roots are. There is the basis of our physical life. The farther we get away from the land, the greater our insecurity. ... It is there waiting to honor all the labor we are willing to invest in it, and able to tide us across any local dislocation of economic conditions. No unemployment insurance can be compared to an alliance between man and a plot of land.”</span></div>
<div align="left" style="color: #003300;">
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">3. Helen & Scott Nearing. Living the Good Life: How to Live Sanely & Simply in a Troubled World. Schocken, 1954.</span></div>
<div align="left" style="color: #003300;">
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">4. US Census 2000 Special Report. Demographic Trends of the 20th Century. November 2002. [online] www.census.gov/prod/2002pubs/censr-4.pdf, cited August 29, 2011. Suburbs overtook central cities about 1965 at about 1/3 of total US population each. By 2000, suburbs held half the US population, center cities 30%. Throughout the century, rural areas both lost population through migration and were annexed or incorporated into metropolitan regions.</span></div>
<div align="left" style="color: #003300;">
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">5. The New York Times [online] <a href="http://www.nytimes.com/1991/10/14/us/farmer-suicide-rate-swells-in-1980-s-study-says.html">www.nytimes.com/1991/10/14/us/farmer-suicide-rate-swells-in-1980-s-study-says.html</a>, cited September 6, 2011. More than 900 male farmers committed suicide in Wisconsin, Minnesota, North and South Dakota, and Montana in the 1980s. The peak rate occurred in 1982. Seventy-one female farmers, 96 farm children, and 177 farm workers also committed suicide in this region between 1980 and 1988. Study by the National Farm Medicine Center, Marshfield, Wisc.</span></div>
<div align="left" style="color: #003300;">
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">6. James Howard Kunstler. The Long Emergency: Surviving the End of Oil, Climate Change, and Other Converging Catastrophies of the 21st Century. Atlantic, 2005. Also [online] <a href="http://www.kunstler.com/spch_Vermont%20Oct%2005.htm">www.kunstler.com/spch_Vermont%20Oct%2005.htm</a>, cited 9/6/11.</span></div>
<div align="left" style="color: #003300;">
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">7. Re: Japan [online] <a href="http://www.ide.go.jp/English/Publish/Periodicals/De/pdf/65_04_06.pdf">www.ide.go.jp/English/Publish/Periodicals/De/pdf/65_04_06.pdf</a>, cited Sept. 6, 2011. And also,<a href="http://siteresources.worldbank.org/INTARD/825826-1111148606850/20431879/Zimbabwe.pdf">http://siteresources.worldbank.org/INTARD/825826-1111148606850/20431879/Zimbabwe.pdf</a>. Experts agree that land reforms in Japan, Korea, and Taiwan have made a major contribution to overcoming the legacy of colonial (sic) development (King, 1973).</span></div>
<div align="left" style="color: #003300;">
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">8. The Washington Post [online] <a href="http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2009/06/14/AR2009061402741.html">www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2009/06/14/AR2009061402741.html</a>, cited Sept. 7, 2011.</span></div>
<div align="left" style="color: #003300;">
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Peter Bane is the publisher of Permaculture Activist and the author of <a href="http://permaculturehandbook.com/">The Permaculture Handbook: Garden Farming for Town and Country</a>, forthcoming from New Society Publishers in 2012, of which this essay is an excerpt. Used here with the permission of the publisher. All rights reserved.<span style="color: black;">Please <a href="mailto:infoatpermacultureactivist.net">contact us</a> if you wish to reprint this article in any format, virtual or hardcopy.</span></span></div>
<div class="blogger-post-footer">http://kjpermaculture.blogspot.com/feeds/posts/default
<p id="blogfeeds"><$BlogFeedsVertical$></p>
<p id="postfeeds"><$BlogItemFeedLinks$></p></div>Anonymoushttp://www.blogger.com/profile/03009370115428649864noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-439180943121365896.post-55523554058713285482013-02-09T22:00:00.002-05:002013-02-09T22:00:26.026-05:00PEAK OIL BLUES<span id=".reactRoot[1].[1][2][1]{comment262609473872766_1155759}.0.[1].0.[1].0.[0].[0][2].0.[0]" style="background-color: #f1f2f6; color: #333333; font-family: 'lucida grande', tahoma, verdana, arial, sans-serif; font-size: 10.909090995788574px; line-height: 12.727272033691406px;">PEAK OIL BLUES</span><br id=".reactRoot[1].[1][2][1]{comment262609473872766_1155759}.0.[1].0.[1].0.[0].[0][2].0.[1]" style="background-color: #f1f2f6; color: #333333; font-family: 'lucida grande', tahoma, verdana, arial, sans-serif; font-size: 10.909090995788574px; line-height: 12.727272033691406px;" /><span id=".reactRoot[1].[1][2][1]{comment262609473872766_1155759}.0.[1].0.[1].0.[0].[0][2].0.[2]" style="background-color: #f1f2f6; color: #333333; font-family: 'lucida grande', tahoma, verdana, arial, sans-serif; font-size: 10.909090995788574px; line-height: 12.727272033691406px;">We had us some fun, burnin’ it up like a billion little suns</span><br id=".reactRoot[1].[1][2][1]{comment262609473872766_1155759}.0.[1].0.[1].0.[0].[0][2].0.[3]" style="background-color: #f1f2f6; color: #333333; font-family: 'lucida grande', tahoma, verdana, arial, sans-serif; font-size: 10.909090995788574px; line-height: 12.727272033691406px;" /><span id=".reactRoot[1].[1][2][1]{comment262609473872766_1155759}.0.[1].0.[1].0.[0].[0][2].0.[4]" style="background-color: #f1f2f6; color: #333333; font-family: 'lucida grande', tahoma, verdana, arial, sans-serif; font-size: 10.909090995788574px; line-height: 12.727272033691406px;">Turning it day from night, yea we did it up right</span><br id=".reactRoot[1].[1][2][1]{comment262609473872766_1155759}.0.[1].0.[1].0.[0].[0][2].0.[5]" style="background-color: #f1f2f6; color: #333333; font-family: 'lucida grande', tahoma, verdana, arial, sans-serif; font-size: 10.909090995788574px; line-height: 12.727272033691406px;" /><span id=".reactRoot[1].[1][2][1]{comment262609473872766_1155759}.0.[1].0.[1].0.[0].[0][2].0.[6]" style="background-color: #f1f2f6; color: #333333; font-family: 'lucida grande', tahoma, verdana, arial, sans-serif; font-size: 10.909090995788574px; line-height: 12.727272033691406px;">It was a hydrocarbon party that was ragin’ for generations</span><br id=".reactRoot[1].[1][2][1]{comment262609473872766_1155759}.0.[1].0.[1].0.[0].[0][2].0.[7]" style="background-color: #f1f2f6; color: #333333; font-family: 'lucida grande', tahoma, verdana, arial, sans-serif; font-size: 10.909090995788574px; line-height: 12.727272033691406px;" /><span id=".reactRoot[1].[1][2][1]{comment262609473872766_1155759}.0.[1].0.[1].0.[0].[0][2].0.[8]" style="background-color: #f1f2f6; color: #333333; font-family: 'lucida grande', tahoma, verdana, arial, sans-serif; font-size: 10.909090995788574px; line-height: 12.727272033691406px;">But the Sun’s coming up now and, man, it ain’t pretty</span><br id=".reactRoot[1].[1][2][1]{comment262609473872766_1155759}.0.[1].0.[1].0.[0].[0][2].0.[9]" style="background-color: #f1f2f6; color: #333333; font-family: 'lucida grande', tahoma, verdana, arial, sans-serif; font-size: 10.909090995788574px; line-height: 12.727272033691406px;" /><span id=".reactRoot[1].[1][2][1]{comment262609473872766_1155759}.0.[1].0.[1].0.[0].[0][2].0.[10]" style="background-color: #f1f2f6; color: #333333; font-family: 'lucida grande', tahoma, verdana, arial, sans-serif; font-size: 10.909090995788574px; line-height: 12.727272033691406px;">We’re on the back-side of the peak (Hubbert’s Peak)</span><br id=".reactRoot[1].[1][2][1]{comment262609473872766_1155759}.0.[1].0.[1].0.[0].[0][2].0.[11]" style="background-color: #f1f2f6; color: #333333; font-family: 'lucida grande', tahoma, verdana, arial, sans-serif; font-size: 10.909090995788574px; line-height: 12.727272033691406px;" /><span id=".reactRoot[1].[1][2][1]{comment262609473872766_1155759}.0.[1].0.[1].0.[0].[0][2].0.[12]" style="background-color: #f1f2f6; color: #333333; font-family: 'lucida grande', tahoma, verdana, arial, sans-serif; font-size: 10.909090995788574px; line-height: 12.727272033691406px;">And it’s fallin’, fallin’, fallin’ down (fossil fuel production)</span><br id=".reactRoot[1].[1][2][1]{comment262609473872766_1155759}.0.[1].0.[1].0.[0].[0][2].0.[13]" style="background-color: #f1f2f6; color: #333333; font-family: 'lucida grande', tahoma, verdana, arial, sans-serif; font-size: 10.909090995788574px; line-height: 12.727272033691406px;" /><span id=".reactRoot[1].[1][2][1]{comment262609473872766_1155759}.0.[1].0.[1].0.[0].[0][2].0.[14]" style="background-color: #f1f2f6; color: #333333; font-family: 'lucida grande', tahoma, verdana, arial, sans-serif; font-size: 10.909090995788574px; line-height: 12.727272033691406px;">And we better start facing up to it (economic contraction)</span><br id=".reactRoot[1].[1][2][1]{comment262609473872766_1155759}.0.[1].0.[1].0.[0].[0][2].0.[15]" style="background-color: #f1f2f6; color: #333333; font-family: 'lucida grande', tahoma, verdana, arial, sans-serif; font-size: 10.909090995788574px; line-height: 12.727272033691406px;" /><span id=".reactRoot[1].[1][2][1]{comment262609473872766_1155759}.0.[1].0.[1].0.[0].[0][2].0.[16]" style="background-color: #f1f2f6; color: #333333; font-family: 'lucida grande', tahoma, verdana, arial, sans-serif; font-size: 10.909090995788574px; line-height: 12.727272033691406px;">Living on the backside of the peak</span><br id=".reactRoot[1].[1][2][1]{comment262609473872766_1155759}.0.[1].0.[1].0.[0].[0][2].0.[17]" style="background-color: #f1f2f6; color: #333333; font-family: 'lucida grande', tahoma, verdana, arial, sans-serif; font-size: 10.909090995788574px; line-height: 12.727272033691406px;" /><span id=".reactRoot[1].[1][2][1]{comment262609473872766_1155759}.0.[1].0.[1].0.[0].[0][2].0.[18]" style="background-color: #f1f2f6; color: #333333; font-family: 'lucida grande', tahoma, verdana, arial, sans-serif; font-size: 10.909090995788574px; line-height: 12.727272033691406px;">We had the power of the gods and the mind of a child</span><br id=".reactRoot[1].[1][2][1]{comment262609473872766_1155759}.0.[1].0.[1].0.[0].[0][2].0.[19]" style="background-color: #f1f2f6; color: #333333; font-family: 'lucida grande', tahoma, verdana, arial, sans-serif; font-size: 10.909090995788574px; line-height: 12.727272033691406px;" /><span id=".reactRoot[1].[1][2][1]{comment262609473872766_1155759}.0.[1].0.[1].0.[0].[0][2].0.[20]" style="background-color: #f1f2f6; color: #333333; font-family: 'lucida grande', tahoma, verdana, arial, sans-serif; font-size: 10.909090995788574px; line-height: 12.727272033691406px;">Energy-dense and pound-foolish – it’s a dangerous combination</span><br id=".reactRoot[1].[1][2][1]{comment262609473872766_1155759}.0.[1].0.[1].0.[0].[0][2].0.[21]" style="background-color: #f1f2f6; color: #333333; font-family: 'lucida grande', tahoma, verdana, arial, sans-serif; font-size: 10.909090995788574px; line-height: 12.727272033691406px;" /><span id=".reactRoot[1].[1][2][1]{comment262609473872766_1155759}.0.[1].0.[1].0.[0].[0][2].0.[22]" style="background-color: #f1f2f6; color: #333333; font-family: 'lucida grande', tahoma, verdana, arial, sans-serif; font-size: 10.909090995788574px; line-height: 12.727272033691406px;">Building towers to the heavens, digging pits halfway to hell</span><br id=".reactRoot[1].[1][2][1]{comment262609473872766_1155759}.0.[1].0.[1].0.[0].[0][2].0.[23]" style="background-color: #f1f2f6; color: #333333; font-family: 'lucida grande', tahoma, verdana, arial, sans-serif; font-size: 10.909090995788574px; line-height: 12.727272033691406px;" /><span id=".reactRoot[1].[1][2][1]{comment262609473872766_1155759}.0.[1].0.[1].0.[0].[0][2].0.[24]" style="background-color: #f1f2f6; color: #333333; font-family: 'lucida grande', tahoma, verdana, arial, sans-serif; font-size: 10.909090995788574px; line-height: 12.727272033691406px;">Moving mountains, oh we had so much energy to burn</span><br id=".reactRoot[1].[1][2][1]{comment262609473872766_1155759}.0.[1].0.[1].0.[0].[0][2].0.[25]" style="background-color: #f1f2f6; color: #333333; font-family: 'lucida grande', tahoma, verdana, arial, sans-serif; font-size: 10.909090995788574px; line-height: 12.727272033691406px;" /><span id=".reactRoot[1].[1][2][1]{comment262609473872766_1155759}.0.[1].0.[1].0.[0].[0][2].0.[26]" style="background-color: #f1f2f6; color: #333333; font-family: 'lucida grande', tahoma, verdana, arial, sans-serif; font-size: 10.909090995788574px; line-height: 12.727272033691406px;">[Chorus]</span><br id=".reactRoot[1].[1][2][1]{comment262609473872766_1155759}.0.[1].0.[1].0.[0].[0][2].0.[27]" style="background-color: #f1f2f6; color: #333333; font-family: 'lucida grande', tahoma, verdana, arial, sans-serif; font-size: 10.909090995788574px; line-height: 12.727272033691406px;" /><span id=".reactRoot[1].[1][2][1]{comment262609473872766_1155759}.0.[1].0.[1].0.[0].[0][2].0.[28]" style="background-color: #f1f2f6; color: #333333; font-family: 'lucida grande', tahoma, verdana, arial, sans-serif; font-size: 10.909090995788574px; line-height: 12.727272033691406px;">We sucked the rivers dry, ravaged the forests, emptied the oceans of fish</span><br id=".reactRoot[1].[1][2][1]{comment262609473872766_1155759}.0.[1].0.[1].0.[0].[0][2].0.[29]" style="background-color: #f1f2f6; color: #333333; font-family: 'lucida grande', tahoma, verdana, arial, sans-serif; font-size: 10.909090995788574px; line-height: 12.727272033691406px;" /><span id=".reactRoot[1].[1][2][1]{comment262609473872766_1155759}.0.[1].0.[1].0.[0].[0][2].0.[30]" style="background-color: #f1f2f6; color: #333333; font-family: 'lucida grande', tahoma, verdana, arial, sans-serif; font-size: 10.909090995788574px; line-height: 12.727272033691406px;">We wrecked the climate, wasted the soil, and perpetrated mass extinctions</span><br id=".reactRoot[1].[1][2][1]{comment262609473872766_1155759}.0.[1].0.[1].0.[0].[0][2].0.[31]" style="background-color: #f1f2f6; color: #333333; font-family: 'lucida grande', tahoma, verdana, arial, sans-serif; font-size: 10.909090995788574px; line-height: 12.727272033691406px;" /><span id=".reactRoot[1].[1][2][1]{comment262609473872766_1155759}.0.[1].0.[1].0.[0].[0][2].0.[32]" style="background-color: #f1f2f6; color: #333333; font-family: 'lucida grande', tahoma, verdana, arial, sans-serif; font-size: 10.909090995788574px; line-height: 12.727272033691406px;">Wow, what a gas! What a gas! …but we’re out of gas now</span><br id=".reactRoot[1].[1][2][1]{comment262609473872766_1155759}.0.[1].0.[1].0.[0].[0][2].0.[33]" style="background-color: #f1f2f6; color: #333333; font-family: 'lucida grande', tahoma, verdana, arial, sans-serif; font-size: 10.909090995788574px; line-height: 12.727272033691406px;" /><span id=".reactRoot[1].[1][2][1]{comment262609473872766_1155759}.0.[1].0.[1].0.[0].[0][2].0.[34]" style="background-color: #f1f2f6; color: #333333; font-family: 'lucida grande', tahoma, verdana, arial, sans-serif; font-size: 10.909090995788574px; line-height: 12.727272033691406px;">(mournful sigh)</span><br id=".reactRoot[1].[1][2][1]{comment262609473872766_1155759}.0.[1].0.[1].0.[0].[0][2].0.[35]" style="background-color: #f1f2f6; color: #333333; font-family: 'lucida grande', tahoma, verdana, arial, sans-serif; font-size: 10.909090995788574px; line-height: 12.727272033691406px;" /><a href="http://www.resilience.org/stories/2010-01-21/peak-oil-rock-roll" id=".reactRoot[1].[1][2][1]{comment262609473872766_1155759}.0.[1].0.[1].0.[0].[0][2].0.[36]" rel="nofollow" style="background-color: #f1f2f6; color: #3b5998; cursor: pointer; font-family: 'lucida grande', tahoma, verdana, arial, sans-serif; font-size: 10.909090995788574px; line-height: 12.727272033691406px; text-decoration: initial;" target="_blank">http://www.resilience.org/stories/2010-01-21/peak-oil-rock-roll</a><div class="blogger-post-footer">http://kjpermaculture.blogspot.com/feeds/posts/default
<p id="blogfeeds"><$BlogFeedsVertical$></p>
<p id="postfeeds"><$BlogItemFeedLinks$></p></div>Anonymoushttp://www.blogger.com/profile/03009370115428649864noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-439180943121365896.post-35720113970963523872013-02-09T21:58:00.000-05:002013-02-09T21:58:17.772-05:00Resilience or death: Preparing our farms for the end of agriculture (…as we know it)<br />
<div class="page_origin" style="background-color: white; float: left; font-family: Verdana, Geneva, 'Bitstream Vera Sans', 'DejaVu Sans', sans-serif; font-size: 11.199999809265137px; font-style: italic; line-height: 15.475000381469727px; margin-top: 0.5em;">
Published <span class="date-display-single">May 16 2012</span> by <a href="http://www.energybulletin.net/stories/2012-05-16/resilience-or-death-preparing-our-farms-end-agriculture-%E2%80%A6-we-know-it" style="color: #6858d6; text-decoration: initial;">Energy Bulletin</a>, Archived <span class="date-display-single">May 16 2012</span></div>
<h2 class="title" style="background-color: white; clear: both; font-family: Constantina, Georgia, 'Nimbus Roman No9 L', serif; font-size: 24px; line-height: 1.3em; margin-bottom: 0em; margin-top: 0.667em; padding-top: 0.5em;">
Resilience or death: Preparing our farms for the end of agriculture (…as we know it)</h2>
<div class="origin" style="background-color: white; font-family: Verdana, Geneva, 'Bitstream Vera Sans', 'DejaVu Sans', sans-serif; font-size: 16px; font-weight: bold; line-height: 15.475000381469727px; margin: 0.25em 0px 0.5em;">
by Dan Allen</div>
<div class="content" style="background-color: white; color: #444444; font-family: Verdana, Geneva, 'Bitstream Vera Sans', 'DejaVu Sans', sans-serif; font-size: 12px; line-height: 1.4em; max-width: 900px; min-width: 200px; padding: 0px; width: 596.1500244140625px;">
<div style="line-height: 1.4em; margin: 1em 0em;">
*********************</div>
<div style="line-height: 1.4em; margin: 1em 0em;">
<i>“[G]lobal food production is hitting an array of ecological constraints, while population growth and changing diets are driving up demand. …[C]urrent food production is massively subsidised through fossil fuel inputs, and…as those inputs become less available, and people become poorer due to economic contraction, food productivity and access will be undermined. …In totality, we are at the edge of an evolving systemic crisis. Peak oil and food constraints are already undermining the stability of our credit-strained integrated globalised economy. The core pillars of that economy: critical infrastructure, production flows, economies of scale, the financial and monetary system, behavioural adaptation, resource access and energy flows-are likely to begin forcing contagious failure.” – David Korowicz, <a href="http://www.feasta.org/2011/05/14/in-the-world-at-the-limits-to-growth/" style="color: #6858d6; text-decoration: initial;">In the world, at the limits to growth</a></i></div>
<div style="line-height: 1.4em; margin: 1em 0em;">
<i>“…But near-term, things will be bad enough. Over the next several decades, the Western United States and the semi-arid region from North Dakota to Texas will develop semi-permanent drought, with rain, when it does come, occurring in extreme events with heavy flooding. …More and more of the Midwest would be a dust bowl. California’s Central Valley could no longer be irrigated. Food prices would rise to unprecedented levels. If this sounds apocalyptic, it is.” – James Hansen, <a href="http://www.nytimes.com/2012/05/10/opinion/game-over-for-the-climate.html?_r=1" style="color: #6858d6; text-decoration: initial;">Game Over for the Climate</a></i></div>
<div style="line-height: 1.4em; margin: 1em 0em;">
<i>“The birds / are waiting to sing in the trees / that will grow in the quiet / that will come when the last / of the dire machines has passed, / burning the world, and the burning / has ceased. / And so am I.” – Wendell Berry, Sabbaths 2005 VIII (in Leavings)</i></div>
<div style="line-height: 1.4em; margin: 1em 0em;">
<b>SUMMARY:</b> No civilization has ever faced the agricultural challenges confronting us over the coming decades. Ever. And if we can pull it off – wherever we CAN pull it off – it will necessarily be with an agriculture of maximum resilience; an agriculture that can get knocked down and stagger back up again and again and again. So let’s do this.</div>
<div style="line-height: 1.4em; margin: 1em 0em;">
<b>REFERENCES FOR AGRICULTURAL LIMITS:</b></div>
<div style="line-height: 1.4em; margin: 1em 0em;">
I. Energy/economic collapse:</div>
<ul style="line-height: 1.4em; margin: 1em 0em; padding-left: 2em;">
<li style="margin: 0px; padding: 0px;">Richard Heinberg: <a href="http://www.energybulletin.net/stories/2011-12-14/soaring-oil-and-food-prices-threaten-affordable-food-supply" style="color: #6858d6; text-decoration: initial;">The End of Growth (2011)</a>; <a href="http://www.postcarbon.org/report/41306-the-food-and-farming-transition-toward" style="color: #6858d6; text-decoration: initial;">“The Food and Farming Transition”</a></li>
<li style="margin: 0px; padding: 0px;">David Korowicz: <a href="http://www.feasta.org/2011/06/20/energy-food-constraints-will-collapse-global-economic-recovery/" style="color: #6858d6; text-decoration: initial;">Energy & Food Constraints will Collapse Global Economic Recovery</a>; <a href="http://www.feasta.org/2011/05/14/in-the-world-at-the-limits-to-growth/" style="color: #6858d6; text-decoration: initial;">In the world, at the limits to growth</a>; <a href="http://www.feasta.org/2010/03/15/tipping-point-near-term-systemic-implications-of-a-peak-in-global-oil-production-an-outline-review/" style="color: #6858d6; text-decoration: initial;">Tipping Point: Near-Term Systemic Implications of a Peak in Global Oil Production – An Outline Review</a></li>
<li style="margin: 0px; padding: 0px;">Chris Martenson: <a href="http://www.chrismartenson.com/" style="color: #6858d6; text-decoration: initial;">The Crash Course (2011)</a>; <a href="http://www.chrismartenson.com/page/transcript-joel-salatin-how-prepare-future-increasingly-defined-localized-food-energy" style="color: #6858d6; text-decoration: initial;">Transcript for Joel Salatin: How to Prepare for A Future Increasingly Defined By Localized Food & Energy</a></li>
</ul>
<div style="line-height: 1.4em; margin: 1em 0em;">
II. Nuclear power-plant accidents and spent-fuel safety:</div>
<ul style="line-height: 1.4em; margin: 1em 0em; padding-left: 2em;">
<li style="margin: 0px; padding: 0px;">Arnie Gunderson: <a href="http://www.fairewinds.com/" style="color: #6858d6; text-decoration: initial;">Fairewinds Energy Education</a> (An excellent and comprehensive resource; See collected videos, podcasts, and reports)</li>
<li style="margin: 0px; padding: 0px;">Robert Alvarez: <a href="http://www.huffingtonpost.com/robert-alvarez/americas-nuclear-spentfue_b_871718.html" style="color: #6858d6; text-decoration: initial;">America's Nuclear Spent-Fuel Time Bombs</a>; <a href="http://www.ips-dc.org/reports/spent_nuclear_fuel_pools_in_the_us_reducing_the_deadly_risks_of_storage" style="color: #6858d6; text-decoration: initial;">Spent Nuclear Fuel Pools in the U.S.: Reducing the Deadly Risks of Storage</a></li>
<li style="margin: 0px; padding: 0px;"><a href="http://www.nirs.org/" style="color: #6858d6; text-decoration: initial;">Nuclear Information and Resource Service:</a> (NIRS is a clearinghouse site with lots of great nuclear reports.)</li>
</ul>
<div style="line-height: 1.4em; margin: 1em 0em;">
III. Sociopolitical troubles:</div>
<ul style="line-height: 1.4em; margin: 1em 0em; padding-left: 2em;">
<li style="margin: 0px; padding: 0px;">Michael Klare: The Race for What’s Left (2012); Rising Powers, Shrinking Planet (2008); Resource Wars (2002); <a href="http://www.tomdispatch.com/post/175540/tomgram%3A_michael_klare%2C_oil_wars_on_the_horizon/" style="color: #6858d6; text-decoration: initial;">The Energy Wars Heat Up</a></li>
<li style="margin: 0px; padding: 0px;">Richard Heinberg: <a href="http://www.energybulletin.net/stories/2012-01-10/geopolitical-implications-%E2%80%9Cpeak-everything%E2%80%9D" style="color: #6858d6; text-decoration: initial;">Geopolitical implications of “Peak Everything”</a></li>
<li style="margin: 0px; padding: 0px;">Rick Munroe: <a href="http://www.energybulletin.net/stories/2012-04-03/review-lt-col-eggen%E2%80%99s-thesis-impact-peaking-world-oil-production-global-balance-p" style="color: #6858d6; text-decoration: initial;">Review of Lt. Col. Eggen’s thesis, Impact of the Peaking of World Oil Production on the Global Balance of Power</a>; and many other peak-oil reviews from a military perspective at<a href="http://www.energybulletin.net/authors/Rick+Munroe" style="color: #6858d6; text-decoration: initial;">Energy Bulletin/Authors/Rick Munroe</a></li>
</ul>
<div style="line-height: 1.4em; margin: 1em 0em;">
IV. Climate change:</div>
<ul style="line-height: 1.4em; margin: 1em 0em; padding-left: 2em;">
<li style="margin: 0px; padding: 0px;">James Hansen: Storms of My Grandchildren (2009); <a href="http://www.columbia.edu/~jeh1/" style="color: #6858d6; text-decoration: initial;">Dr. James E. Hansen</a>; <a href="http://www.columbia.edu/~mhs119/" style="color: #6858d6; text-decoration: initial;">Updating the Climate Science</a>; <a href="http://www.nytimes.com/2012/05/10/opinion/game-over-for-the-climate.html?_r=3&ref=opinion" style="color: #6858d6; text-decoration: initial;">Game Over for the Climate</a></li>
<li style="margin: 0px; padding: 0px;">Joseph Romm: <a href="http://thinkprogress.org/climate/2011/10/26/353997/nature-dust-bowlification-food-insecurity/" style="color: #6858d6; text-decoration: initial;">Nature Publishes My Piece on Dust-Bowlification and the Grave Threat It Poses to Food Security</a>; <a href="http://thinkprogress.org/climate/2012/05/13/483247/james-hansen-is-correct-about-catastrophic-projections-for-us-drought-if-we-dont-act-now/" style="color: #6858d6; text-decoration: initial;">James Hansen Is Correct About Catastrophic Projections For U.S. Drought If We Don’t Act Now</a></li>
</ul>
<div style="line-height: 1.4em; margin: 1em 0em;">
<b>THE FINAL DAYS OF INDUSTRIAL AGRICULTURE</b></div>
<div style="line-height: 1.4em; margin: 1em 0em;">
Visualize, if you will, rivers of food -- rivers of industrial food flowing from the earth to our US kitchens like water. Massive upwellings of industrial food, coaxed from the abused soils of distant agricultural centers, rushing in great torrents over huge distances. And these great torrents of food now branching off at the great population centers, splitting furiously in the last tiny fraction of their journey to our industrial kitchens – just in time.</div>
<div style="line-height: 1.4em; margin: 1em 0em;">
All as if by magic.</div>
<div style="line-height: 1.4em; margin: 1em 0em;">
…But wait, it’s not actually magic! Looking behind the curtains, we can see that there are great, poison-belching fires of ancient sunlight burning day and night to both raise the food and keep these great food rivers flowing.</div>
<div style="line-height: 1.4em; margin: 1em 0em;">
And now, turning from the roaring fossil-fires and billions of hungry mouths grown dependent on them, we glance over at the great gas tanks of ancient sunlight. …And we gasp. They’re half empty!</div>
<div style="line-height: 1.4em; margin: 1em 0em;">
…Pessimist!</div>
<div style="line-height: 1.4em; margin: 1em 0em;">
But the pessimism is justified when we notice, alarmingly, that the gas lines running from the tanks to feed the great fires are beginning to constrict. They are unavoidably and irreversibly constricting. The gas lines that feed the great machines are getting smaller and smaller and smaller…</div>
<div style="line-height: 1.4em; margin: 1em 0em;">
And as the flow rate of ancient sunlight begins to slow, the flow of industrial food begins to slow with it.</div>
<div style="line-height: 1.4em; margin: 1em 0em;">
Little by little at first.</div>
<div style="line-height: 1.4em; margin: 1em 0em;">
Then faster. And faster. And faster and faster. And faster and faster and faster…</div>
<div style="line-height: 1.4em; margin: 1em 0em;">
And then it stops. …Nothing.</div>
<div style="line-height: 1.4em; margin: 1em 0em;">
The great rivers of industrial food run dry. Out of gas.</div>
<div style="line-height: 1.4em; margin: 1em 0em;">
Industrial civilization – the destroyer of worlds – laid low.</div>
<div style="line-height: 1.4em; margin: 1em 0em;">
And if you’d like a visual here, the flow rate of this great industrial river of food (or industrial anything, really) will probably look pretty much like the gray part of the figure below – the “Net Hubbert Curve.”</div>
<div style="line-height: 1.4em; margin: 1em 0em;">
…And I don’t think the estimated time-line here is too far off either.</div>
<div style="line-height: 1.4em; margin: 1em 0em;">
<span class="inline inline-center" style="display: block; text-align: center;"><img alt="" class="image image-img_assist_custom" height="274" src="http://energybulletin.net/sites/default/files/images/image001_0.img_assist_custom.png" style="border: none;" title="" width="400" /></span></div>
<div style="line-height: 1.4em; margin: 1em 0em;">
<b>FIGURE 1: THE NET-HUBBERT CURVE</b> – tracking the rise and fall of net energy from petroleum; used in the context of this essay as a rough predictor of industrial agricultural output. Note that a somewhat similar, rapid-collapse, ‘shark-fin’ shape can be found in the ‘food per capita’ curve of the Limits to Growth analysis at <a href="http://www.esf.edu/efb/hall/2009-05Hall0327.pdf" style="color: #6858d6; text-decoration: initial;">Revisiting the Limits to Growth After Peak Oil</a>.<br /><b>Source:</b> <a href="http://netenergy.theoildrum.com/node/5500" style="color: #6858d6; text-decoration: initial;">The Net Hubbert Curve: What Does It Mean?</a></div>
<div style="line-height: 1.4em; margin: 1em 0em;">
But wait… Isn’t this net-energy decline argument for the collapse of industrial agriculture a bit too simplistic?</div>
<div style="line-height: 1.4em; margin: 1em 0em;">
Well, the answer is no -- because exponentially-increasing net fossil-fuel energy is the pin that holds the whole industrial machine together. And as net-energy inputs decline, the machine simply falls apart -- the pieces scattering and losing their integrity. Industrial agriculture will simply be one of those unfortunate pieces. Gone.</div>
<div style="line-height: 1.4em; margin: 1em 0em;">
Indeed, as David Korowicz writes, “The high dependence of food on fossil fuel inputs, the delocalisation of food sourcing, and lean just-in-time inventories could lead to quickly evolving food insecurity risks even in the most developed countries. At issue is not just food production, but the ability to link surpluses to deficits, collapsed purchasing power, and the ability to monetize transactions.” (<a href="http://www.feasta.org/2010/03/15/tipping-point-near-term-systemic-implications-of-a-peak-in-global-oil-production-an-outline-review/" style="color: #6858d6; text-decoration: initial;">Tipping Point: Near-Term Systemic Implications of a Peak in Global Oil Production – An Outline Review</a>)</div>
<div style="line-height: 1.4em; margin: 1em 0em;">
…So there it is. Industrial agriculture, R.I.P. ca. 1945-2025. …Or sooner.</div>
<div style="line-height: 1.4em; margin: 1em 0em;">
And good riddance to the toxic destroyer, sworn enemy of the ecosphere, final cleaver of the bond between humans and the land.</div>
<div style="line-height: 1.4em; margin: 1em 0em;">
<b>MAKING OTHER PLANS</b></div>
<div style="line-height: 1.4em; margin: 1em 0em;">
But of course, we humans HAVE known other ways to feed ourselves. We HAVE known other ways to produce food without the aid of these unholy pyres of ancient sunlight.</div>
<div style="line-height: 1.4em; margin: 1em 0em;">
And so I imagine we’ll need to recall those pre-industrial ways back before too long, no? We’ll need to re-visit those authors who have illuminated key ideas and practices of an ecologically-sane agriculture that almost was: F.H. King’s ‘Farmers of Forty Centuries’; Sir Albert Howard’s ‘An Agricultural Testament’; Liberty Hyde Bailey’s ‘The Holy Earth’; J. Russell Smith’s ‘Tree Crops’; Wendell Berry’s poetry, novels, and essays; the collected works of Gene Logsdon, ‘Contrary Farmer’.</div>
<div style="line-height: 1.4em; margin: 1em 0em;">
And I imagine we’ll need to refine our agricultural philosophies and methods in light of all our new (or rediscovered, really) ecological knowledge. We’ll need to seriously consult, in a very practical way, the great agricultural and ecological thinkers of our time: Aldo Leopold’s ‘Land Ethic’; Mollison & Holmgren’s ‘Permaculture’; Wes Jackson’s ‘Natural Systems Agriculture’; Derrick Jensen’s ‘Listening to the Land;’ among others.</div>
<div style="line-height: 1.4em; margin: 1em 0em;">
And I imagine we’ll need to identify, replicate, and refine the thousands of small, ecologically-sane farming experiments already underway in this country – little jewels, often hanging by an economic thread, buffeted by the spastic convulsions of a dying industrialism.</div>
<div style="line-height: 1.4em; margin: 1em 0em;">
And maybe we should get started with all this before the industrial food cupboard is completely bare, no? …Barack? Can you even hear us?</div>
<div style="line-height: 1.4em; margin: 1em 0em;">
Cut to dimly lit living room at noon, curtains drawn, soap operas pre-empted by an urgent announcement from our fearless leader: “OK, unemployed database engineers who can’t tell a seed from a Sudafed, and college-educated baristas who wouldn’t know a collard if it clocked them in the head – it’s time to grow yourselves some dinner! …Ready, set…go!”</div>
<div style="line-height: 1.4em; margin: 1em 0em;">
<b>THE FINAL DAYS OF HUMAN AGRICULTURE?</b></div>
<div style="line-height: 1.4em; margin: 1em 0em;">
But even with the many non-industrial agricultural options theoretically open to us, there are still several well-grounded reasons to be pessimistic about the prospects for ANY form US agriculture over the remainder of this century. And here we need not visualize a great fuel-fed river running dry – but merely to look towards the nearest (or even distant) nuclear spent-fuel pools, missile silos, and the +40% CO2-enriched air around your head.</div>
<div style="line-height: 1.4em; margin: 1em 0em;">
<b>I. NUCLEAR THREATS</b> -- On the nuclear front, our 100+ aging reactors, brimming with unimaginably toxic and combustible spent fuel are literally ticking time bombs. Increasingly-routine disruptions in the electric grid could send them popping off like corks all over the country. Fukushima, USA X 100. Check out the references at the start of this essay. In the interest of space, let me just quote nuclear engineer Arnie Gunderson (<a href="http://www.fairewinds.com/" style="color: #6858d6; text-decoration: initial;">www.fairewinds.com</a>) here from a recent Radio Ecoshock podcast: “It’s impossible to predict the worst event that Mother Nature or humans, in the form of terrorists, can do to a nuclear power plant. …Nuclear power, when things go wrong…is a technology that can destroy a nation.”</div>
<div style="line-height: 1.4em; margin: 1em 0em;">
…Because how DOES that cesium-137 taste with fresh, organic kale and free range eggs? Probably a bit metallicky, huh? …Wait…what’s this lump?...</div>
<div style="line-height: 1.4em; margin: 1em 0em;">
<b>II. THREATS OF WAR</b> -- As for our deadly missiles of war sleeping lightly in their silos…well, we can all imagine how that might play out. Imagine the unimaginable! (The author shudders.) Follow Michael Klare’s work for a front-row seat on the ramped-up nastiness emerging as an armed-to-the-teeth global technological civilization begins to come apart at the seams. (<a href="http://www.energybulletin.net/stories/2012-05-10/energy-wars-heat" style="color: #6858d6; text-decoration: initial;">The Energy Wars Heat Up</a>). And as the economy craters and folks get testy, our 160 years of domestic semi-tranquility may indeed be drawing to a close.</div>
<div style="line-height: 1.4em; margin: 1em 0em;">
…Because how DOES your garden grow when farmers all around you are being reduced to “bug splat” by unseen drones and your crops, such as they are, are harvested by hordes of starving refugees? …Just don’t forget to turn those compost piles!</div>
<div style="line-height: 1.4em; margin: 1em 0em;">
<b>III. CLIMATE THREATS</b> -- And on the climate change front, spend a long time checking out the following paleo-climate graphs from NASA’s James Hansen. And please note the disturbingly narrow climatic range in which human agriculture has EVER worked – the paper-thin, 10,000-year Holocene period at almost exactly “2 oC” on all three of these graphs.</div>
<div style="line-height: 1.4em; margin: 1em 0em;">
<span class="inline inline-center" style="display: block; text-align: center;"><img alt="" class="image image-_original" height="638" src="http://energybulletin.net/sites/default/files/images/image003_1.gif" style="border: none;" title="" width="451" /></span></div>
<div style="line-height: 1.4em; margin: 1em 0em;">
<b>FIGURE 2: JAMES HANSEN’S PALEO-CLIMATE GRAPHS.</b> Note that the Holocene – 10,000-year-long home of human agriculture – is located in only a very narrow band right around 2 oC on these graphs. The coming departure from Holocene temperatures and climatic stability poses grave challenges to human agriculture.<br /><b>Source: <a href="http://www.columbia.edu/~mhs119/Milankovic/" style="color: #6858d6; text-decoration: initial;">James Hansen (NASA)</a></b></div>
<div style="line-height: 1.4em; margin: 1em 0em;">
…And note that we are almost certainly moving rapidly away from this excruciatingly narrow climatic window -- as we speak, even. (Follow all the fun at Joe Romm’s <a href="http://climateprogress.org/" style="color: #6858d6; text-decoration: initial;">climateprogress.org</a> and James’Hansen’s <a href="http://www.columbia.edu/~mhs119/" style="color: #6858d6; text-decoration: initial;">Updating the Climate Science</a>).</div>
<div style="line-height: 1.4em; margin: 1em 0em;">
Indeed, on the temperature scales of graphs above, we’re headed from 2 oC (the Holocene) to where? To 4 oC? …to 5 oC? …to 6 oC? …to 7 oC? …higher? Hell, early-Cenozoic, here we come!</div>
<div style="line-height: 1.4em; margin: 1em 0em;">
Biblical droughts, floods, winds, disease, sea-level rise, oh my!</div>
<div style="line-height: 1.4em; margin: 1em 0em;">
How far away will we have pushed the climate system with our clumsy industrial blundering and the incipient positive-feedbacks?</div>
<div style="line-height: 1.4em; margin: 1em 0em;">
…And will agriculture even work AT ALL in these brave new climatic regimes?</div>
<div style="line-height: 1.4em; margin: 1em 0em;">
In response, I quote from the great probabilistic philosopher, Dirty Harry: “You've got to ask yourself one question: Do I feel lucky? Well, do ya, punk?”</div>
<div style="line-height: 1.4em; margin: 1em 0em;">
And having now entrusted our agricultural fate to the dubious kindness and violent, schizophrenic mood-swings of an unraveling complex system, we may indeed become just one more species scrambling for survival in the Great Anthropocene Extinction.</div>
<div style="line-height: 1.4em; margin: 1em 0em;">
<b>SO THEN WHAT DO WE DO, MR. DOOMER-HEAD?</b></div>
<div style="line-height: 1.4em; margin: 1em 0em;">
Well…there, I did it. I said the ‘E’-word.</div>
<div style="line-height: 1.4em; margin: 1em 0em;">
…So having gotten this far, let me summarize: (1) Industrial agriculture has NO chance, even short-term; (3) the transition to an ecologically-sane, post-industrial agriculture will be damn hard -- but is conceivably possible; and (3) even THAT might not be enough -- because human agriculture itself only MAYBE has a chance, long term, due to the gathering nuclear and climatic storms.</div>
<div style="line-height: 1.4em; margin: 1em 0em;">
So where does that leave us?</div>
<div style="line-height: 1.4em; margin: 1em 0em;">
It leaves us here: (1) We embrace (and hasten?) the collapse of the industrial killing-machine; (2) we apply ourselves to the creation of a resilient, ecologically-sane, land-based agriculture with all our hearts and minds; and (3) we pray to God or gods or Gaia or the Infinite Ether for mercy, for we were as children and knew not what we did.</div>
<div style="line-height: 1.4em; margin: 1em 0em;">
Sounds like a plan. …I guess.</div>
<div style="line-height: 1.4em; margin: 1em 0em;">
Well, no use wallowing in self-pity at this point.</div>
<div style="line-height: 1.4em; margin: 1em 0em;">
Let’s just do it.</div>
<div style="line-height: 1.4em; margin: 1em 0em;">
<b>RESILIENCE OR DEATH</b></div>
<div style="line-height: 1.4em; margin: 1em 0em;">
But let’s be honest with ourselves here: This is gonna be damn hard. It’s gonna take more than just gumption and rah-rah, eco-farming spirit to get through this mess.</div>
<div style="line-height: 1.4em; margin: 1em 0em;">
We’re going to need a very different and very special agriculture to confront the awesome challenges we’re facing here.</div>
<div style="line-height: 1.4em; margin: 1em 0em;">
We are going to need an agriculture certainly far different from the absurdly fragile and destructive industrial model – but it will also necessarily be different from just about any agriculture we’ve seen for thousands of years. …Or maybe ever.</div>
<div style="line-height: 1.4em; margin: 1em 0em;">
Because whatever agriculture we practice in the US in the coming decades, it will face a toxic combination of searing challenges: global economic collapse, intense socio-political destabilization, debilitating nuclear and chemical pollution, and a potentially apocalyptic destabilization of the global climate.</div>
<div style="line-height: 1.4em; margin: 1em 0em;">
No human civilization has EVER faced, much less survived, this fetid cocktail of shit-storms in our 10,000 year history of growing our own food. …Ever. In fact, civilizations and populations have blinked out in the face of far weaker challenges.</div>
<div style="line-height: 1.4em; margin: 1em 0em;">
But if we can pull it off – wherever we are ABLE to pull it off -- it will necessarily be with an agriculture of maximum resilience – one that can get knocked down and stagger back up again and again; one that utilizes the overlapping talents and resiliency of countless organisms as a buffer against the blows that will certainly come and come and come and come again; one that takes full and skillful advantage of EVERY food-producing strategy ever utilized by our species.</div>
<div style="line-height: 1.4em; margin: 1em 0em;">
…Or it won’t be at all.</div>
<div style="line-height: 1.4em; margin: 1em 0em;">
Resilience or death. That’s our choice.</div>
<div style="line-height: 1.4em; margin: 1em 0em;">
The cultural selection process will be brutal in the challenging decades to come, and it will hinge almost entirely on whether a given local culture has its agricultural act together – whether its farms are tuned into the new (and constantly shifting) biophysical realities of this planet: And if they are? Advance to the next (wildly uncertain) growing season. And if they aren’t? Thanks for playing, goodbye.</div>
<div style="line-height: 1.4em; margin: 1em 0em;">
May we all live in interesting times, indeed!</div>
<div style="line-height: 1.4em; margin: 1em 0em;">
<b>RESILLIENCY ATTRIBUTES</b></div>
<div style="line-height: 1.4em; margin: 1em 0em;">
OK, so we’ll almost certainly need an agriculture of ‘maximum resilience.’ But how do we go about designing such an agriculture?</div>
<div style="line-height: 1.4em; margin: 1em 0em;">
To answer that we would be wise to collectively consult Holmgren’s excellent and comprehensive permaculture design principles -- and really the entire voluminous body of permaculture literature (<a href="http://www.chelseagreen.com/" style="color: #6858d6; text-decoration: initial;">Chelsea Green</a>). But in the interest of space, I’ll just cut to the chase here and say that we’ll need to adopt a slew of farming strategies – as many as possible – each with complementary resiliencies.</div>
<div style="line-height: 1.4em; margin: 1em 0em;">
And why? Because when one strategy (or two or three or four) invariably gets laid low, others will be there to take up the slack – at least partially; at least to help us limp over to the next growing season.</div>
<div style="line-height: 1.4em; margin: 1em 0em;">
To accomplish this, we’ll need to consider both the many kinds of food producing strategies we can employ in any given place, but also what each strategy has going for it in the resiliency sense – its resiliency attributes.</div>
<div style="line-height: 1.4em; margin: 1em 0em;">
This will necessarily be tackled differently in each region, in each food-shed, and on each farm -- but as an example, here’s a partial analysis I sketched up for some strategies I’m using and/or developing on my farm in central New Jersey.</div>
<div style="line-height: 1.4em; margin: 1em 0em;">
<span class="inline inline-center" style="display: block; text-align: center;"><img alt="" class="image image-_original" height="324" src="http://energybulletin.net/sites/default/files/images/image005.gif" style="border: none;" title="" width="576" /></span></div>
<div style="line-height: 1.4em; margin: 1em 0em;">
<b>FIGURE 3: RESILIENCY ATTRIBUTES OF DIFFERENT CROP TYPES ON MY NJ FARM.</b> Each crop type has its own resiliency pros and cons – as does each individual crop within a type, each variety within each crop, and each genetically-distinct individual within a variety. We would do well to utilize as many resiliency profiles as possible at each level to make it through the coming troubles. (For more details, see my essay <a href="http://www.energybulletin.net/stories/2010-12-13/agriculture-stands-chance-perennial-polyculture-hard-limits-post-carbon-farming" style="color: #6858d6; text-decoration: initial;">An agriculture that stands a chance: perennial polyculture & the hard limits of post-carbon farming</a>)</div>
<div style="line-height: 1.4em; margin: 1em 0em;">
And I think it’s also helpful to consider which of these crop types possess the best resiliency against some of the specific agricultural stresses we can expect. In the chart below I’ve marked with an ‘X’ the two crop types on my farm with the (arguably) best resilencies to each environmental and socio-political stressor. It’s certainly not a comprehensive chart – reality is much messier than this -- but it gives a taste of the sorts of analyses I think will be crucial if we’re able to develop an agriculture that stands a chance for a given farm and region.</div>
<div style="line-height: 1.4em; margin: 1em 0em;">
For example, annual vegetables have relatively little resilience against drought and floods, but due to the many types available, they offer good resilience against pests and disease – assuming you skillfully take advantage of this diversity. They also offer good resilience against a forced relocation due to their often-short fruiting/bearing times and mobile seeds. …Because it’ll be awfully hard to throw those chestnut trees on your back when the local nuclear power plant blows a gasket and you need to scram for 100 years or so.</div>
<div style="line-height: 1.4em; margin: 1em 0em;">
<span class="inline inline-center" style="display: block; text-align: center;"><img alt="" class="image image-_original" height="345" src="http://energybulletin.net/sites/default/files/images/image007.gif" style="border: none;" title="" width="575" /></span></div>
<div style="line-height: 1.4em; margin: 1em 0em;">
<b>FIGURE 4: CROP TYPES WITH THE BEST RESILIENCIES AGAINST SOME POSSIBLE AGRICULTURAL STRESSES IN CENTRAL NJ.</b> The two crops with (arguably) the best resilience against each stress are marked with an ‘X’. Reality will undoubtedly be far messier than this, but the point here is that some crops will do better against some stresses than others. The more variety we have – the broader our resiliency profiles – the better chance we have of getting through each growing season in our increasingly-destabilized socio-political and physical climates.</div>
<div style="line-height: 1.4em; margin: 1em 0em;">
<b>RINGS OF RESILIENCE</b></div>
<div style="line-height: 1.4em; margin: 1em 0em;">
Another factor to consider in designing this uber-resilient agriculture is the scale required by each crop type – i.e. roughly how large of an area should be devoted to each crop.</div>
<div style="line-height: 1.4em; margin: 1em 0em;">
This scale will be determined by both the productivity of a given crop type in a given location, but also by the labor requirements. For example, I’d have trouble keeping up with five acres of tomatoes vines, but I can easily handle five acres of chestnut trees. The ‘Rings of Resilience’ diagram below illustrates the relative scale of some food/fiber producing strategies open to me on my farm in central NJ and a possibly-reasonable scale for each.</div>
<div style="line-height: 1.4em; margin: 1em 0em;">
<span class="inline inline-center" style="display: block; text-align: center;"><img alt="" class="image image-_original" height="402" src="http://energybulletin.net/sites/default/files/images/image009.gif" style="border: none;" title="" width="456" /></span></div>
<div style="line-height: 1.4em; margin: 1em 0em;">
<b>FIGURE 5: “THE RINGS OF RESILIENCE”</b> – Possibly-appropriate scales for several different crop types on a central-NJ farm. Each crop type has its own suite of resilience attributes and strengths, all adding up to an agriculture that might just stand a chance in the challenging era to come. Management intensity requirements decreases outward from the center. (See David Holmgren’s discussion of ‘Principle 7: Design from patterns to details’ in Permaculture: Principles and Pathways Beyond Sustainability for a somewhat similar take on this idea.)</div>
<div style="line-height: 1.4em; margin: 1em 0em;">
<b>ANNUAL CROPS:</b> (1 acre) Annual veggies, fruits, and grains. These require labor-intensive soil disturbance (at least without access to trucked-in compost/mulch). Shallow-rooted and thus need babying or sacrifice during the ever more frequent and nasty droughts. Require labor-intensive weed management. Grass/clover strips between the veggie rows promote some biodiversity (<a href="http://www.misty-acres-farm.com/" style="color: #6858d6; text-decoration: initial;">Misty Acres Farm</a>), but not nearly as much as the perennial strategies that follow. Grains grown in the small-scale Gene Logsdon strip fashion. Small plots of annual veggies & grain can be ridiculously productive with annual manuring (from winter animal bedding) and adequate watering during dry weeks. Very time-sensitive for planting, and requires some skill in seed harvest and saving. Will crash and burn within a few months if you’re forced to take an involuntary leave of absence. …But you can bring seeds with you.</div>
<div style="line-height: 1.4em; margin: 1em 0em;">
<b>SMALL PERENNIAL CROPS:</b> (2 acres) Perennial cane & bush fruits, perennial vegetables (sunchokes, scorzonera, Chinese yam, groundnuts, etc.), bush nuts (ex: hazelnuts), inherently smaller-sized fruit trees (ex: paw paw), bamboos, and (perhaps someday) The Land Institute’s perennial grains. Species and varieties that don’t need babying. Requires only very infrequent labor-intensive soil disturbance. Much easier weed management. Allows better biodiversity than annuals, but still on the lower side. Fairly productive, requiring less manure & water inputs than annuals, due to more extensive root systems and more robust soil communities. More resistant to drought. Avoids need to save seed annually, as well as the time-sensitive & labor-intensive planting windows. Will persist for about 2-8 years if you need to lay low somewhere else for a spell.</div>
<div style="line-height: 1.4em; margin: 1em 0em;">
<b>GRAZED PASTURE:</b> (4 acres) Perennial grasses & clovers grazed by ruminants (sheep, goats, and cows) – for meat, milk, wool, and some occasional hay. No difficult soil disturbance required. Relatively easy weed management (two words: include goats). But only so-so above-ground biodiversity due to simple spatial structure -- but soil can support a veritable rainforest of species if not over-grazed. Deep rooted and quite drought resistant – will go dormant, but not die, during a drought. Fairly productive and multipurpose. Will persist for ~10-15 years if you need to skip town – using goats to whip it back to pasture again quickly.</div>
<div style="line-height: 1.4em; margin: 1em 0em;">
<b>GRAZED ORCHARD:</b> (8 acres) A diverse stand of standard-sized fruit and nut trees set far enough apart for some grazing of grasses & clovers underneath. No soil disturbance or weed management worries at all. Pick hardy species and varieties that don’t need spraying and babying. Good biodiversity -- both above and below ground. Multi-purpose for wood products when trees are pruned (by saw or wind) or need to be replaced. Grazing underneath provides free weed-management and contributes towards raising all the ruminant-based food/fiber products. Very drought resistant – although yield will suffer. Attracts edible wildlife as an added bonus. Will persist for decades if you’re otherwise indisposed. Will feed you if even if you house is torched, all your animals stolen, your veggie seeds lost, and the steely boot of oppression is on your neck.</div>
<div style="line-height: 1.4em; margin: 1em 0em;">
<b>MANAGED FOREST:</b> (16 acres) Native-type, multi-layered, mixed-deciduous forest with a variety of large trees, understory trees, shrubs, and herbs. Managed with a attentive, humble, and loving eye for selective harvest of wood, wild-plant foraging, and hunting. A sort of slow-motion garden – steered gently over many human generations to a desired species mix, in consultation and partnership with the land itself. Depending on the species, it has good resistance to drought, fire, and many other calamities. The gold standard for both biodiversity and resilience in my region. Both a supplementary and emergency food source. Can persist for centuries if your region is scheduled for a human-timeout.</div>
<div style="line-height: 1.4em; margin: 1em 0em;">
<b>WILD LANDS:</b> (as much as possible within a few hours walking distance) An anything-goes species mix. Whatever the land feels like growing. Nudged in a desired direction perhaps by hunting and harvest (and maybe the occasional fire), but otherwise too large to be managed. A fall-back food-source for plants and animals when all hell breaks loose. …Back to the stone age! We’ve earned it!</div>
<div style="line-height: 1.4em; margin: 1em 0em;">
I should note that aquaculture – specifically food production from ponds – is one possible crop type for my farm I haven’t considered here. But that’s just because I haven’t tried it yet. …But I have a pond and an algae-filled pool, so it’s on my ‘to-do’ list. …Only 24 hours in a day. (See Gene Logsdon’s Pond Lovers)</div>
<div style="line-height: 1.4em; margin: 1em 0em;">
And again, this is just stuff that I’ve been working on so far, where I live. I’m not claiming this can withstand the coming shit-storms. I have no idea. But this is my best shot – the best I can do. It’s going to evolve and expand as I learn more. We just need to do a similar process of learning, testing, and ‘resilifying’ our farms across the entire country – with whatever strategies turn out to work on each particular farm.</div>
<div style="line-height: 1.4em; margin: 1em 0em;">
So let’s do it.</div>
<div style="line-height: 1.4em; margin: 1em 0em;">
<b>LESSONS FROM A NEARBY FARM</b></div>
<div style="line-height: 1.4em; margin: 1em 0em;">
But CAN we do it?</div>
<div style="line-height: 1.4em; margin: 1em 0em;">
Being brutally honest with ourselves, I suppose we need to acknowledge that this ‘future of human agriculture’ stuff is, at best, a pretty mixed bag -- scary yet tentatively promising, discouraging yet cautiously-hopeful, overwhelming yet oddly-invigorating.</div>
<div style="line-height: 1.4em; margin: 1em 0em;">
The creation of a new and lasting agriculture in the face of all the trouble screamin’ down on us is a monumental task. …But we have no choice. It’s resilience or death at this point.</div>
<div style="line-height: 1.4em; margin: 1em 0em;">
And this is not a task that will be accomplished via grand, general policies and green-flowery language sent down from on-high; it will be undertaken farm by farm, field by field, by millions and millions of recovering industriaholics reacquainting themselves with the land, reacquainting themselves with the countless organisms they’ve tried for so long to ignore, avoid, and kill.</div>
<div style="line-height: 1.4em; margin: 1em 0em;">
It’ll be easy for these millions of new farmers to get lost in the details, uncertainty, and heartbreaks along the way – to start running down the wrong road just because it’s the only one we can see down at the moment.</div>
<div style="line-height: 1.4em; margin: 1em 0em;">
So maybe to close here, we should pull back and put all this in perspective a bit.</div>
<div style="line-height: 1.4em; margin: 1em 0em;">
Come over here and look at this…</div>
<div style="line-height: 1.4em; margin: 1em 0em;">
I’ve spent some time lately watching ants farm some aphids on a three-foot tall dock plant growing from the foundation of my garage. As I surmise (perhaps only half-correctly), the ants brought the aphids to the plant, protected them to adulthood, and now ‘milk’ them of their sugary secretions as the aphids graze on nutrient rich fluids in the dock. It’s a scene of serene bucolic contentment, hard against the weathered boards, cinders, and garbage cans of my garage.</div>
<div style="line-height: 1.4em; margin: 1em 0em;">
And on the surrounding land, I farm as well. I grow vegetables, tend an orchard, care for a growing perennial-food-crop nursery, raise chickens and sheep, and work to integrate my farm into the local human and natural communities.</div>
<div style="line-height: 1.4em; margin: 1em 0em;">
But these ants are the true masters here. For while their actions are perhaps more genetically hard-wired than my farming practices, I would argue that their farming is also far, far more experienced, better adapted, more sustainable, and more resilient than mine. It’s not even close.</div>
<div style="line-height: 1.4em; margin: 1em 0em;">
And I could easily ruin their little farm next to my garage. One careless swipe of a stick would do it.</div>
<div style="line-height: 1.4em; margin: 1em 0em;">
But they’d be OK, I suppose. They’d maybe gather their aphids, traipse back to the nest, locate some other promising dock plant, and cobble together a new aphid-milking operation. Or maybe they’d try their hand at some other ant-related agricultural enterprise. I don’t know enough about them to say.</div>
<div style="line-height: 1.4em; margin: 1em 0em;">
But seeing as how they’re already thriving amidst the ecological train-wreck of my driveway and out-buildings, I bet they’ll get by. Or at least their colony will. Or at least their species.</div>
<div style="line-height: 1.4em; margin: 1em 0em;">
But I don’t know if I could say the same about my farm, about my community, about my species.</div>
<div style="line-height: 1.4em; margin: 1em 0em;">
…Maybe I better go back and watch them a bit longer.</div>
<div style="line-height: 1.4em; margin: 1em 0em;">
…I’ll pull up a chair for you too.</div>
<div style="line-height: 1.4em; margin: 1em 0em;">
We’ve all got a lot to learn.</div>
<div class="image-clear" style="clear: both; font-size: 0px; height: 1px; line-height: 0px; margin-bottom: -1px;">
</div>
</div>
<div class="end-notes" style="background-color: white; font-family: Verdana, Geneva, 'Bitstream Vera Sans', 'DejaVu Sans', sans-serif; font-size: 12px; line-height: 15.475000381469727px;">
<div class="editorial-notes" style="background-color: #f8f8f8; background-position: initial initial; background-repeat: initial initial; border-top-color: rgb(221, 221, 221); border-top-style: solid; border-top-width: 3px; font-family: Constantina, Georgia, 'Nimbus Roman No9 L', serif; font-style: italic; margin-top: 3em; padding: 0px 1em 1em;">
<h5 style="font-size: 1.1em; line-height: 1.3em; margin-bottom: 0.909em; margin-top: 0.909em;">
Editorial Notes</h5>
<div>
<div style="margin-bottom: 1em; margin-top: 1em;">
From the author: I'm a high school chemistry teacher in NJ. I'm also a concerned father, organic farmer, and community garden organizer.</div>
<div style="margin-bottom: 1em; margin-top: 1em;">
You can contact me at <a href="mailto:danallen1968@yahoo.com" style="color: #6858d6; text-decoration: initial;">danallen1968@yahoo.com</a>.</div>
<div style="margin-bottom: 1em; margin-top: 1em;">
Other posts by Dan Allen at Energy Bulletin: <a href="http://www.energybulletin.net/authors/Dan+Allen" style="color: #6858d6; text-decoration: initial;" title="http://www.energybulletin.net/authors/Dan+Allen">http://www.energybulletin.net/authors/Dan+Allen</a></div>
</div>
</div>
</div>
<div class="blogger-post-footer">http://kjpermaculture.blogspot.com/feeds/posts/default
<p id="blogfeeds"><$BlogFeedsVertical$></p>
<p id="postfeeds"><$BlogItemFeedLinks$></p></div>Anonymoushttp://www.blogger.com/profile/03009370115428649864noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-439180943121365896.post-86440476681736485522013-02-09T21:56:00.000-05:002013-02-09T21:56:08.877-05:00An agriculture that stands a chance: perennial polyculture & the hard limits of post-carbon farming<br />
<div class="page_origin" style="background-color: white; float: left; font-family: Verdana, Geneva, 'Bitstream Vera Sans', 'DejaVu Sans', sans-serif; font-size: 11.199999809265137px; font-style: italic; line-height: 15.475000381469727px; margin-top: 0.5em;">
Published <span class="date-display-single">Dec 13 2010</span> by <a href="http://www.energybulletin.net/stories/2010-12-13/agriculture-stands-chance-perennial-polyculture-hard-limits-post-carbon-farming" style="color: #6858d6; text-decoration: initial;">Energy Bulletin</a>, Archived <span class="date-display-single">Dec 13 2010</span></div>
<h2 class="title" style="background-color: white; clear: both; font-family: Constantina, Georgia, 'Nimbus Roman No9 L', serif; font-size: 24px; line-height: 1.3em; margin-bottom: 0em; margin-top: 0.667em; padding-top: 0.5em;">
An agriculture that stands a chance: perennial polyculture & the hard limits of post-carbon farming</h2>
<div class="origin" style="background-color: white; font-family: Verdana, Geneva, 'Bitstream Vera Sans', 'DejaVu Sans', sans-serif; font-size: 16px; font-weight: bold; line-height: 15.475000381469727px; margin: 0.25em 0px 0.5em;">
by Dan Allen</div>
<div class="content" style="background-color: white; color: #444444; font-family: Verdana, Geneva, 'Bitstream Vera Sans', 'DejaVu Sans', sans-serif; font-size: 12px; line-height: 1.4em; max-width: 900px; min-width: 200px; padding: 0px; width: 596.1500244140625px;">
<blockquote style="color: #2b3a6d; font-family: Constantina, Georgia, 'Nimbus Roman No9 L', serif; font-size: 1.1em; font-style: italic; line-height: 1.4em; margin: 1.5em 2.5em;">
<div style="line-height: 1.4em; margin: 1em 0em;">
“The American food system rests on an unstable foundation of massive fossil fuel inputs. It must be reinvented in the face of declining fuel stocks.”<br />-- Richard Heinberg and Michael Bomford, ‘The Food and Farming Transition‘ (<a href="http://www.postcarbon.org/report/41306-the-food-and-farming-transition-toward" style="color: #6858d6; text-decoration: initial;" title="http://www.postcarbon.org/report/41306-the-food-and-farming-transition-toward">http://www.postcarbon.org/report/41306-the-food-and-farming-transition-t...</a>)</div>
</blockquote>
<blockquote style="color: #2b3a6d; font-family: Constantina, Georgia, 'Nimbus Roman No9 L', serif; font-size: 1.1em; font-style: italic; line-height: 1.4em; margin: 1.5em 2.5em;">
<div style="line-height: 1.4em; margin: 1em 0em;">
“The United States and many other heavily populated countries face a growing threat of severe and prolonged drought in coming decades. ...[W]arming temperatures associated with climate change will likely create increasingly dry conditions across much of the globe in the next 30 years, possibly reaching a scale in some regions by the end of the century that has rarely, if ever, been observed in modern times.”<br />-- NCAR report, quoted by Joe Romm at<a href="http://climateprogress.org/2010/10/20/ncar-daidrought-under-global-warming-a-review/" style="color: #6858d6; text-decoration: initial;" title="http://climateprogress.org/2010/10/20/ncar-daidrought-under-global-warming-a-review/">http://climateprogress.org/2010/10/20/ncar-daidrought-under-global-warmi...</a></div>
</blockquote>
<blockquote style="color: #2b3a6d; font-family: Constantina, Georgia, 'Nimbus Roman No9 L', serif; font-size: 1.1em; font-style: italic; line-height: 1.4em; margin: 1.5em 2.5em;">
<div style="line-height: 1.4em; margin: 1em 0em;">
“If you're looking at how daunting a task is, you're looking at the wrong side of the equation and you will find the things that will limit you and prevent you from succeeding. Put roots in the ground. Grow your food. Build your shelter. Create a Permaculture enterprise and provide real Permaculture goods and services, then link up with others that are doing complimentary things. This is the way we will create a new culture and economy.”<br />—Mark Shepherd, farmer (<a href="http://www.energybulletin.net/stories/2010-11-12/mark-shepherds-106-acre-permaculture-farm-viola-wisconsin" style="color: #6858d6; text-decoration: initial;" title="http://www.energybulletin.net/stories/2010-11-12/mark-shepherds-106-acre-permaculture-farm-viola-wisconsin">http://www.energybulletin.net/stories/2010-11-12/mark-shepherds-106-acre...</a>)</div>
</blockquote>
<h3 style="font-size: 1.3em; line-height: 1.3em; margin-bottom: 0.769em; margin-top: 0.769em;">
Summary</h3>
<div style="line-height: 1.4em; margin: 1em 0em;">
Our fate as a nation in the post-carbon era hinges, to a great extent, on the fate of our agriculture. Unfortunately, US agriculture faces a slew of constricting limits (energetic, climatic, material, etc.) that gravely threaten the continued viability of our current annual-monoculture-based model. An alternative agricultural model based on polycultures of perennial crops will likely be more than just a ‘good idea’ in the coming post-carbon era – it’ll be a damn NECESSITY. So grab your shovels, America -- it’s time to begin the transition to an agriculture that stands a chance.</div>
<h3 style="font-size: 1.3em; line-height: 1.3em; margin-bottom: 0.769em; margin-top: 0.769em;">
Note on References</h3>
<div style="line-height: 1.4em; margin: 1em 0em;">
For those of you who are taken aback or unbelieving of the ‘doomish’ warnings I’ll be slinging about in the first part of this essay, check out the following sources for background:</div>
<ol style="margin: 1em 0px; padding-left: 2em;">
<li style="margin: 0px; padding: 0px;">Food & Agriculture: search archived food & agriculture posts on <a href="http://www.energybulletin.net/" style="color: #6858d6; text-decoration: initial;" title="www.energybulletin.net">www.energybulletin.net</a> and<a href="http://e360.yale.edu/;" style="color: #6858d6; text-decoration: initial;" title="http://e360.yale.edu/;">http://e360.yale.edu/;</a> see also books by Wes Jackson, Wendell Berry, Sharon Astyk, and Lester Brown;</li>
<li style="margin: 0px; padding: 0px;">Energy & Economy: search <a href="http://www.energybulletin.net/" style="color: #6858d6; text-decoration: initial;" title="www.energybulletin.net">www.energybulletin.net</a>, <a href="http://www.theoildrum.com/" style="color: #6858d6; text-decoration: initial;" title="www.theoildrum.com">www.theoildrum.com</a>, and<a href="http://www.chrismartenson.com%3B/" style="color: #6858d6; text-decoration: initial;" title="www.chrismartenson.com;">www.chrismartenson.com;</a> as well as Richard Heinberg’s ‘Blackout’, ‘Peak Everything’, and ‘The Party’s Over’;</li>
<li style="margin: 0px; padding: 0px;">Climate Change: See daily updates & archived climate-science posts at<a href="http://climateprogress.org/category/science/;" style="color: #6858d6; text-decoration: initial;" title="http://climateprogress.org/category/science/;">http://climateprogress.org/category/science/;</a> explore ALL the links on James Hansen’s website at <a href="http://www.columbia.edu/~jeh1/;" style="color: #6858d6; text-decoration: initial;" title="http://www.columbia.edu/~jeh1/;">http://www.columbia.edu/~jeh1/;</a> search <a href="http://e360.yale.edu/;" style="color: #6858d6; text-decoration: initial;" title="http://e360.yale.edu/;">http://e360.yale.edu/;</a> and see books on climate change by James Hansen, David Archer, Joe Romm, and Fred Pearce.</li>
</ol>
<h3 style="font-size: 1.3em; line-height: 1.3em; margin-bottom: 0.769em; margin-top: 0.769em;">
Your Food System = House of Cards</h3>
<div style="line-height: 1.4em; margin: 1em 0em;">
I have some bad news: If you’re not at least ‘deeply disturbed’ about the prospects for US agricultural in the 21st century, you’re not paying nearly close enough attention to the trajectory of biophysical reality in this country.</div>
<div style="line-height: 1.4em; margin: 1em 0em;">
Because despite the bountiful yields of food and fiber we currently extract from our soils, trouble looms really big and really scary in the coming decades for US agriculture. And I don’t mean just ‘fewer selections of canned soup’ in the local Stop-N-Shop; I mean NO soup in the Stop-N-Shop. Maybe no Stop-N-Shop. Maybe no shopping, period. I mean hunger. Maybe famine. Here. Soon. Perhaps of ‘biblical proportions’.</div>
<div style="line-height: 1.4em; margin: 1em 0em;">
Huh? Doth he exaggerate? Coming troubles in the land of the ‘heaping corn mountains’? Food shortages in the republic of super-markets and super-sized bellies? These seeming incongruities are resolved if we acknowledge the scary truth about US agriculture: it’s about as fragile in its current fossil-fuel-dependent, annual-monoculture form as a trembling house of cards.</div>
<div style="line-height: 1.4em; margin: 1em 0em;">
Examined closely, our current, record-breaking, industrial-agricultural yields are dependent on a tenuous combination of EACH of the following ‘pillars’: (1) OIL & GAS: cheap fossil energy for making nitrogen-fertilizer, mining phosphate, running farm machinery, transporting food, and maintaining a functioning growth-dependent economy where credit is available, (2) LAND & SOIL: ample acreage of currently-productive soils (threatened now by erosion, salinization, sea-level rise, and incipient shortages of key nutrients), (3) WATER: ample irrigation water from snowmelt and groundwater-aquifers, and (4) CLIMATE: a climate that is still passably stable, without too many severe droughts, storms, or temperature extremes.</div>
<div style="line-height: 1.4em; margin: 1em 0em;">
My doomish leanings with regard to our current industrial food system derive primarily from the following two facts: (1) The failure of ANY ONE of the above four ‘pillars’ will bring our food system to its knees. This, of course, is the result of our food system being structured (as most industrial systems are) to maximize efficiency at the expense of robustness and resiliency. In other words, our sleek, streamlined, modern food system adheres to ‘Liebig’s Law of the Minimum’ – it only works as well as its weakest link. (2) One or more of these pillars will almost certainly disintegrate at some point in the next few years or decades over a large portion of the food-producing US. Of course, this disintegration is already under way -- all four of these pillars are eroding rapidly as we speak (literally & figuratively; see references above). And all four are highly vulnerable to a rapid ‘phase change’ in the near future – this decade, perhaps.</div>
<div style="line-height: 1.4em; margin: 1em 0em;">
In short, you SHOULD be disturbed by our agricultural prospects – DEEPLY disturbed. Our industrial agricultural system is about to stop working. The house of cards that provides your food is trembling…swaying…ominously, while darkening skies and a skittering armada of little dust devils presage one helluva storm about to kick up.</div>
<h3 style="font-size: 1.3em; line-height: 1.3em; margin-bottom: 0.769em; margin-top: 0.769em;">
Portrait of the Food System as a Young Catastrophe</h3>
<div style="line-height: 1.4em; margin: 1em 0em;">
So with industrial agriculture about to slam head-long into a score of biophysical limits all at once, plausible scenarios for epic failure of our food system in the next few decades are numerous indeed. But before I go into recommendations for an agricultural system that might actually stand a chance in the coming era of rapidly constricting limits, I’d like to briefly outline the most likely general scenario for the failure of our current industrial food system in the US.</div>
<div style="line-height: 1.4em; margin: 1em 0em;">
I think we can neatly summarize the coming demise of our current agricultural model as a lethal one-two punch from the following executioners: peak oil and climate change. As discussed above, either one of these factors BY ITSELF would spell disaster for our food security under the current industrial model. But guess what? We’re getting BOTH at the same time. Interesting times indeed! (We are truly blessed in that sense, no?)</div>
<div style="line-height: 1.4em; margin: 1em 0em;">
As presented in chilling detail at the 2010 ASPO conference, we have a few years (at the most, and probably less) before fossil energy that is both cheap and abundant is permanently a thing of the past. And even before that happens, our current growth-dependent economy is very likely to implode as it becomes increasingly starved of its key growth-enabling ‘nutrient’ -- cheap fossil energy. During such an economic implosion, much of the fragile logistical and energetic infrastructure on which our current industrial food system depends would very quickly evaporate.</div>
<div style="line-height: 1.4em; margin: 1em 0em;">
Because, really, how are we going to run the tractors, combines, and food-delivery trucks on their necessarily-tight industrial schedules when fossil fuel supplies suddenly become undependable or outrageously expensive? The answer: We’ll have trouble. Supply lines will break down. Crops won’t get planted here and there (or everywhere) for lack of credit or lack of fuel. And all this would then very quickly translate into localized or national shortages of cheap food – and possibly even shortages of food at any price. There will be hunger and want in many an unfortunate region in the US. People will get cranky. People will lose their manners. People will lose their lives.</div>
<div style="line-height: 1.4em; margin: 1em 0em;">
And while the government/military will likely assume control of the foundering industrial-agriculture ship in short-order, given the time-sensitive nature of most agriculture manipulations, it seems highly unlikely that severe food-supply ‘discontinuities’ could be avoided unless a crack emergency plan was ready and waiting to be implemented by the present government. But as Chris Martenson and Rick Munroe have discussed recently, there does not seem to be such a plan. (<a href="http://www.chrismartenson.com/blog/future-chaos-there-no-plan-b/46331" style="color: #6858d6; text-decoration: initial;" title="http://www.chrismartenson.com/blog/future-chaos-there-no-plan-b/46331">http://www.chrismartenson.com/blog/future-chaos-there-no-plan-b/46331</a>)</div>
<div style="line-height: 1.4em; margin: 1em 0em;">
So, with apologies to the National Beef Council: hunger, want, anger, and violence – it’s what’s for supper!</div>
<h3 style="font-size: 1.3em; line-height: 1.3em; margin-bottom: 0.769em; margin-top: 0.769em;">
Evolution of a Food Catastrophe</h3>
<div style="line-height: 1.4em; margin: 1em 0em;">
Unfortunately, looking even longer term, past the initial chaotic food shortages and socio-political upheaval, the picture doesn’t get any prettier. In fact, it becomes horrifying.</div>
<div style="line-height: 1.4em; margin: 1em 0em;">
Our current industrial food system in the US is just not designed to produce food with limited energetic and material inputs. Like the industrial economy as a whole, it just doesn’t DO limits. And hard, constricting limits on these inputs will not only be a hallmark of the initial economic convulsions -- they will continue indefinitely into our Greer/Kunstler-illuminated future. There will be no energetic or economic recovery of our industrial economic system – no respite from these ever-constricting limits.</div>
<div style="line-height: 1.4em; margin: 1em 0em;">
So then, what sort of industrial-agricultural yield trends might we expect in grain and vegetable-producing regions of the US with vastly-restricted N/P-fertilizer inputs that will surely accompany our energetic and economic difficulties? The answer: crap. And the next year: less than crap. And the next year…etc.</div>
<div style="line-height: 1.4em; margin: 1em 0em;">
And this, of course, sets up the killing blow to our now-reeling agricultural system: climate change. For we have, through our knowing corruption of the atmosphere, already earned centuries of increasingly destabilized climatic conditions across our continent. We can almost certainly expect a dramatic increase in crippling droughts, destructive/flooding storms and hurricanes, farmland-destroying sea-level rise, and killing temperature extremes of both destructive magnitude and unexpected timing. (Oh, and did I mention the oceans are dying? i.e. There goes ‘Plan B.’)</div>
<div style="line-height: 1.4em; margin: 1em 0em;">
Furthermore, evidence suggests that ‘slow’ positive feedbacks (melting sea ice, ice sheet decay, methane degassing from tundra and polar oceans, etc) are ALREADY kicking in. The repercussions of these feedbacks may push the climate system towards the ultra-deadly upper-end of current climate change projections within this century -- the ones heretofore largely based on suspect fossil fuel reserves. Tipping points may well be close at hand – in fact, they may have already been passed. Every second the CO2-belching industrial experiment continues diminishes our future and edges us closer to disaster. It is a VERY scary picture indeed that is revealing itself in climate-science-land. Horrifying, in fact. (See climate references above.)</div>
<div style="line-height: 1.4em; margin: 1em 0em;">
So in light of these still-evolving climate change realities then, we are forced to ask ourselves the following questions: What sort of yields will we get in corn, bean, & wheat country (and vegetable country) when beset by the crippling ‘biblical’ droughts that are expected? The answer: crap. And what sort of yields will we get in the currently-productive irrigated regions (presently watered with depleting fossil aquifers and endangered mountain snow-packs) when the water is no longer flowing? The answer: virtually none. And what sort of yields will we get when freakishly-intense storms, ill-timed ‘weird weather’ temperatures, and climate-change-induced pest outbreaks attack our vast industrial monocultures? The answer: Well…you get an agriculture that increasingly resembles Russian roulette.</div>
<div style="line-height: 1.4em; margin: 1em 0em;">
Now combine all this climate-related mischief with the coming energetic, material, and economic limitations from peak oil discussed previously. What kinds of yields might one expect then? Seriously, what would you get then, as we move into the middle decades of this century? With all these increasingly-likely depredations conspiring against our fragile industrial food system, what would you get? Would you get ANYTHING? (Note: A chilling shudder around the shoulder area and a pensive gaze out the window would be appropriate here.)</div>
<div style="line-height: 1.4em; margin: 1em 0em;">
And so it goes. Because the bleak future of our current industrial agricultural system --pummeled as it will be by energetic/material shortages and climatic disturbances -- is ALREADY dialed-in. The fossil-energy and climate situations described above are, at this late date, no longer ‘problems’ to be solved with technological or social cleverness, but rather ‘predicaments’ to be adapted to as they inevitably unfold and degenerate. We have dallied too long at the ball, and the carriage is already turning back into a pumpkin -- no matter how skillfully we argue that it cannot possibly do so.</div>
<div style="line-height: 1.4em; margin: 1em 0em;">
So, note to country: Our current food system is ALREADY condemned. It will fail in its current form, significantly or entirely. Guaranteed. And probably pretty soon – within the next several decades. And maybe very soon – perhaps within THIS decade. As such, it must be replaced as soon as possible with an agriculture that conforms to the new biophysical realities confronting us.</div>
<div style="line-height: 1.4em; margin: 1em 0em;">
Simply put, it must be replaced with an agriculture that stands a chance.</div>
<h3 style="font-size: 1.3em; line-height: 1.3em; margin-bottom: 0.769em; margin-top: 0.769em;">
The Trouble with Annual Monocultures</h3>
<div style="line-height: 1.4em; margin: 1em 0em;">
But what might such a replacement agricultural system look like? And really, is agriculture even POSSIBLE under such dire biophysical limitations? To answer this, we must first examine the foundation of our current industrial system in a little more detail -- and with an ecologically-trained eye, at that. (Note: See Wes Jackson’s “New Roots for Agriculture” for a full discussion of this.)</div>
<div style="line-height: 1.4em; margin: 1em 0em;">
Current industrial US agriculture is based primarily on ANNUAL crops – plants that must be planted anew every year from seed. The annual trait introduces several problems that have plagued agriculture since its inception, but which have taken on new and ominous dimensions as the ever-more-crowded industrial era draws to an end:</div>
<ol style="margin: 1em 0px; padding-left: 2em;">
<li style="margin: 0px; padding: 0px;"><b>Soil loss and degradation: </b>Annual replanting requires soil disturbances multiple times every year, resulting in erosion, oxidation of vital soil organic matter, and leaching of nutrients. Without careful amendments, such disturbances beget a steady lessening of productivity and a decreased resilience to stress.<div style="line-height: 1.4em; margin: 1em 0em;">
</div>
</li>
<li style="margin: 0px; padding: 0px;"><b>Energy input requirements: </b>All these soil-massaging manipulations necessitate significant energy inputs to power the fleets of tractors and combines. Of course, this energy input today is handled by fossil fuels; formerly it was accomplished through draft animal and slaves; in the future we’ll all likely need to contribute. But whatever the source, the energy requirements of annual agriculture are prodigious.</li>
<li style="margin: 0px; padding: 0px;"><b>Inefficient nutrient & water utilization: </b>The relatively poorly-developed root systems of these annually-grown plants prevent efficient utilization of water and soil nutrients. Also, any potential assistance from mycorrhizal fungi are minimized (or prevented entirely) by the constant disturbances involved in annual cultivation. Furthermore, disturbed soil captures and holds significantly less water than soil that is not disturbed annually. Considerable quantities of desperately needed water and nutrients have and will increasingly continue to be lost by the relatively feeble root systems of annual crops.</li>
</ol>
<div style="line-height: 1.4em; margin: 1em 0em;">
In the drought-stricken, fertilizer-limited agricultural era to come, these screaming limitations of annual crops are simply a recipe for famine.</div>
<div style="line-height: 1.4em; margin: 1em 0em;">
But that’s not all! Our current industrial agricultural regime is also based on MONOCULTURES of these annual plants – large fields of just a single type of crop, and usually a very genetically-similar representation of that crop at that. This genetic homogeneity presents several significant problems in the coming energy-starved, climate-destabilized era:</div>
<ol style="margin: 1em 0px; padding-left: 2em;">
<li style="margin: 0px; padding: 0px;"><b>Pest vulnerability: </b>Monocultures are notoriously susceptible to devastating pest outbreaks. And such outbreaks will not only be intensified in a destabilized climate, our energy-limitations would prevent us from controlling them in the familiar energy-intensive manner.<div style="line-height: 1.4em; margin: 1em 0em;">
</div>
</li>
<li style="margin: 0px; padding: 0px;"><b>Inefficient nutrient & water utilization: </b>Each plant in a monoculture competes perfectly with every other plant -- and thus rapidly depletes a single region of the soil profile of both water and the suite of nutrients favored by that crop.</li>
<li style="margin: 0px; padding: 0px;"><b>Increased vulnerability to weird weather: </b>Weird or extreme weather very rarely knock out multiple types of crops in a single field. But in a monoculture, there is a good chance of losing an entire gigantic crop from just a single (increasingly common) weird-weather event – rather than just one crop out of many.</li>
</ol>
<div style="line-height: 1.4em; margin: 1em 0em;">
Now combine the limitations of monoculture crops with the drawbacks of annual crops, and you quickly realize that relying on an agriculture of annual monocultures to get us through the coming energetic, economic and climatic limitations is simply suicide.</div>
<div style="line-height: 1.4em; margin: 1em 0em;">
We flat-out need to find a better way.</div>
<h3 style="font-size: 1.3em; line-height: 1.3em; margin-bottom: 0.769em; margin-top: 0.769em;">
Perennial Polyculture Rising</h3>
<div style="line-height: 1.4em; margin: 1em 0em;">
OK, so we’ve established two things so far: (1) trouble’s a-comin’ in the form of severe energy limitations, economic collapse, material-input-limitations, and climatic destabilization, and (2) that our current agriculture based on annual monocultures is just not gonna cut it.</div>
<div style="line-height: 1.4em; margin: 1em 0em;">
But knowing these uncomfortable truths brings up a host of difficult questions: Like, what then do we DO about it? Is there anything we CAN do? Because how do we “fix” an agricultural model that is almost 100% at odds with the constricting demands of biophysical reality in this country?</div>
<div style="line-height: 1.4em; margin: 1em 0em;">
Well, a possible solution is already taking shape in various forms around the country – albeit at a much smaller scale and growth rate than we need. And while this new agricultural ‘movement’ has no official unifying name at the moment, all the strategies rely on POLYCULTURES of PERENNIAL crops. This strategy, of course, is the polar opposite of our current annual monoculture-based system. And, as we’ll discuss shortly, it just might work for the exact same reasons our current system will fail.</div>
<div style="line-height: 1.4em; margin: 1em 0em;">
You can find these various efforts presently under names like Natural Systems Agriculture, Permaculture, Forest Gardening, Mixed-species Organic Orcharding, Holistic Pasture Management, and The Land Institute’s perennial grain program. But again, all these diverse strategies involve efforts to fashion a food system based on polycultures of perennial crops. As such, we can perhaps lump them all together under the name ‘Perennial Polyculture.’ And note that none of these strategies are really ‘new’ – they’ve just been increasingly marginalized and neglected throughout our species’ unfortunate 10,000-year infatuation with the short-term benefits of annual monocultures.</div>
<h3 style="font-size: 1.3em; line-height: 1.3em; margin-bottom: 0.769em; margin-top: 0.769em;">
Advantages of Perennial Polyculture</h3>
<div style="line-height: 1.4em; margin: 1em 0em;">
OK, so why, specifically, might this ‘new’ perennial polyculture strategy work – or at least give us a fighting chance in the challenging times ahead?</div>
<div style="line-height: 1.4em; margin: 1em 0em;">
First let’s look at the ‘perennial’ aspect – i.e. the ability of these crops to survive multiple years -- sometimes decades, sometimes centuries -- without replanting. The Land Institute’s Jerry Glover summed up the advantages of perennial crops nicely in a June 2010 article in the journal Science entitled “Increased Food and Ecosystem Security via Perennial Grains.” In it, he wrote: “Compared with annual counterparts, perennial crops tend to have longer growing seasons and deeper rooting depths, and they intercept, retain, and utilize more precipitation. Longer photosynthetic seasons resulting from earlier canopy development and longer green leaf duration increase seasonal light interception efficiencies, an important factor in plant productivity. Greater root mass reduces erosion risks and maintains more soil carbon compared with annual crops. Annual grain crops can lose five times as much water and 35 times as much nitrate as perennial crops. Perennial crops require fewer passes of farm equipment and less fertilizer and herbicide, important attributes in regions most needing agricultural advancement.” (<a href="http://www.landinstitute.org/vnews/display.v/SEC/Publications%3E%3EScience" style="color: #6858d6; text-decoration: initial;" title="http://www.landinstitute.org/vnews/display.v/SEC/Publications%3E%3EScience">http://www.landinstitute.org/vnews/display.v/SEC/Publications%3E%3EScien...</a>)</div>
<div style="line-height: 1.4em; margin: 1em 0em;">
And now consider the ‘polyculture’ aspect – which we can define as the planting of a diverse mixture of crops in the same field, as well as the presence of a diverse genetic make-up within each individual crop. This multi-level diversity presents a host of advantages that mirror the disadvantages of monocultures discussed previously. Namely, polycultures would offer (1) a decreased likelihood of and vulnerability to pest outbreaks, (2) a more efficient holding and utilization of both water and soil nutrients, and (3) a decreased risk to catastrophic crop failure from weird weather events.</div>
<div style="line-height: 1.4em; margin: 1em 0em;">
In short, both the ‘perennial’ and ‘polyculture’ aspects of this ‘new’ agriculture lend themselves well to the daunting biophysical challenges bearing down on us. And facing these challenges honestly, it is becoming increasingly apparent that the rapid and extensive deployment of an agriculture based on perennial polyculture is probably our only hope for reliably feeding ourselves in the decades ahead.</div>
<h3 style="font-size: 1.3em; line-height: 1.3em; margin-bottom: 0.769em; margin-top: 0.769em;">
The Four Smiling Faces of Perennial Polyculture</h3>
<div style="line-height: 1.4em; margin: 1em 0em;">
OK, now that we’ve sung the praises of perennial polyculture, I think it’ll be helpful here to lay out the four main types of ‘perennial polyculture’ agriculture currently being practiced (or developed) in the US. I do this, of course, not to say that a given farm-of-the-future needs to pick just one type, but just to point out the key features of each.</div>
<div style="line-height: 1.4em; margin: 1em 0em;">
As mentioned above, none of these perennial polyculture forms of agriculture are new, nor are they completely absent from our current agricultural mix in the US. But since none of them fits nicely into the current industrial model, they have been either (1) relegated to niche status by the subsidy-distorted market, (2) co-opted and debased to fit the industrial model, or, especially in the case of still-developing perennial grains, (3) denied their rightful share of national funding for research and development.</div>
<div style="line-height: 1.4em; margin: 1em 0em;">
So here they are, the four smiling faces of perennial polyculture:</div>
<ol style="margin: 1em 0px; padding-left: 2em;">
<li style="margin: 0px; padding: 0px;"><b>Holistically-Managed Pasture: </b>These are the good, old-fashioned pastures of perennial grasses and clovers for the grazing of (and fertilization by) ruminants (sheep, goats, and cows) -- but managed in a more ecologically-informed manner than has been practiced for much of our nation’s history. Such enlightened management considers both the needs of the plants and the animals, as well as the needs of the surrounding people and ecosystems. For a good, accessible introduction to this art form, see Gene Logsdon’s “All Flesh Is Grass.” See also Joel Salatin’s Virginia farm as featured in the movie ‘Food Inc.’ or any of his wonderful books. For a more hard-core version of this method of managed grazing, see books by Allan Savory and Andre Voisin. I should note here that much of the ecological devastation of modern animal ‘farming’ has been due to its debasement in conforming to the industrial model. But the raising of animals needn’t be immoral or ecologically destructive, and, if limited in scale and managed skillfully, can allow the farm to fit comfortably and beneficially within the surrounding ecosystems.<br /><br /><div style="line-height: 1.4em; margin: 1em 0em;">
</div>
</li>
<li style="margin: 0px; padding: 0px;"><b>Mixed Fruit & Nut Orchards: </b>Here I refer to another seeming relic from days-gone-by – the organically-managed, low-input, mixed fruit and nut orchard. And while this tree-crop form of agriculture has been just as debased by the industrial model as livestock raising, it need not be the chemical-soaked, fertilizer-guzzling, soil-eroding, ultra-fragile abomination it is today. Why? There are multiple species of fruit and nut trees in any given region of the US that produce reasonably or even exceptionally well with zero chemical inputs. Moreover, there are varieties with each of these suitable species that perform better than others on a given year or in a given soil type. If these are identified, and planted on a sufficiently-large scale in an ecologically-informed manner, they can make a VERY significant contribution to our food supply. A good theoretical foundation for this form of agriculture can be found in the extensive permaculture literature, including “Edible Forest Gardens” by Jacke & Toensmeier. See also “Tree Crops” by J. Russell Smith (originally published in 1939, and now with an introduction by Wendell Berry). For a good real-life example of what I’m talking about, check out the recent article describing Mark Shepherd’s incredible Wisconsin farm at <a href="http://www.energybulletin.net/stories/2010-11-12/mark-shepherds-106-acre-permaculture-farm-viola-wisconsin" style="color: #6858d6; text-decoration: initial;" title="http://www.energybulletin.net/stories/2010-11-12/mark-shepherds-106-acre-permaculture-farm-viola-wisconsin">http://www.energybulletin.net/stories/2010-11-12/mark-shepherds-106-acre...</a>. I should say, on a personal note, that reading the above piece about Shepherd’s Wisconsin farm was almost a religious experience for me, and will probably (hopefully) define much of the remainder of my work here on Earth.<br /><br /><div style="line-height: 1.4em; margin: 1em 0em;">
</div>
</li>
<li style="margin: 0px; padding: 0px;"><b>Perennial Vegetables, Berries, and Cane-Fruits: </b>Huh? Perennial vegetables? But most people are already familiar with at least some of these already: asparagus, rhubarb, artichokes, horseradish, and sunchokes come to mind. There are, however, many other species of perennial vegetables that might be developed into big contributors to our future food mix. Check out Eric Toensmeier’s utterly fantastic book, “Perennial Vegetables” for a number of examples suitable for different US regions. And as Toensmeier points out, the much-needed development and breeding of these vegetables can be accomplished by you and me – testing out and improving different species and varieties, and finding ways to incorporate them into our traditionally-annual veggie gardens and truck-farms. Berries and cane-fruits, of course, should be part of any vegetable operation, and many wonderful books detail their low-input rearing and uses.<br /><br /><div style="line-height: 1.4em; margin: 1em 0em;">
</div>
</li>
<li style="margin: 0px; padding: 0px;"><b>Perennial Grains: </b>This is the only one of the four ‘pillars’ of perennial polyculture that is not yet ready to be deployed. It also would have, arguably, the largest impact of the four strategies, if successful. Wes Jackson’s The Land Institute (Kansas) has been working for decades on developing a mixture of perennial grains that can be planted in the same field and harvested together. Given that almost all grain production currently comes from annuals (corn, wheat, rice, soybeans), an extensive breeding program is being undertaken by The Land Institute (and others) to develop the new perennial grains that would work in such a system. This involves both perennializing annual grains and domesticating existing perennial grains. Check out ALL the literature available at their website (<a href="http://www.landinstitute.org/" style="color: #6858d6; text-decoration: initial;" title="http://www.landinstitute.org/">http://www.landinstitute.org/</a>), which includes books, scholarly papers, and articles. Also get a hold of ALL Wes Jackson’s books, including (and especially) his seminal 1980 book “New Roots for Agriculture.” And one final note here: While The Land Institute’s perennial grain program is probably the most important scientific project on Earth, it probably gets less national funding than the stretch of highway that runs through my town. …Priorities, priorities.</li>
</ol>
<h3 style="font-size: 1.3em; line-height: 1.3em; margin-bottom: 0.769em; margin-top: 0.769em;">
We Must Do This Ourselves</h3>
<div style="line-height: 1.4em; margin: 1em 0em;">
All right, lets take stock of what this rather long essay has attempted to accomplish so far: (1) establish that our current annual-monoculture-based industrial agricultural system has no future and is in danger of imminent collapse, (2) outline both the inherent ecological drawbacks of annual monocultures, and the corresponding virtues of perennial polycultures, and (3) give examples of (and references for) the four promising specific applications of perennial polyculture that can be implemented in this country.</div>
<div style="line-height: 1.4em; margin: 1em 0em;">
So what’s left? Well...we just need to frickin’ DO it!</div>
<div style="line-height: 1.4em; margin: 1em 0em;">
Now look, I was as cautiously-hopeful (shamefully-delusional) as anyone that Obama would somehow rise above the miasma of corporate toxicity in our nation’s time of need; that he would attempt to fix an obviously-broken food system headed for disaster; that he would channel his inner Jimmy Carter and tell us the damn truth. But he hasn’t. And he won’t. And I think it’s just a flat-out waste of time and energy to pretend, at this late hour, that ANYONE up top will ever get a clue.</div>
<div style="line-height: 1.4em; margin: 1em 0em;">
So sure, it’d be great if the US Government wasn’t infected by a terminal case of corporatus suicidalis. And it’d be fantastic US Department of Agriculture was guided by thinking human beings who were serious and knowledgeable about agriculture and its tenuous ecological underpinnings. And it’d be super if the US citizenry were informed enough to recognize the dangerous insanity of our food system and demand a change. But sadly, none of these are true, nor will they ever become true in time to avert the coming food catastrophe in this country.</div>
<div style="line-height: 1.4em; margin: 1em 0em;">
So then what can we DO about that? We do the only thing we CAN do: we do it OURSELVES. We call up our neighbors, lace up our boots, grab some shovels from the shed, load the seedlings into the wheelbarrow, and start building a sane fricking food system all by our damn selves. We say “f*%k off” to these ‘leaders’ whose short-sightedness and greed would doom our children and grandchildren to hunger and misery, and we get down to some good work -- some work that just might make a difference. That’s what we do.</div>
<div style="line-height: 1.4em; margin: 1em 0em;">
We rebuild our local food systems OURSELVES, at the individual and community level, as best as we can in whatever time we have available. THAT’S what we do.</div>
<h3 style="font-size: 1.3em; line-height: 1.3em; margin-bottom: 0.769em; margin-top: 0.769em;">
Building Our Knowledge, Gathering Our Tools, and Honing Our Skills</h3>
<div style="line-height: 1.4em; margin: 1em 0em;">
Now, I suppose if I’m turning you all out into your lawns and fields to build this new food system, you might want me to supply a few specifics, huh? OK, here’s a brief outline on what we need to get going. And note that you can begin TODAY -- in whatever season you happen to be reading this. For clarity, I’ll divide the necessary tasks into three categories: building our knowledge, gathering our tools, and honing our skills.</div>
<ol style="margin: 1em 0px; padding-left: 2em;">
<li style="margin: 0px; padding: 0px;"><b>Building Our Knowldedge: </b>Learn the basics of soils and ecology. Internalize both Aldo Leopold’s Land Ethic (“A Sand County Almanac”), and Holmgren’s permaculture principles (“Permaculture: Principles and Pathways”). Read every book by Wendell Berry, Wes Jackson, and Gene Logsdon. Learn the natural histories of the perennial species of tree, shrub, vine, cane, vegetable, and grain we’ll be employing, as well as their means of propagation (Toogood’s “Plant Propagation”). Learn the art of permaculture landscape design (Mollison & Holmgren). Read-up on how to keep a couple sheep, goats, and chickens -- and maybe a cow, if you have the room.<br /><br /><div style="line-height: 1.4em; margin: 1em 0em;">
</div>
</li>
<li style="margin: 0px; padding: 0px;"><b>Gathering Our Tools: </b>Get your hands on as many varieties of as many species of food-producing perennials as you can -- trees, shrubs, veggies, etc. (ex: See<a href="http://empirechestnut.com/" style="color: #6858d6; text-decoration: initial;" title="http://empirechestnut.com/">http://empirechestnut.com/</a>, <a href="http://www.forestag.com/" style="color: #6858d6; text-decoration: initial;" title="http://www.forestag.com/">http://www.forestag.com/</a>, and the ‘fedco trees’ division at<a href="http://fedcoseeds.com/" style="color: #6858d6; text-decoration: initial;" title="http://fedcoseeds.com/">http://fedcoseeds.com/</a>, and <a href="http://millernurseries.com/" style="color: #6858d6; text-decoration: initial;" title="http://millernurseries.com/">http://millernurseries.com/</a>). Plant them anywhere you can. These will be the genetic stock of the new perennial agriculture that you and your community will create. Construct a little plant propagation ‘lab’ in the corner of your house, garage, or lawn. Stock it with whatever you might need (see Toogood’s “Plant Propagation”). Get some good picks and shovels. Get some materials to protect your trees until they’re above deer-level (<a href="http://www.forestag.com/" style="color: #6858d6; text-decoration: initial;" title="http://www.forestag.com/">http://www.forestag.com/</a>). Try to find other like-minded people in your community -- you’ll need both their help and their moral support. Find some good low-input breeds of sheep or goats & get a breeding pair for your back yard.<br /><br /><div style="line-height: 1.4em; margin: 1em 0em;">
</div>
</li>
<li style="margin: 0px; padding: 0px;"><b>Honing Our Skills: </b>Practice propagating the various perennials you’ve collected. Start distributing them around your property and anywhere else anybody will let you plant them. Watch them closely & note which work best for you. Practice selecting and breeding for traits you want. Try to get as many people as you can to plant perennial food species in your community -- work on your techniques of ‘gentle persuasion’. Experiment with storage of your bounty -- root cellars, rodent-proof boxes. Pay attention to your animals and your pasture.</li>
</ol>
<div style="line-height: 1.4em; margin: 1em 0em;">
OK...Got all that? Hey, but even if you don’t have EVERYTHING yet, it doesn’t matter -- it’s OK to ‘wing it’. Just keep the trajectory moving forward. Plant a couple food trees this spring, and then even more in the fall…and then even MORE the next Spring.</div>
<div style="line-height: 1.4em; margin: 1em 0em;">
And call me crazy, but all this learning, planting, observing, and community organizing actually sounds like a heap-load of fun to me. i.e. This stuff doesn’t need to be grim or oppressive – it can be a CELEBRATION if you make it so. And even if this stuff ISN’T your cup of tea, you can still help: consider letting somebody else plant stuff on your property, lend some tools or funds to a community effort, pass this message on to somebody who might be interested.</div>
<div style="line-height: 1.4em; margin: 1em 0em;">
So let’s get this ball of perennial polyculture goodness rolling! Good luck!!!!!</div>
<div style="line-height: 1.4em; margin: 1em 0em;">
<i>From the author: "I'm a high school Chemistry teacher in NJ. I'm also a concerned father, organic farmer, and community garden organizer.</i></div>
<i></i><div style="line-height: 1.4em; margin: 1em 0em;">
<i>You can contact me at <a href="mailto:danallen1968@yahoo.com" style="color: #6858d6; text-decoration: initial;">danallen1968@yahoo.com</a>.</i></div>
</div>
<div class="blogger-post-footer">http://kjpermaculture.blogspot.com/feeds/posts/default
<p id="blogfeeds"><$BlogFeedsVertical$></p>
<p id="postfeeds"><$BlogItemFeedLinks$></p></div>Anonymoushttp://www.blogger.com/profile/03009370115428649864noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-439180943121365896.post-66620167020253105062013-01-20T01:39:00.003-05:002013-01-20T01:40:21.336-05:00The Return of Agent Orange?<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><b>Sign the petition to stop #AgentOrange #GMOs: Within a week, the #USDA could approve #Dow’s new “Enlist” brand #corn, genetically engineered to resist massive doses of the herbicide 2,4-D <a href="http://tiny.cc/uoaxow">http://tiny.cc/uoaxow</a> This is suicidal.</b></span><br />
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<a href="https://sphotos-a.xx.fbcdn.net/hphotos-ash3/526772_388462137906897_1568017037_n.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="400" src="https://sphotos-a.xx.fbcdn.net/hphotos-ash3/526772_388462137906897_1568017037_n.jpg" width="360" /></a></div>
<br /><div class="blogger-post-footer">http://kjpermaculture.blogspot.com/feeds/posts/default
<p id="blogfeeds"><$BlogFeedsVertical$></p>
<p id="postfeeds"><$BlogItemFeedLinks$></p></div>Anonymoushttp://www.blogger.com/profile/03009370115428649864noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-439180943121365896.post-25479064826914550202013-01-10T23:20:00.000-05:002013-01-10T23:20:46.933-05:00My FB posts from the Permaculture Activist group<span style="background-color: white; color: #333333; font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 12.727272033691406px; line-height: 15.454545021057129px;">See these and much more at </span><span style="color: #333333; font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><span style="font-size: 12.727272033691406px; line-height: 15.454545021057129px;">https://www.facebook.com/groups/PermacultureActivist/</span></span><br />
<span style="background-color: white; color: #333333; font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 12.727272033691406px; line-height: 15.454545021057129px;">__________________________________________________</span><br />
<span style="background-color: white; color: #333333; font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 12.727272033691406px; line-height: 15.454545021057129px;">"A study in Cincinnati finds that young people prosecuted for delinquency are four times more likely than the general population to have high levels of lead in their bones." Hmmmm.</span><br />
<div class="-cx-PRIVATE-uiImageBlock__content " style="overflow: hidden;">
<div style="color: #333333; font-size: 10.909090995788574px; line-height: 12.727272033691406px;">
<strong style="color: #3b5998; cursor: pointer; display: inline !important; font-size: 11px; min-height: 72px; padding: 8px 10px 10px; text-decoration: initial;"><span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><br /></span></strong></div>
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: x-small;"><b><a href="http://truth-out.org/opinion/item/13838-the-grime-behind-the-crime">The Grime Behind the Crime</a></b></span><br />
<div style="color: #333333; line-height: 12.727272033691406px;">
<strong style="color: #3b5998; cursor: pointer; display: inline !important; min-height: 72px; padding: 8px 10px 10px; text-decoration: initial;"><span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: x-small;"><br /></span></strong></div>
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: x-small;"><a href="http://www.commondreams.org/headline/2013/01/10-1"><b>Poisoned Planet: Doubling of Ocean Mercury Levels Threatens Global Health</b></a></span></div>
<span style="font-size: x-small;"><b><br /><span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><a href="http://www.motherjones.com/kevin-drum/2013/01/lead-and-crime-assessing-evidence">Lead and Crime: Assessing the Evidence</a></span></b></span><br />
<div>
<span style="font-size: x-small;"><span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><br /></span></span></div>
<div>
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: x-small;"><b><a href="http://www.motherjones.com/kevin-drum/2013/01/lead-and-crime-assessing-evidence">Does Lead Paint Produce More Crime Too?</a></b></span><span style="font-size: x-small;"><span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><br /></span></span><span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: x-small;"><b><a href="http://www.motherjones.com/environment/2012/12/soil-lead-researcher-howard-mielke">"Just One Lick": The Hidden Lead That Could Sicken Your Kids</a></b></span><span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">_________________________________________</span><br />
<br />
<div class="mvm uiStreamAttachments fbMainStreamAttachment" data-ft="{"type":10,"tn":"H"}" style="margin-bottom: 10px; margin-top: 10px;">
<div class="shareRedesign -cx-PRIVATE-ogAttachmentButtons__container" style="position: relative; width: 398px;">
<div class="clearfix shareRedesignContainer" style="background-color: #f7f7f7; zoom: 1;">
<a aria-hidden="true" class="shareMediaLink shareRedesignMedia -cx-PRIVATE-uiImageBlock__image lfloat" data-ft="{"type":41,"tn":"E"}" href="http://www.onearth.org/article/fracking-the-amish" rel="nofollow" style="color: #3b5998; cursor: pointer; display: block; float: left; margin-right: 0px; position: relative; text-decoration: initial;" tabindex="-1" target="_blank"><img alt="" class="shareMediaPhoto img" src="https://fbstatic-a.akamaihd.net/rsrc.php/v2/y4/r/-PAXP-deijE.gif" style="background-image: url(https://fbexternal-a.akamaihd.net/safe_image.php?d=AQBcxp31T8cthuhW&w=90&h=90&url=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.onearth.org%2Ffiles%2Fonearth%2Fdad_and_kid_400.jpg&cfs=1); background-position: 50% 50%; background-repeat: no-repeat no-repeat; border: 0px; display: block; height: 90px; width: 90px;" /></a><br />
<div class="-cx-PRIVATE-uiImageBlock__content " style="overflow: hidden;">
<strong style="color: #3b5998; cursor: pointer; display: inline !important; font-size: 11px; min-height: 72px; padding: 8px 10px 10px; text-decoration: initial;"><span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><a class="pam shareText" href="http://www.onearth.org/article/fracking-the-amish" rel="nofollow" style="color: #3b5998; cursor: pointer; display: inline !important; font-size: 11px; min-height: 72px; padding: 8px 10px 10px; text-decoration: initial;" target="_blank">Fracking the Amish | OnEarth Magazine</a></span></strong><span style="color: #3b5998; cursor: pointer; display: inline !important; font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 11px; min-height: 72px; padding: 8px 10px 10px; text-decoration: initial;"><a class="pam shareText" href="http://www.onearth.org/article/fracking-the-amish" rel="nofollow" style="color: #3b5998; cursor: pointer; display: inline !important; font-size: 11px; min-height: 72px; padding: 8px 10px 10px; text-decoration: initial;" target="_blank">A bleak December sky hangs low over rural Lawrence County, Pennsylvania. Here, in areas populated by large Amish families, open fields roll toward the horizon uninterrupted by electrical wires and telephone poles. Stepping from a car that seems grossly out of place in this 19th century landscape, Ca...</a></span></div>
</div>
</div>
</div>
<form action="https://www.facebook.com/ajax/ufi/modify.php" class="live_10151432241235362_316526391751760 commentable_item autoexpand_mode" data-live="{"seq":10151432328640362}" id="u_0_1r" method="post" rel="async" style="margin: 0px; padding: 0px;">
<div class="clearfix uiStreamFooter " style="display: table-cell; width: 10000px; zoom: 1;">
<b><span style="font-size: large;">________________________________</span></b><span style="color: #999999; font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: xx-small;"><span style="line-height: 12.727272033691406px;"><b><br /></b></span></span><a aria-hidden="true" class="shareMediaLink shareRedesignMedia -cx-PRIVATE-uiImageBlock__image lfloat" data-ft="{"type":41,"tn":"E"}" href="http://www.onearth.org/article/out-to-lunch" rel="nofollow" style="color: #3b5998; cursor: pointer; display: block; float: left; font-size: 10.909090995788574px; line-height: 12.727272033691406px; margin-right: 0px; position: relative;" tabindex="-1" target="_blank"><img alt="" class="shareMediaPhoto img" src="https://fbstatic-a.akamaihd.net/rsrc.php/v2/y4/r/-PAXP-deijE.gif" style="background-image: url(https://fbexternal-a.akamaihd.net/safe_image.php?d=AQDZGRqSUTNueJcF&w=90&h=90&url=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.onearth.org%2Ffiles%2Fonearth%2F13win_fda_01_a_feature.jpg&cfs=1); background-position: 50% 50%; background-repeat: no-repeat no-repeat; border: 0px; display: block; height: 90px; width: 90px;" /></a><br />
<div class="-cx-PRIVATE-uiImageBlock__content " style="color: #333333; font-size: 10.909090995788574px; line-height: 12.727272033691406px; overflow: hidden;">
<strong style="color: #3b5998; cursor: pointer; display: inline !important; font-size: 11px; min-height: 72px; padding: 8px 10px 10px; text-decoration: initial;"><span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><a class="pam shareText" href="http://www.onearth.org/article/out-to-lunch" rel="nofollow" style="color: #3b5998; cursor: pointer; display: inline !important; font-size: 11px; min-height: 72px; padding: 8px 10px 10px; text-decoration: initial;" target="_blank">The FDA Is Out to Lunch | OnEarth Magazine</a></span></strong><a class="pam shareText" href="http://www.onearth.org/article/out-to-lunch" rel="nofollow" style="color: #3b5998; cursor: pointer; display: inline !important; font-size: 11px; min-height: 72px; padding: 8px 10px 10px; text-decoration: initial;" target="_blank"><span class="caption" data-ft="{"tn":"L"}"><span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">www.onearth.org</span></span></a><br />
<div class="attachmentText fsm fwn fcg" style="color: grey; font-size: 11px; max-height: 72px; overflow: hidden;">
<div class="mts uiAttachmentDesc translationEligibleUserAttachmentMessage" data-ft="{"tn":"M"}" style="margin-top: 3px; word-break: break-word; word-wrap: break-word;">
<a class="pam shareText" href="http://www.onearth.org/article/out-to-lunch" rel="nofollow" style="color: #3b5998; cursor: pointer; display: block; min-height: 72px; padding: 8px 10px 10px; text-decoration: initial;" target="_blank"><span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">All of his life, Paul Schwarz had been active and healthy. When his family imagined the various ways the decorated veteran of World War II might eventually die, they never...</span></a></div>
</div>
</div>
</div>
</form>
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">_________________________________________</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><br /></span>
<br />
<div class="mvm uiStreamAttachments fbMainStreamAttachment" data-ft="{"type":10,"tn":"H"}" style="margin-bottom: 10px; margin-top: 10px;">
<div class="shareRedesign -cx-PRIVATE-ogAttachmentButtons__container" style="position: relative; width: 398px;">
<div class="clearfix shareRedesignContainer" style="background-color: #f7f7f7; zoom: 1;">
<a aria-hidden="true" class="shareMediaLink shareRedesignMedia -cx-PRIVATE-uiImageBlock__image lfloat" data-ft="{"type":41,"tn":"E"}" href="http://nres.illinois.edu/News_Restoration_Ag_Project" rel="nofollow" style="color: #3b5998; cursor: pointer; display: block; float: left; margin-right: 0px; position: relative;" tabindex="-1" target="_blank"><img alt="" class="shareMediaPhoto img" src="https://fbstatic-a.akamaihd.net/rsrc.php/v2/y4/r/-PAXP-deijE.gif" style="background-image: url(https://fbexternal-a.akamaihd.net/safe_image.php?d=AQBa06klQpg1FenU&w=90&h=90&url=http%3A%2F%2Fnres.illinois.edu%2Fsystem%2Ffiles%2FASAP_eco-systemsmall.jpg&cfs=1); background-position: 50% 50%; background-repeat: no-repeat no-repeat; border: 0px; display: block; height: 90px; width: 90px;" /></a><br />
<div class="-cx-PRIVATE-uiImageBlock__content " style="overflow: hidden;">
<strong style="color: #3b5998; cursor: pointer; display: inline !important; font-size: 11px; min-height: 72px; padding: 8px 10px 10px; text-decoration: initial;"><span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><a class="pam shareText" href="http://www.facebook.com/l.php?u=http%3A%2F%2Fnres.illinois.edu%2FNews_Restoration_Ag_Project&h=5AQHRMioW&s=1" rel="nofollow" style="color: #3b5998; cursor: pointer; display: inline !important; font-size: 11px; min-height: 72px; padding: 8px 10px 10px; text-decoration: initial;" target="_blank">Restoration Agriculture at the University of Illinois via ASAP Illinois :: Department of Natural Res</a></span></strong><br />
<div class="attachmentText fsm fwn fcg" style="color: grey; font-size: 11px; max-height: 72px; overflow: hidden;">
<a class="pam shareText" href="http://www.facebook.com/l.php?u=http%3A%2F%2Fnres.illinois.edu%2FNews_Restoration_Ag_Project&h=5AQHRMioW&s=1" rel="nofollow" style="color: #3b5998; cursor: pointer; display: block; min-height: 72px; padding: 8px 10px 10px; text-decoration: initial;" target="_blank"><span class="caption" data-ft="{"tn":"L"}"><span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">nres.illinois.edu</span></span></a><br />
<div class="mts uiAttachmentDesc translationEligibleUserAttachmentMessage" data-ft="{"tn":"M"}" style="margin-top: 3px; word-break: break-word; word-wrap: break-word;">
<a class="pam shareText" href="http://www.facebook.com/l.php?u=http%3A%2F%2Fnres.illinois.edu%2FNews_Restoration_Ag_Project&h=5AQHRMioW&s=1" rel="nofollow" style="color: #3b5998; cursor: pointer; display: block; min-height: 72px; padding: 8px 10px 10px; text-decoration: initial;" target="_blank"><span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">This spring students at the University of Illinois initiated a study of permaculture design at the Sustainable Student Farm on the South Farms of the Urbana, Illinois Campus. The study is called Restoration Agriculture, and the goal of the project is to compare the production of traditional corn and...</span></a></div>
</div>
</div>
</div>
<div class="shareRedesignTopBorder" style="border-top-color: rgba(0, 0, 0, 0.0784314); border-top-style: solid; border-top-width: 1px; left: 1px; position: absolute; right: 1px; top: 0px;">
</div>
<div class="shareRedesignRightBorder" style="border-right-color: rgba(0, 0, 0, 0.0784314); border-right-style: solid; border-right-width: 1px; bottom: 0px; position: absolute; right: 0px; top: 0px;">
</div>
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">__________________________________________</span></div>
<div class="shareRedesign -cx-PRIVATE-ogAttachmentButtons__container" style="position: relative; width: 398px;">
<h5 class="uiStreamMessage userContentWrapper" data-ft="{"type":1,"tn":"K"}" style="font-size: 11px; font-weight: normal; margin: 0px 0px 5px; padding: 0px; word-break: break-word; word-wrap: break-word;">
<span class="messageBody" data-ft="{"type":3}" style="color: #333333; font-size: 13px; line-height: 1.38;"><span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Of the 1,236 documented "community gardens," recognized by various groups throughout the city [Chicago], it turned out only 160 – or 13 percent – were really growing food (according to aerial images from June of 2010). But trolling over the city, frame by frame on Google Earth, Taylor found what looked like 4,494 possible sites of urban agriculture, many of which appeared to be small residential gardens. Their total mass adds up to 264,181 square meters of urban agriculture, much of it on the city’s South and West sides and far northwest where minority and immigrant communities are located.<br /><a href="http://www.theatlanticcities.com/neighborhoods/2013/01/mapping-urban-agriculture-sky/4346/" rel="nofollow nofollow" style="color: #3b5998; cursor: pointer; text-decoration: initial;" target="_blank">http://<wbr></wbr><span class="word_break" style="display: inline-block;"></span>www.theatlanticcities.com/<wbr></wbr><span class="word_break" style="display: inline-block;"></span>neighborhoods/2013/01/<wbr></wbr><span class="word_break" style="display: inline-block;"></span>mapping-urban-agriculture-sky/<wbr></wbr><span class="word_break" style="display: inline-block;"></span>4346/</a></span></span></h5>
<div class="mvm uiStreamAttachments fbMainStreamAttachment" data-ft="{"type":10,"tn":"H"}" style="margin-bottom: 10px; margin-top: 10px;">
<div class="shareRedesign -cx-PRIVATE-ogAttachmentButtons__container" style="position: relative; width: 398px;">
<div class="clearfix shareRedesignContainer" style="background-color: #f7f7f7; zoom: 1;">
<a aria-hidden="true" class="shareMediaLink shareRedesignMedia -cx-PRIVATE-uiImageBlock__image lfloat" data-ft="{"type":41,"tn":"E"}" href="http://www.theatlanticcities.com/neighborhoods/2013/01/mapping-urban-agriculture-sky/4346/" rel="nofollow" style="color: #3b5998; cursor: pointer; display: block; float: left; margin-right: 0px; position: relative; text-decoration: initial;" tabindex="-1" target="_blank"><img alt="" class="shareMediaPhoto img" src="https://fbstatic-a.akamaihd.net/rsrc.php/v2/y4/r/-PAXP-deijE.gif" style="background-image: url(https://fbexternal-a.akamaihd.net/safe_image.php?d=AQAdr9UX90jxY36G&w=90&h=90&url=http%3A%2F%2Fcdn.theatlanticcities.com%2Fimg%2Fupload%2F2013%2F01%2F08%2Flead_image%2Fthumb.png&cfs=1); background-position: 50% 50%; background-repeat: no-repeat no-repeat; border: 0px; display: block; height: 90px; width: 90px;" /></a><br />
<div class="-cx-PRIVATE-uiImageBlock__content " style="overflow: hidden;">
<strong style="color: #3b5998; cursor: pointer; display: inline !important; font-size: 11px; min-height: 72px; padding: 8px 10px 10px; text-decoration: initial;"><span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><a class="pam shareText" href="http://www.theatlanticcities.com/neighborhoods/2013/01/mapping-urban-agriculture-sky/4346/" rel="nofollow" style="color: #3b5998; cursor: pointer; display: inline !important; font-size: 11px; min-height: 72px; padding: 8px 10px 10px; text-decoration: initial;" target="_blank">Mapping Urban Agriculture From the Sky</a></span></strong><a class="pam shareText" href="http://www.theatlanticcities.com/neighborhoods/2013/01/mapping-urban-agriculture-sky/4346/" rel="nofollow" style="color: #3b5998; cursor: pointer; display: inline !important; font-size: 11px; min-height: 72px; padding: 8px 10px 10px; text-decoration: initial;" target="_blank"><span class="caption" data-ft="{"tn":"L"}"><span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">www.theatlanticcities.com</span></span></a><br />
<div class="attachmentText fsm fwn fcg" style="color: grey; font-size: 11px; max-height: 72px; overflow: hidden;">
<div class="mts uiAttachmentDesc translationEligibleUserAttachmentMessage" data-ft="{"tn":"M"}" style="margin-top: 3px; word-break: break-word; word-wrap: break-word;">
<a class="pam shareText" href="http://www.theatlanticcities.com/neighborhoods/2013/01/mapping-urban-agriculture-sky/4346/" rel="nofollow" style="color: #3b5998; cursor: pointer; display: block; min-height: 72px; padding: 8px 10px 10px; text-decoration: initial;" target="_blank"><span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Google Earth could help quantify urban gardens much better than advocates on the ground.</span></a></div>
</div>
</div>
</div>
<div class="shareRedesignTopBorder" style="border-top-color: rgba(0, 0, 0, 0.0784314); border-top-style: solid; border-top-width: 1px; left: 1px; position: absolute; right: 1px; top: 0px;">
</div>
<div class="shareRedesignRightBorder" style="border-right-color: rgba(0, 0, 0, 0.0784314); border-right-style: solid; border-right-width: 1px; bottom: 0px; position: absolute; right: 0px; top: 0px;">
</div>
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">________________________________________</span></div>
</div>
<form action="https://www.facebook.com/ajax/ufi/modify.php" class="live_10151432188980362_316526391751760 commentable_item collapsed_comments autoexpand_mode" data-live="{"seq":0}" id="u_0_3j" method="post" rel="async" style="margin: 0px; padding: 0px;">
<div class="clearfix uiStreamFooter " style="color: #999999; display: table-cell; width: 10000px; zoom: 1;">
</div>
</form>
</div>
</div>
<form action="https://www.facebook.com/ajax/ufi/modify.php" class="live_10151432212480362_316526391751760 commentable_item autoexpand_mode" data-live="{"seq":10151432212530362}" id="u_0_3i" method="post" rel="async" style="margin: 0px; padding: 0px;">
<div class="clearfix uiStreamFooter " style="color: #999999; display: table-cell; width: 10000px; zoom: 1;">
</div>
</form>
<span style="color: #333333; font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 1.38;">At the international Permaculture Your Campus Conference, directors of the award-winning UMass Permaculture Initiative will give an introduction to permaculture in a campus setting and share the value that it has created for the University of Massachusetts system and local community.</span><br />
<h5 class="uiStreamMessage userContentWrapper" data-ft="{"type":1,"tn":"K"}" style="font-size: 11px; font-weight: normal; margin: 0px 0px 5px; padding: 0px; word-break: break-word; word-wrap: break-word;">
<span class="messageBody" data-ft="{"type":3}" style="color: #333333; font-size: 13px; line-height: 1.38;"><span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><br />Participants will learn how to develop a successful permaculture initiative for their campus and will leave with their own individualized action plan for their own campus permaculture initiative.<br /><a href="http://www.facebook.com/l.php?u=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.umasspermacultureconference.com%2F&h=NAQEjYq_UAQHQwCYitVruifNHqVGX_cpOd43-BeUSD33wqg&s=1" rel="nofollow nofollow" style="color: #3b5998; cursor: pointer; text-decoration: initial;" target="_blank">http://<wbr></wbr><span class="word_break" style="display: inline-block;"></span>www.umasspermacultureconference<wbr></wbr><span class="word_break" style="display: inline-block;"></span>.com/</a></span></span></h5>
<div class="mvm uiStreamAttachments fbMainStreamAttachment" data-ft="{"type":10,"tn":"H"}" style="margin-bottom: 10px; margin-top: 10px;">
<div class="shareRedesign -cx-PRIVATE-ogAttachmentButtons__container" style="position: relative; width: 398px;">
<div class="clearfix shareRedesignContainer" style="background-color: #f7f7f7; zoom: 1;">
<a aria-hidden="true" class="shareMediaLink shareRedesignMedia -cx-PRIVATE-uiImageBlock__image lfloat" data-ft="{"type":41,"tn":"E"}" href="http://www.facebook.com/l.php?u=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.umasspermacultureconference.com%2F&h=hAQGKa8th&s=1" rel="nofollow" style="color: #3b5998; cursor: pointer; display: block; float: left; margin-right: 0px; position: relative; text-decoration: initial;" tabindex="-1" target="_blank"><img alt="" class="shareMediaPhoto img" src="https://fbstatic-a.akamaihd.net/rsrc.php/v2/y4/r/-PAXP-deijE.gif" style="background-image: url(https://fbexternal-a.akamaihd.net/safe_image.php?d=AQBZhoOoE8pjU0F3&w=90&h=90&url=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.umasspermacultureconference.com%2Fuploads%2F1%2F0%2F7%2F5%2F10752957%2F7157920_orig.jpg&cfs=1); background-position: 50% 50%; background-repeat: no-repeat no-repeat; border: 0px; display: block; height: 90px; width: 90px;" /></a><br />
<div class="-cx-PRIVATE-uiImageBlock__content " style="overflow: hidden;">
<strong style="color: #3b5998; cursor: pointer; display: inline !important; font-size: 11px; min-height: 72px; padding: 8px 10px 10px; text-decoration: initial;"><span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><a class="pam shareText" href="http://www.umasspermacultureconference.com/" rel="nofollow" style="color: #3b5998; cursor: pointer; display: inline !important; font-size: 11px; min-height: 72px; padding: 8px 10px 10px; text-decoration: initial;" target="_blank">Permaculture Your Campus Conference 2013</a></span></strong><a class="pam shareText" href="http://www.umasspermacultureconference.com/" rel="nofollow" style="color: #3b5998; cursor: pointer; display: inline !important; font-size: 11px; min-height: 72px; padding: 8px 10px 10px; text-decoration: initial;" target="_blank"><span class="caption" data-ft="{"tn":"L"}"><span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">www.umasspermacultureconference.com</span></span></a><br />
<div class="attachmentText fsm fwn fcg" style="color: grey; font-size: 11px; max-height: 72px; overflow: hidden;">
<div class="mts uiAttachmentDesc translationEligibleUserAttachmentMessage" data-ft="{"tn":"M"}" style="margin-top: 3px; word-break: break-word; word-wrap: break-word;">
<a class="pam shareText" href="http://www.umasspermacultureconference.com/" rel="nofollow" style="color: #3b5998; cursor: pointer; display: block; min-height: 72px; padding: 8px 10px 10px; text-decoration: initial;" target="_blank"><span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Information about the Permaculture Your Campus Conference</span></a></div>
</div>
</div>
</div>
<div class="shareRedesignTopBorder" style="border-top-color: rgba(0, 0, 0, 0.0784314); border-top-style: solid; border-top-width: 1px; left: 1px; position: absolute; right: 1px; top: 0px;">
</div>
<div class="shareRedesignRightBorder" style="border-right-color: rgba(0, 0, 0, 0.0784314); border-right-style: solid; border-right-width: 1px; bottom: 0px; position: absolute; right: 0px; top: 0px;">
</div>
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">__________________________________________</span></div>
</div>
<form action="https://www.facebook.com/ajax/ufi/modify.php" class="live_10151428714160362_316526391751760 commentable_item autoexpand_mode" data-live="{"seq":10151430399505362}" id="u_a_1c" method="post" rel="async" style="margin: 0px; padding: 0px;">
<div class="clearfix uiStreamFooter " style="color: #999999; display: table-cell; width: 10000px; zoom: 1;">
</div>
</form>
<br />
<div class="mvm uiStreamAttachments fbMainStreamAttachment" data-ft="{"type":10,"tn":"H"}" style="margin-bottom: 10px; margin-top: 10px;">
<div class="shareRedesign -cx-PRIVATE-ogAttachmentButtons__container" style="position: relative; width: 398px;">
<div class="clearfix shareRedesignContainer" style="background-color: #f7f7f7; zoom: 1;">
<a aria-hidden="true" class="shareMediaLink shareRedesignMedia -cx-PRIVATE-uiImageBlock__image lfloat" data-ft="{"type":41,"tn":"E"}" href="http://bustanqaraaqa.weebly.com/" rel="nofollow" style="color: #3b5998; cursor: pointer; display: block; float: left; margin-right: 0px; position: relative;" tabindex="-1" target="_blank"><img alt="" class="shareMediaPhoto img" src="https://fbstatic-a.akamaihd.net/rsrc.php/v2/y4/r/-PAXP-deijE.gif" style="background-image: url(https://fbexternal-a.akamaihd.net/safe_image.php?d=AQC6P0-_rC8TU7bf&w=90&h=90&url=http%3A%2F%2Fbustanqaraaqa.weebly.com%2Fuploads%2F1%2F1%2F9%2F4%2F11942974%2F9469600.jpg&cfs=1); background-position: 50% 50%; background-repeat: no-repeat no-repeat; border: 0px; display: block; height: 90px; width: 90px;" /></a><br />
<div class="-cx-PRIVATE-uiImageBlock__content " style="overflow: hidden;">
<strong style="color: #3b5998; cursor: pointer; display: inline !important; font-size: 11px; min-height: 72px; padding: 8px 10px 10px; text-decoration: initial;"><span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><a class="pam shareText" href="http://bustanqaraaqa.weebly.com/" rel="nofollow" style="color: #3b5998; cursor: pointer; display: inline !important; font-size: 11px; min-height: 72px; padding: 8px 10px 10px; text-decoration: initial;" target="_blank">Bustan Qaraaqa</a></span></strong><br />
<div class="attachmentText fsm fwn fcg" style="color: grey; font-size: 11px; max-height: 72px; overflow: hidden;">
<div class="mts uiAttachmentDesc translationEligibleUserAttachmentMessage" data-ft="{"tn":"M"}" style="margin-top: 3px; word-break: break-word; word-wrap: break-word;">
<a class="pam shareText" href="http://bustanqaraaqa.weebly.com/" rel="nofollow" style="color: #3b5998; cursor: pointer; display: block; min-height: 72px; padding: 8px 10px 10px; text-decoration: initial;" target="_blank"><span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Bustan Qaraaqa project work on the farm and in the community with the Bedouin and the Farmers promoting and implementing sustainable environmental managemnt and alternative technologies</span></a></div>
</div>
</div>
</div>
<div class="shareRedesignTopBorder" style="border-top-color: rgba(0, 0, 0, 0.0784314); border-top-style: solid; border-top-width: 1px; left: 1px; position: absolute; right: 1px; top: 0px;">
</div>
<div class="shareRedesignRightBorder" style="border-right-color: rgba(0, 0, 0, 0.0784314); border-right-style: solid; border-right-width: 1px; bottom: 0px; position: absolute; right: 0px; top: 0px;">
</div>
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">_________________________________________</span></div>
</div>
<form action="https://www.facebook.com/ajax/ufi/modify.php" class="live_10151428894015362_316526391751760 commentable_item autoexpand_mode" data-live="{"seq":0}" id="u_b_1b" method="post" rel="async" style="margin: 0px; padding: 0px;">
<div class="clearfix uiStreamFooter " style="color: #999999; display: table-cell; width: 10000px; zoom: 1;">
</div>
</form>
<br />
<div class="mvm uiStreamAttachments fbMainStreamAttachment" data-ft="{"type":10,"tn":"H"}" style="margin-bottom: 10px; margin-top: 10px;">
<div class="shareRedesign -cx-PRIVATE-ogAttachmentButtons__container" style="position: relative; width: 398px;">
<div class="clearfix shareRedesignContainer" style="background-color: #f7f7f7; zoom: 1;">
<a aria-hidden="true" class="shareMediaLink shareRedesignMedia -cx-PRIVATE-uiImageBlock__image lfloat" data-ft="{"type":41,"tn":"E"}" href="http://www.foodsecurityalberta.org/blog/2012/12/30/acres-usa-conference-report/" rel="nofollow" style="background-color: #f7f7f7; clear: left; color: #3b5998; cursor: pointer; display: inline !important; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em; position: relative; text-decoration: initial;" tabindex="-1" target="_blank"><img alt="" class="shareMediaPhoto img" src="https://fbstatic-a.akamaihd.net/rsrc.php/v2/y4/r/-PAXP-deijE.gif" style="background-image: url(https://fbexternal-a.akamaihd.net/safe_image.php?d=AQDpH8Xpl4xiGVxd&w=90&h=90&url=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.foodsecurityalberta.org%2Fblog%2Fwp-content%2Fuploads%2F2012%2F12%2FIMG_1540-300x225.jpeg&cfs=1); background-position: 50% 50%; background-repeat: no-repeat no-repeat; border: 0px; display: block; height: 90px; width: 90px;" /></a><div class="-cx-PRIVATE-uiImageBlock__content " style="overflow: hidden;">
<strong style="color: #3b5998; cursor: pointer; display: inline !important; font-size: 11px; min-height: 72px; padding: 8px 10px 10px; text-decoration: initial;"><span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><a class="pam shareText" href="http://www.foodsecurityalberta.org/blog/2012/12/30/acres-usa-conference-report/" rel="nofollow" style="color: #3b5998; cursor: pointer; display: inline !important; font-size: 11px; min-height: 72px; padding: 8px 10px 10px; text-decoration: initial;" target="_blank">ACRES USA Conference Report | Growing Food Security in Alberta</a></span></strong><a class="pam shareText" href="http://www.foodsecurityalberta.org/blog/2012/12/30/acres-usa-conference-report/" rel="nofollow" style="color: #3b5998; cursor: pointer; display: inline !important; font-size: 11px; min-height: 72px; padding: 8px 10px 10px; text-decoration: initial;" target="_blank"><span class="caption" data-ft="{"tn":"L"}"><span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">www.foodsecurityalberta.org</span></span></a><br />
<div class="attachmentText fsm fwn fcg" style="color: grey; font-size: 11px; max-height: 72px; overflow: hidden;">
<div class="mts uiAttachmentDesc translationEligibleUserAttachmentMessage" data-ft="{"tn":"M"}" style="margin-top: 3px; word-break: break-word; word-wrap: break-word;">
<a class="pam shareText" href="http://www.foodsecurityalberta.org/blog/2012/12/30/acres-usa-conference-report/" rel="nofollow" style="color: #3b5998; cursor: pointer; display: block; min-height: 72px; padding: 8px 10px 10px; text-decoration: initial;" target="_blank"><span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">At the start of December, Vance and I had the opportunity to travel to Louisville, Kentucky for the 2012 ACRES USA Conference. We’d heard about this conference from a few of our farming mentors who have gone several times and have talked about how important its become in their farm journey.</span></a></div>
</div>
</div>
</div>
<div class="shareRedesignTopBorder" style="border-top-color: rgba(0, 0, 0, 0.0784314); border-top-style: solid; border-top-width: 1px; left: 1px; position: absolute; right: 1px; top: 0px;">
</div>
<div class="shareRedesignRightBorder" style="border-right-color: rgba(0, 0, 0, 0.0784314); border-right-style: solid; border-right-width: 1px; bottom: 0px; position: absolute; right: 0px; top: 0px;">
</div>
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">_________________________________________</span></div>
</div>
<form action="https://www.facebook.com/ajax/ufi/modify.php" class="live_10151427893755362_316526391751760 commentable_item autoexpand_mode" data-live="{"seq":0}" id="u_b_1e" method="post" rel="async" style="margin: 0px; padding: 0px;">
<div class="clearfix uiStreamFooter " style="color: #999999; display: table-cell; width: 10000px; zoom: 1;">
</div>
</form>
<br />
<div class="mvm uiStreamAttachments fbMainStreamAttachment" data-ft="{"type":10,"tn":"H"}" style="margin-bottom: 10px; margin-top: 10px;">
<div class="shareRedesign -cx-PRIVATE-ogAttachmentButtons__container" style="position: relative; width: 398px;">
<div class="clearfix shareRedesignContainer" style="background-color: #f7f7f7; zoom: 1;">
<div class="-cx-PRIVATE-uiImageBlock__content " style="overflow: hidden;">
<a class="pam shareText" href="http://www.foodsecurityalberta.org/blog/2012/12/27/megga-watt-the-rise-of-the-food-garage/" rel="nofollow" target="_blank"></a><a aria-hidden="true" class="shareMediaLink shareRedesignMedia -cx-PRIVATE-uiImageBlock__image lfloat" data-ft="{"type":41,"tn":"E"}" href="http://www.foodsecurityalberta.org/blog/2012/12/27/megga-watt-the-rise-of-the-food-garage/" rel="nofollow" style="clear: left; color: #3b5998; cursor: pointer; display: inline !important; float: left; font-size: 11px; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em; min-height: 72px; padding: 8px 10px 10px; position: relative; text-decoration: initial;" tabindex="-1" target="_blank"><img alt="" class="shareMediaPhoto img" src="https://fbstatic-a.akamaihd.net/rsrc.php/v2/y4/r/-PAXP-deijE.gif" style="background-image: url(https://fbexternal-a.akamaihd.net/safe_image.php?d=AQCRpryIomFH04Fx&w=90&h=90&url=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.foodsecurityalberta.org%2Fblog%2Fwp-content%2Fuploads%2F2012%2F12%2Fbuckminster-fuller-300x212.jpeg&cfs=1); background-position: 50% 50%; background-repeat: no-repeat no-repeat; border: 0px; display: block; height: 90px; width: 90px;" /></a><strong style="color: #3b5998; cursor: pointer; display: inline !important; font-size: 11px; min-height: 72px; padding: 8px 10px 10px; text-decoration: initial;"><span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><a class="pam shareText" href="http://www.foodsecurityalberta.org/blog/2012/12/27/megga-watt-the-rise-of-the-food-garage/" rel="nofollow" style="color: #3b5998; cursor: pointer; display: inline !important; font-size: 11px; min-height: 72px; padding: 8px 10px 10px; text-decoration: initial;" target="_blank">MEGGA-watt? The Rise of The Food Garage…! | Growing Food Security in Alberta</a></span></strong><a class="pam shareText" href="http://www.foodsecurityalberta.org/blog/2012/12/27/megga-watt-the-rise-of-the-food-garage/" rel="nofollow" style="color: #3b5998; cursor: pointer; display: inline !important; font-size: 11px; min-height: 72px; padding: 8px 10px 10px; text-decoration: initial;" target="_blank"><span class="caption" data-ft="{"tn":"L"}"><span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">www.foodsecurityalberta.org</span></span></a><br />
<div class="attachmentText fsm fwn fcg" style="color: grey; font-size: 11px; max-height: 72px; overflow: hidden;">
<div class="mts uiAttachmentDesc translationEligibleUserAttachmentMessage" data-ft="{"tn":"M"}" style="margin-top: 3px; word-break: break-word; word-wrap: break-word;">
<a class="pam shareText" href="http://www.foodsecurityalberta.org/blog/2012/12/27/megga-watt-the-rise-of-the-food-garage/" rel="nofollow" style="color: #3b5998; cursor: pointer; display: block; min-height: 72px; padding: 8px 10px 10px; text-decoration: initial;" target="_blank"><span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">(A nine part blog in support of the MEGGA-watt? Project entry in The Carbon Farmer's "Face Your Footprint" contest – please vote daily until Feb 24 – http://bit.ly/Tf4a44)</span></a></div>
</div>
</div>
</div>
<div class="shareRedesignTopBorder" style="border-top-color: rgba(0, 0, 0, 0.0784314); border-top-style: solid; border-top-width: 1px; left: 1px; position: absolute; right: 1px; top: 0px;">
</div>
<div class="shareRedesignRightBorder" style="border-right-color: rgba(0, 0, 0, 0.0784314); border-right-style: solid; border-right-width: 1px; bottom: 0px; position: absolute; right: 0px; top: 0px;">
</div>
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">__________________________________________</span></div>
</div>
<form action="https://www.facebook.com/ajax/ufi/modify.php" class="live_10151427893620362_316526391751760 commentable_item autoexpand_mode" data-live="{"seq":0}" id="u_c_16" method="post" rel="async" style="margin: 0px; padding: 0px;">
<div class="clearfix uiStreamFooter " style="color: #999999; display: table-cell; width: 10000px; zoom: 1;">
</div>
</form>
<span style="color: #333333; font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 1.38;">Nibbling away at the local edges of consumer culture. Try this in your town!</span><br />
<div class="mvm uiStreamAttachments fbMainStreamAttachment" data-ft="{"type":10,"tn":"H"}" style="margin-bottom: 10px; margin-top: 10px;">
<div class="shareRedesign" style="position: relative; width: 398px;">
<div class="shareRedesignText" style="background-color: #f7f7f7;">
<a class="pam shareText" href="http://www.sustainablebusiness.com/index.cfm/go/news.display/id/24424" rel="nofollow" style="color: #3b5998; cursor: pointer; display: block; padding: 8px 10px 10px; text-decoration: initial;" target="_blank"></a><br />
<div class="attachmentText fsm fwn fcg" style="color: grey; font-size: 11px; max-height: 72px; overflow: hidden;">
<div class="uiAttachmentTitle" data-ft="{"type":11,"tn":"C"}" style="color: #3b5998; word-break: break-word; word-wrap: break-word;">
<a class="pam shareText" href="http://www.sustainablebusiness.com/index.cfm/go/news.display/id/24424" rel="nofollow" style="color: #3b5998; cursor: pointer; display: block; padding: 8px 10px 10px; text-decoration: initial;" target="_blank"><strong><span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Massachusetts Town Bans Single-Use Water Bottles</span></strong></a></div>
<div class="mts uiAttachmentDesc translationEligibleUserAttachmentMessage" data-ft="{"tn":"M"}" style="margin-top: 3px; word-break: break-word; word-wrap: break-word;">
<a class="pam shareText" href="http://www.sustainablebusiness.com/index.cfm/go/news.display/id/24424" rel="nofollow" style="color: #3b5998; cursor: pointer; display: block; padding: 8px 10px 10px; text-decoration: initial;" target="_blank"><span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">The new law addresses the huge amount of waste created and the greenhouse gases from fossil fuel production.</span></a></div>
</div>
<a class="pam shareText" href="http://www.sustainablebusiness.com/index.cfm/go/news.display/id/24424" rel="nofollow" style="color: #3b5998; cursor: pointer; display: block; padding: 8px 10px 10px; text-decoration: initial;" target="_blank">
</a></div>
<div class="shareRedesignTopBorder" style="border-top-color: rgba(0, 0, 0, 0.0784314); border-top-style: solid; border-top-width: 1px; left: 1px; position: absolute; right: 1px; top: 0px;">
</div>
<div class="shareRedesignRightBorder" style="border-right-color: rgba(0, 0, 0, 0.0784314); border-right-style: solid; border-right-width: 1px; bottom: 0px; position: absolute; right: 0px; top: 0px;">
</div>
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">_________________________________________</span></div>
<div class="shareRedesign" style="position: relative; width: 398px;">
<div class="mvm uiStreamAttachments fbMainStreamAttachment" data-ft="{"type":10,"tn":"H"}" style="margin-bottom: 10px; margin-top: 10px;">
<div class="shareRedesign -cx-PRIVATE-ogAttachmentButtons__container" style="position: relative; width: 398px;">
<div class="clearfix shareRedesignContainer" style="background-color: #f7f7f7; zoom: 1;">
<a aria-hidden="true" class="shareMediaLink shareRedesignMedia -cx-PRIVATE-uiImageBlock__image lfloat" data-ft="{"type":41,"tn":"E"}" href="http://www.rawstory.com/rs/2013/01/02/poland-bans-genetically-modified-maize-and-potatoes/" rel="nofollow" style="color: #3b5998; cursor: pointer; display: block; float: left; margin-right: 0px; position: relative; text-decoration: initial;" tabindex="-1" target="_blank"><img alt="" class="shareMediaPhoto img" src="https://fbstatic-a.akamaihd.net/rsrc.php/v2/y4/r/-PAXP-deijE.gif" style="background-image: url(https://fbexternal-a.akamaihd.net/safe_image.php?d=AQDQZeJINGTyBn2L&w=90&h=90&url=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.rawstory.com%2Frs%2Fwp-content%2Fuploads%2F2011%2F09%2Fraw_story_logo.png&cfs=1); background-position: 50% 50%; background-repeat: no-repeat no-repeat; border: 0px; display: block; height: 90px; width: 90px;" /></a><br />
<div class="-cx-PRIVATE-uiImageBlock__content " style="overflow: hidden;">
<strong style="color: #3b5998; cursor: pointer; display: inline !important; font-size: 11px; min-height: 72px; padding: 8px 10px 10px; text-decoration: initial;"><span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><a class="pam shareText" href="http://www.rawstory.com/rs/2013/01/02/poland-bans-genetically-modified-maize-and-potatoes/" rel="nofollow" style="color: #3b5998; cursor: pointer; display: inline !important; font-size: 11px; min-height: 72px; padding: 8px 10px 10px; text-decoration: initial;" target="_blank">Poland bans genetically modified maize and potatoes | The Raw Story</a></span></strong><a class="pam shareText" href="http://www.rawstory.com/rs/2013/01/02/poland-bans-genetically-modified-maize-and-potatoes/" rel="nofollow" style="color: #3b5998; cursor: pointer; display: inline !important; min-height: 72px; padding: 8px 10px 10px; text-decoration: initial;" target="_blank"><span class="caption" data-ft="{"tn":"L"}" style="font-size: 11px;"><span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">www.rawstory.com</span></span></a><br />
<div class="attachmentText fsm fwn fcg" style="color: grey; max-height: 72px; overflow: hidden;">
<div class="mts uiAttachmentDesc translationEligibleUserAttachmentMessage" data-ft="{"tn":"M"}" style="margin-top: 3px; word-break: break-word; word-wrap: break-word;">
<a class="pam shareText" href="http://www.rawstory.com/rs/2013/01/02/poland-bans-genetically-modified-maize-and-potatoes/" rel="nofollow" style="color: #3b5998; cursor: pointer; display: block; min-height: 72px; padding: 8px 10px 10px; text-decoration: initial;" target="_blank"><span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: x-small;">Poland on Wednesday imposed new bans on the cultivation of certain genetically modified strains of maize and potatoes, a day after an EU required green light for GM crops took effect.</span></a></div>
</div>
</div>
</div>
<div class="shareRedesignTopBorder" style="border-top-color: rgba(0, 0, 0, 0.0784314); border-top-style: solid; border-top-width: 1px; left: 1px; position: absolute; right: 1px; top: 0px;">
</div>
<div class="shareRedesignRightBorder" style="border-right-color: rgba(0, 0, 0, 0.0784314); border-right-style: solid; border-right-width: 1px; bottom: 0px; position: absolute; right: 0px; top: 0px;">
</div>
<b><span style="font-size: large;">_______________________________</span></b></div>
<div class="shareRedesign -cx-PRIVATE-ogAttachmentButtons__container" style="position: relative; width: 398px;">
<a aria-hidden="true" class="external -cx-PRIVATE-uiImageBlock__image -cx-PRIVATE-uiImageBlock__largeImage lfloat" data-ft="{"type":41,"tn":"E"}" href="http://thinkprogress.org/health/2012/11/21/1224761/farmers-insurance-sued-by-corporations/" rel="nofollow" style="background-color: #f1f2f6; color: #3b5998; cursor: pointer; display: block; float: left; font-family: 'lucida grande', tahoma, verdana, arial, sans-serif; font-size: 10.909090995788574px; line-height: 12.727272033691406px; margin-right: 10px;" tabindex="-1" target="_blank"><img alt="" class="img" src="https://fbexternal-a.akamaihd.net/safe_image.php?d=AQBsrtofdtSxR6Ky&w=90&h=90&url=http%3A%2F%2Fthinkprogress.org%2Fwp-content%2Fuploads%2F2012%2F11%2Fmonsanto-300x229.jpg" style="border: 0px; display: block; max-height: 90px; max-width: 90px;" /></a><br />
<div class="-cx-PRIVATE-uiImageBlock__content " style="background-color: #f1f2f6; color: #333333; font-family: 'lucida grande', tahoma, verdana, arial, sans-serif; font-size: 10.909090995788574px; line-height: 12.727272033691406px; overflow: hidden;">
<div class="fsm fwn fcg" style="color: grey; font-size: 11px;">
<div class="uiAttachmentTitle" data-ft="{"type":11,"tn":"C"}" style="color: #333333; word-break: break-word; word-wrap: break-word;">
<strong><a href="http://thinkprogress.org/health/2012/11/21/1224761/farmers-insurance-sued-by-corporations/" rel="nofollow" style="color: #3b5998; cursor: pointer; text-decoration: initial;" target="_blank">Farmers Told To Buy Insurance If They Don’t Want To Get Sued By Corporations</a></strong></div>
<span class="caption" data-ft="{"tn":"L"}">thinkprogress.org</span><br />
<div class="mts uiAttachmentDesc translationEligibleUserAttachmentMessage" data-ft="{"tn":"M"}" style="margin-top: 5px; word-break: break-word; word-wrap: break-word;">
<div class="text_exposed_root" id="id_50ef8f976b3ed4921032036" style="display: inline;">
Every year for the past 13 years, biotechnology giant Monsanto Company has sued <span class="text_exposed_hide">...</span></div>
</div>
</div>
</div>
</div>
</div>
<form action="https://www.facebook.com/ajax/ufi/modify.php" class="live_10151417943530362_316526391751760 commentable_item autoexpand_mode" data-live="{"seq":10151418048130362}" id="u_k_1b" method="post" rel="async" style="margin: 0px; padding: 0px;">
<div class="clearfix uiStreamFooter " style="color: #999999; display: table-cell; width: 10000px; zoom: 1;">
</div>
</form>
</div>
</div>
<form action="https://www.facebook.com/ajax/ufi/modify.php" class="live_10151427849310362_316526391751760 commentable_item autoexpand_mode" data-live="{"seq":10151427877520362}" id="u_c_19" method="post" rel="async" style="margin: 0px; padding: 0px;">
<div class="clearfix uiStreamFooter " style="color: #999999; display: table-cell; width: 10000px; zoom: 1;">
</div>
</form>
</div>
<div class="blogger-post-footer">http://kjpermaculture.blogspot.com/feeds/posts/default
<p id="blogfeeds"><$BlogFeedsVertical$></p>
<p id="postfeeds"><$BlogItemFeedLinks$></p></div>Anonymoushttp://www.blogger.com/profile/03009370115428649864noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-439180943121365896.post-34719314724820626912012-11-15T11:05:00.000-05:002012-11-15T11:36:02.047-05:00Peter Bane on Youtube<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><b>Peter Bane in three video talks about permaculture and garden farming.</b></span><br />
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><b>See <a href="http://permaculturehandbook.com/">http://permacultu<span id="goog_763461243"></span><span id="goog_763461244"></span>rehandbook.com/</a> for more info.</b></span><br />
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><b></b></span><iframe allowfullscreen="allowfullscreen" frameborder="0" height="236" src="http://www.youtube.com/embed/FCYQRLq4LSw" width="420"></iframe><br />
<br />
<iframe allowfullscreen="allowfullscreen" frameborder="0" height="236" src="http://www.youtube.com/embed/ySydk4R77po" width="420"></iframe><br />
<br />
<iframe allowfullscreen="allowfullscreen" frameborder="0" height="236" src="http://www.youtube.com/embed/r8zdvj4wxqg" width="420"></iframe><div class="blogger-post-footer">http://kjpermaculture.blogspot.com/feeds/posts/default
<p id="blogfeeds"><$BlogFeedsVertical$></p>
<p id="postfeeds"><$BlogItemFeedLinks$></p></div>Anonymoushttp://www.blogger.com/profile/03009370115428649864noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-439180943121365896.post-62606101207719137012012-11-10T21:11:00.000-05:002012-11-10T21:11:20.781-05:00<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
</div>
<div style="text-align: left;">
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: large;">Stuff harvested from Facebook, October 10, 2012</span></div>
<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiLakMrrC8xdFwuu3LOz_ui1hT3IzlWfkJOszLx0ufI4V3V6BtuQU3NkSUhJTTdqPu_JVCtvDnGiXsElqJ7ZkvMhyTKFskriF9tQHDM9QHdvUOQGldNKhbE7jiDdnGgOaZp0P7JKSkXWJ4/s1600/reciprocity.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="393" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiLakMrrC8xdFwuu3LOz_ui1hT3IzlWfkJOszLx0ufI4V3V6BtuQU3NkSUhJTTdqPu_JVCtvDnGiXsElqJ7ZkvMhyTKFskriF9tQHDM9QHdvUOQGldNKhbE7jiDdnGgOaZp0P7JKSkXWJ4/s400/reciprocity.jpg" width="400" /></a><div class="blogger-post-footer">http://kjpermaculture.blogspot.com/feeds/posts/default
<p id="blogfeeds"><$BlogFeedsVertical$></p>
<p id="postfeeds"><$BlogItemFeedLinks$></p></div>Anonymoushttp://www.blogger.com/profile/03009370115428649864noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-439180943121365896.post-39115874152336959412012-09-08T08:32:00.002-05:002012-09-08T08:32:59.697-05:003-D Printing...With Concrete!<br />
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Behrokh Khoshnevis is a professor of Industrial & Systems Engineering and is the Director of Manufacturing Engineering Graduate Program at the University of Southern California (USC). He is active in CAD/CAM, robotics and mechatronics related related research projects that include the development of novel Solid Free Form, or Rapid Prototyping, processes (Contour Crafting and SIS), automated construction of civil structures, development of CAD/CAM systems for biomedical applications (eg, restorative dentistry, rehabilitation engineering, haptics devices for medical applications), autonomous mobile and modular robots for assembly applications in space, and invention of technologies in the field of oil and gas. His research in simulation has aimed at creating intelligent simulation tools that can automatically perform many simulation functions that are conventionally performed by human analysts. His textbook, "Discrete Systems Simulation", and his simulation software EZSIM benefit from some aspects of his research in simulation. He routinely conducts lectures and seminars on invention and technology development. He is a Fellow member of the Society for Computer Simulation and a Fellow member of the Institute of Industrial Engineering. He is a senior member of the Society of Manufacturing Engineers. His website: <a href="http://www-rcf.usc.edu/" target="_blank">www-rcf.usc.edu</a></span><br />
<br />
<iframe frameborder="0" height="331" scrolling="no" src="http://tedxtalks.ted.com/video/TEDxOjai-Behrokh-Khoshnevis-Con/player?layout=&read_more=1" width="420"></iframe><div class="blogger-post-footer">http://kjpermaculture.blogspot.com/feeds/posts/default
<p id="blogfeeds"><$BlogFeedsVertical$></p>
<p id="postfeeds"><$BlogItemFeedLinks$></p></div>Anonymoushttp://www.blogger.com/profile/03009370115428649864noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-439180943121365896.post-28764334912892598822012-06-19T17:19:00.000-05:002012-06-19T17:19:54.166-05:00The Water Retention Landscape of Tamera<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">The Water Retention Landscape of <a href="http://www.blogger.com/"><span id="goog_744383613"></span>Tamera Peace Research Center<span id="goog_744383614"></span></a> in Southern Portugal is a model for natural decentralized water management, restoration of damaged ecosystems and disaster prevention. It is a basis for reforestation, agriculture and aquaculture, especially in regions threatened by desertification, and is an integral part of a comprehensive model for sustainability in water, food, energy and social structures. (See also </span><span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><a href="http://challenge.bfi.org/2012Finalist_Tamera">http://challenge.bfi.org/2012Finalist_Tamera</a>)</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><br /></span><br />
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><span style="line-height: 20px;">The global crises of hunger, water scarcity and rapid urbanization worsen as deforestation and inappropriate agriculture degrade vast areas of land and interrupt hydrological cycles. Soil that can no longer absorb the rain is eroded, resulting in desertification, falling groundwater levels, and disastrous floods. A new approach to water management is urgently needed.</span>
</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><span style="line-height: 20px;"><br /></span></span><br />
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><span style="line-height: 20px;">The model consists of interconnected rainwater retention spaces (or “lakes”) designed (by <a href="http://www.krameterhof.at/en/" target="_blank">Sepp Holzer</a>) harmoniously into the landscape. The lakes are created by building earth dams, behind which rainwater is stored. The lakes are not sealed, so the water can seep into and soak the surrounding earth-body. They are built with deep and shallow zones and meandering shorelines, so the water moves constantly ensuring its vitality, oxygenation and self-purification. Terraces are built around the lakes for organic cultivation of fruit trees, vegetables and other crops, and mixed aquaculture can be established in the lakes.</span></span><br />
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><br style="line-height: 20px;" /><span style="line-height: 20px;">The goal is to retain all rainwater on the land, replenish the groundwater, encourage springs to reappear, and reduce soil erosion to near zero, while supplying a community of 300 people with healthy organic produce. Five lakes have already been created across Tamera's 150 hectare (370 acre) site, and ten more are planned. The results visible so far are that natural vegetation has recovered, much wildlife has returned, a spring has reappeared, and crops can be grown on the lakeside terraces throughout the year requiring less and less artificial irrigation.</span></span>
<br />
<iframe allowfullscreen="" frameborder="0" height="236" src="http://www.youtube.com/embed/-XNDbg5UuNU" width="420"></iframe><div class="blogger-post-footer">http://kjpermaculture.blogspot.com/feeds/posts/default
<p id="blogfeeds"><$BlogFeedsVertical$></p>
<p id="postfeeds"><$BlogItemFeedLinks$></p></div>Anonymoushttp://www.blogger.com/profile/03009370115428649864noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-439180943121365896.post-50249492063600213022012-04-14T09:54:00.001-05:002012-04-14T10:10:40.233-05:002012 Detroit Permaculture Design Course<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"></div><div style="background-color: white; border: 0px; color: #333333; font-size: 12px; margin: 0px; outline: 0px; padding: 0px; text-align: -webkit-auto; vertical-align: baseline;"><h1 style="border-bottom-width: 0px; border-left-width: 0px; border-right-width: 0px; border-top-color: rgb(224, 224, 224); border-top-style: solid; border-top-width: 5px; clear: both; color: black; font-size: 22px; line-height: 30px; margin: 20px 0px 0px; outline: 0px; padding: 10px 0px 0px; vertical-align: baseline;"><span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">2012 Detroit Permaculture Design Course</span></h1></div><div style="background-color: white; border: 0px; color: #333333; margin: 0px; outline: 0px; padding: 0px; text-align: -webkit-auto; vertical-align: baseline;"><span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Jesse D. Tack and Travis S. Childs of Aurora Design Solutions will be teaming up with design instructor Larry Santoyo (of Earthflow Design Works and the Permaculture Institute USA) and Keith Johnson (Patterns for Abundance Design and Permaculture Activist Magazine) to offer a Permaculture Design Course in Detroit Michigan July 22 though August 4th, 2012. Please contact Travis S. Childs at auroradesignsolutions@gmail.com for more information and to sign up for the student waiting list.</span></div><br />
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="http://auroradesignsolutions.com/2012/01/02/permaculture-design-course/" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;" target="_blank"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhvpfnXv_a4OAFHq6jJb68NRsC7iRzZTMcQgAjfEw3UHzFKJP6Lau32Zl3875lm3c5nqz0Pnur1BarMnYHRoM6B-4p65bg8CTKOW5fs_kO8ClUQfL1qMgeR3R6OjxgvF111sSgzs7PPEM8/s1600/Keith&Larry-DetroitPDC.jpg" /></a></div><div class="blogger-post-footer">http://kjpermaculture.blogspot.com/feeds/posts/default
<p id="blogfeeds"><$BlogFeedsVertical$></p>
<p id="postfeeds"><$BlogItemFeedLinks$></p></div>Anonymoushttp://www.blogger.com/profile/03009370115428649864noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-439180943121365896.post-40024662763443442502012-02-27T23:58:00.002-05:002012-02-28T00:06:17.632-05:00The Cybernetic Garden Farm: Information in; information out.<span style="font-family: 'Trebuchet MS', sans-serif;">This unprepared, extemporaneous speech was delivered in the Fall of 2010 in Grand Rapids at the International Conference on Sustainability: Energy, Economy, Environment. It followed Nicole Foss's talk (embedded below) on how she prepared her family for peak oil and economic uncertainty.</span><br />
<iframe allowfullscreen="" frameborder="0" height="284" src="http://www.youtube.com/embed/ySydk4R77po" width="500"></iframe><br />
<div><span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><br />
</span></div><span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">"As a system of design, Permaculture provides a new vocabulary and pattern language for observation and action, attention and listening, that empowers people to co-design homes, neighborhoods, and communities full of truly abundant food, energy, habitat, water, income, and yields enough to share." - Keith Johnson<br />
<br />
Educator Peter Bane is preparing for the local future, beyond the global economy and post peak oil. Bane's talk is the story of the history of permaculture, and how he has used permaculture methods to move towards a self-sustaining homestead using free or low-cost techniques.<br />
<br />
Peter Bane has published the Permaculture Activist Magazine since 1990. He is a garden farmer with Keith Johnson in Bloomington, Indiana, where they teach permaculture design at Indiana University and elsewhere.. Peter has a bachelors from University in Illinois in political design and a diploma in permaculture design from the British Academy of Permculture design. He served on the peak oil task force for the City of Bloomington, Indiana, which was adopted in 2009 December and has recently finished working on The Permaculture Handbook: Garden Farming for Town and Country.<br />
<br />
In this talk, Bane describes, in his own words, how he is moving beyond the money economy, to providing his essential needs from his homestead, and how he is utilizing the principles of permaculture.<br />
<br />
Recorded at the International Conference on Sustainability: Energy, Economy, Environment 2010 hosted by <a href="http://localfuture.org/" target="_blank">Local Future</a> and directed by Aaron Wissner.</span><br />
<div><span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><br />
</span></div><br />
<iframe allowfullscreen="" frameborder="0" height="284" src="http://www.youtube.com/embed/ESYAix1QD1E" width="500"></iframe><br />
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><br />
</span><br />
<a href="http://www.energybulletin.net/stories/2011-10-11/how-i-prepared-my-family-peak-oil-nicole-foss"><span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">http://www.energybulletin.net/stories/2011-10-11/how-i-prepared-my-family-peak-oil-nicole-foss</span></a><div class="blogger-post-footer">http://kjpermaculture.blogspot.com/feeds/posts/default
<p id="blogfeeds"><$BlogFeedsVertical$></p>
<p id="postfeeds"><$BlogItemFeedLinks$></p></div>Anonymoushttp://www.blogger.com/profile/03009370115428649864noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-439180943121365896.post-58052148544852183322012-02-01T16:51:00.000-05:002012-02-01T16:51:38.941-05:00Practical Post Scarcity by Open Source Ecology<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">This trio of video treats is re-evolutionary.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><a href="http://opensourceecology.org/wiki/Crash_Course" style="background-color: white; border-bottom-width: 0px; border-color: initial; border-image: initial; border-left-width: 0px; border-right-width: 0px; border-style: initial; border-top-width: 0px; color: #0066cc; font-size: 16px; line-height: 24px; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px; padding-bottom: 0px; padding-left: 0px; padding-right: 0px; padding-top: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;">Open Source Ecology</a><span style="background-color: white; color: #222222; font-size: 16px; line-height: 24px;"> is a network of farmers, engineers, and supporters that for the last two years has been creating the </span><a href="http://opensourceecology.org/gvcs.php" style="background-color: white; border-bottom-width: 0px; border-color: initial; border-image: initial; border-left-width: 0px; border-right-width: 0px; border-style: initial; border-top-width: 0px; color: #0099ff; font-size: 16px; line-height: 24px; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px; padding-bottom: 0px; padding-left: 0px; padding-right: 0px; padding-top: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;">Global Village Construction Set</a><span style="background-color: white; color: #222222; font-size: 16px; line-height: 24px;">, an open source, low-cost, high performance technological platform that allows for the easy, DIY fabrication of the 50 different Industrial Machines that it takes to build a sustainable civilization with modern comforts. The GVCS lowers the barriers to entry into </span><a href="http://opensourceecology.org/wiki/Category:Food_and_Agriculture" style="background-color: white; border-bottom-width: 0px; border-color: initial; border-image: initial; border-left-width: 0px; border-right-width: 0px; border-style: initial; border-top-width: 0px; color: #0066cc; font-size: 16px; line-height: 24px; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px; padding-bottom: 0px; padding-left: 0px; padding-right: 0px; padding-top: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;">farming</a><span style="background-color: white; color: #222222; font-size: 16px; line-height: 24px;">, </span><a href="http://opensourceecology.org/wiki/Category:Housing_and_construction" style="background-color: white; border-bottom-width: 0px; border-color: initial; border-image: initial; border-left-width: 0px; border-right-width: 0px; border-style: initial; border-top-width: 0px; color: #0066cc; font-size: 16px; line-height: 24px; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px; padding-bottom: 0px; padding-left: 0px; padding-right: 0px; padding-top: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;">building</a><span style="background-color: white; color: #222222; font-size: 16px; line-height: 24px;">, and </span><a href="http://opensourceecology.org/wiki/Category:Digital_Fabrication" style="background-color: white; border-bottom-width: 0px; border-color: initial; border-image: initial; border-left-width: 0px; border-right-width: 0px; border-style: initial; border-top-width: 0px; color: #0066cc; font-size: 16px; line-height: 24px; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px; padding-bottom: 0px; padding-left: 0px; padding-right: 0px; padding-top: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;">manufacturing</a><span style="background-color: white; color: #222222; font-size: 16px; line-height: 24px;"> and </span><a href="http://opensourceecology.org/wiki/Key_Features_of_the_GVCS" style="background-color: white; border-bottom-width: 0px; border-color: initial; border-image: initial; border-left-width: 0px; border-right-width: 0px; border-style: initial; border-top-width: 0px; color: #0066cc; font-size: 16px; line-height: 24px; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px; padding-bottom: 0px; padding-left: 0px; padding-right: 0px; padding-top: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;">can be seen as</a><span style="background-color: white; color: #222222; font-size: 16px; line-height: 24px;"> a life-size lego-like set of modular tools that can create entire</span><a href="http://opensourceecology.org/wiki/Economic_Potential_of_Local_Building_Materials" style="background-color: white; border-bottom-width: 0px; border-color: initial; border-image: initial; border-left-width: 0px; border-right-width: 0px; border-style: initial; border-top-width: 0px; color: #0066cc; font-size: 16px; line-height: 24px; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px; padding-bottom: 0px; padding-left: 0px; padding-right: 0px; padding-top: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;">economies</a><span style="background-color: white; color: #222222; font-size: 16px; line-height: 24px;">, whether in rural Missouri, where the project was founded, in urban redevelopment, or in the developing world.</span></span> <br />
<iframe allowfullscreen="" frameborder="0" height="225" mozallowfullscreen="" src="http://player.vimeo.com/video/33701676?title=0&byline=0&portrait=0" webkitallowfullscreen="" width="400"></iframe><br />
<a href="http://vimeo.com/33701676">Practical Post Scarcity</a> from <a href="http://vimeo.com/opensourceecology">Open Source Ecology</a> on <a href="http://vimeo.com/">Vimeo</a>.<br />
<br />
<iframe allowfullscreen="" frameborder="0" height="284" src="http://www.youtube.com/embed/wbqC8zm7Hyg" width="500"></iframe><br />
<br />
<iframe allowfullscreen="" frameborder="0" height="284" src="http://www.youtube.com/embed/zIsHKrP-66s" width="500"></iframe><div class="blogger-post-footer">http://kjpermaculture.blogspot.com/feeds/posts/default
<p id="blogfeeds"><$BlogFeedsVertical$></p>
<p id="postfeeds"><$BlogItemFeedLinks$></p></div>Anonymoushttp://www.blogger.com/profile/03009370115428649864noreply@blogger.com1