Around 1300 c.e. the Yao and Zhuang people of Guangdong Province in Southern China faced a serious problem. In the Longsheng area there was a growing population, but their mountainous surroundings gave them very little land that could be used for farming. They needed more food and so they turned to technology for the solution. What they did was to terrace their mountainsides even up to slopes of 45%. I’m sure that the method was perfected over the 400 years of building. What they were able to do is still an impressive example of civil engineering, even today. Using stones and mud they built terrace walls that stand firm even with the torrential downpours that are common in the area. They used bamboo piping to distribute water to each paddy - some so narrow that they only have room for two rows of rice. This production system has remained productive for centuries when many other contemporary farming societies around the world simply depleted one area and moved on to the next. These terraces are called Longji, or the ”Dragon’s Spine” and they now extend over 66 square kilometers. They are both beautiful and inspiring.
The large-scale Organic dairy cooperative, “Organic Valley” has just sunk to a new low in the practice of “I will market against my farmer neighbors by stoking consumer’s fears.” They announced that they have launched an on-line calculator that is supposed to show you how much pesticide and fertilizer use is avoided when you buy their products. The news release essentially boils down to the message, “buy our products or you will probably die!” It also essentially accuses the 97.5% of us who don’t buy Organic of destroying the planet.
When talking about pesticides the press report says: “For adults, exposure through diet has been linked to infertility, Parkinson’s, testicular cancer, birth defects and much more. More than one million children in America age five and under ingest at least 15 pesticides daily. Early exposures are suspected in the sharp rise in health problems including autism, obesity, asthma, brain cancer and other childhood cancers.” This broad-brush assertion is misleading on so many levels that it is hard to know where to start. I’m not saying that there have never been any health issues with any pesticide anywhere, but we also have sufficient food in part because of pesticides. Though many people don’t know it, there are pesticides used on organic crops as well. Actually, the EPA has done a very good job of regulating pesticide use over the years so that people don’t need to be frightened about their food.
I need to be very careful in what I say about this topic because it would be easy to scare people beyond what is rational. I could also also easily make enemies in the Wheat industry which is about the last thing I’d like to do. I’m going to try to hit the right balance, but it is risky.
Mycotoxins
Most people don’t know that Mycotoxins are a very real issue in our food supply. These are nasty, natural chemicals that are produced by certain fungi that infect crops. This is not something new. In Medieval times there was a wide-spread neurological disorder called “Ergotism.” It was caused by mycotoxins in the rye crop produced by a disease called “ergot.” The poor people who lived off of rye, rather than wheat, were disproportionately effected.
Mycotoxins are still an issue today. 2009 has been a particularly bad year for a toxin called “vomitoxin” in wheat, barley and pasta wheat. Its not a secret, but unless you read the farm press or trade news, you would never know. Sometime do a Google News search for “vomitoxin.” If there is rain when these grains are flowering, they can become infected with a fungus calledFusarium graminierum. The disease starts by reducing the farmer’s yields, but it can also produce a toxin in the remaining grain called deoxynivalenol (more commonly called DON toxin). The trade term, “vomitoxin,” comes from the physical response that animals have if they are fed too much of this contaminated grain (which is obviously not pretty).
Dr. Norman Borlaug passed away this weekend at 95. He left behind an amazing legacy of contribution to humanity. It is likely that he saved more human lives than any other person in history. He did it by developing far more productive wheat than had ever been grown. His “short stature” wheat had shorter, thicker stems so that it could hold bigger heads of grain that would otherwise “lodge” (collapse over on to the ground where it can’t be harvested). It was also resistant to the devastating wheat disease called “Stem Rust.” This wheat ended up feeding millions of people around the world, particularly in Pakistan and India in the 1960s. Borlaug’s breakthrough was a key part of the “Green Revolution” and it did much to address the hunger and poverty issues of the time. For this, and his life-time of additional work Bourlag recieved the Nobel Peace Prize, the Presidential Medal of Freedom and the Congressional Gold Metal . Only Martin Luther King, Elie Wiesel, Nelson Mandela and Mother Teresa have received all of these commendations. He was also awarded the National Medal of Science and a host of other awards from around the world. There is an excellent article about the life and career of this remarkable man in the Des Moines Register.
This post was originally published on Eco-Libris blog on September 5.
On August 19 Cleantech Group published a report that was supposed to put an end to an ongoing debate on the question if the Kindle and other e-readers are actually greener than physical books. The release’s title was “E-readers a win for carbon emissions.”
It was supposed to be the life cycle analysis many people, including myself were waiting for. I have to admit I was very excited to read about it as we follow this debate for a long time. I decided to read it and see if this is really it. If it’s really over.
The report, entitled ‘The Environmental Impact of Amazon’s Kindle’ was written by senior reporter Emma Ritch. I read the executive brief (7-page long) and was happy to find a well-written analysis that integrates many pieces of information that together create a more coherent picture. At the same time I wasn’t that sure about the validity of the findings.
There were two main issues that bothered me mostly: the carbon footprint of a single Kindle and the assumption about the number of e-books the average user is reading. As you’ll see these are important factors in the analysis and have significant influence on the findings.
Here are my thoughts about them in more details:
1. What’s the carbon footprint of a single Kindle?
This is an important part of the analysis - you can’t have a comparison between physical books and the Kindle without this figure. But fortunately the report has it: “…the second-generation Kindle represents the same emissions as 15 books bought in person or 30 purchased online. That would yield a range of between 60.2 to 306 kg of CO2, or an average of 167.78 kg of CO2 during its lifespan.”
There was a scholarly article published late last year by Dr. Robert Paarlberg entitled “The Ethics of Modern Agriculture.” I would encourage anyone concerned about both the environment and about feeding people to read it. It raises some important questions about the ethics of even well intentioned anti-technology activism.
Paarlberg is a professor at Wellesley and also an associate at the Weatherhead Center for International Affairs at Harvard. He has no ties to agricultural interests or technology companies, but he has spent a lot of time thinking about the ethics of opposition to technologies that could help feed the poor people of the world. His book “Starved for Science” is a detailed review of how the precautionary principle thinking of the rich countries (particularly in Europe) has largely kept agricultural technologies out of Africa including ones that would help feed poor people there.
If you picture a grain farmer out tending a field, you might imagine someone sitting on the metal seat of a tractor like the one in the picture above, moving slowly across a field - perhaps the farmer has a straw hat. That image seems attractive as long as you are not the farmer. Fortunately, this isn’t the real situation in the developed world or we wouldn’t get anyone in our rapidly aging population to do full-time farming on the multiple thousand-acre farms that are typical of a modern, Midwestern family farm.
Today, a progressive farmer will typically be working in an enclosed, air-conditioned cab with surround sound, a cell phone, and an internet connection for tracking commodity futures or catching up on email. Increasingly, the tractor is driving itself by computer and GPS except for occasional intervention. I’ve carried on a number of protracted interviews with farmers who were in just this setting. I know one farmer that ran much of his state senate campaign from a tractor or combine. These new, sophisticated, farm vehicles are not just about keeping the farmer comfortable and multi-tasking. They are important tools for making farming more sustainable.
Sean Daily, Green Living Ideas’ Editor-in-Chief, talks with Chris Page, Director of Climate and Energy Strategy of Yahoo! Green, about new Yahoo! announcements, the corporation’s commitment to carbon neutrality, and the specifics of achieving neutrality on a corporate level through carbon projects and third party certification.
Sean Daily, Green Living Ideas’ Editor-in-Chief, discusses current trends and future developments in the solar technology industry with Dan Thompson, Founder and CEO of SPG Solar.
Host Sean Daily talks about conserving paper and document management as strategies for combating paper addiction in the office with Renee Thomas, Director of Americas Field Marketing for Esker.
Since July 2003, sustainablog has been providing information on environmental and economic sustainability, green and sustainable business, and environmental politics. The blog regularly features environmental leaders, experts in alternative energy and green technology, and real people trying to lighten their environmental footprints.
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