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Tag: farming

Why Vegan? Because Every Death Is a Tragedy

Despite the big numbers, the awfulness of statistics of farmed and slaughtered animals is a matter of flesh and blood—an inescapable onslaught of pain, suffering, and thoughtlessness. The statistics become terrible every single day, whether we are standing in the midst of a slaughterhouse, or walking down a grocery store aisle, or watching a fast-food commercial on television.

Harvesting Justice 19: “The Revolution is Going to be Fought With The Hoe”- Agriculture and Environment in New Mexico

Miguel Santistevan and his partner Margarita García are helping youth reclaim knowledge about traditions behind lands and waters. Sol Feliz Farm, Miguel’s grandfather’s house east of Taos, is an acre of spiral gardens, rock gardens, and straight rows. The farm’s Agriculture Implementation Research and Education (AIRE) project is capturing the imagination of an impassioned group of youth in northern New Mexico.

Harvesting Justice #5: Uprooting Racism in the Food System – African Americans Organize

A shovel overturned can flip so much more than soil, worms, and weeds. Structural racism – the ways in which social systems and institutions promote and perpetuate the oppression of people of color – manifests at all points in the food system. It emerges as barriers to land ownership and credit access for farmers of color, as wage discrimination and poor working conditions for food and farmworkers of color, and as lack of healthy food in neighborhoods of color. It shows up as discrimination in housing, employment, redlining, and other elements which impact food access and food justice.

World in Serious Trouble on Food Front

The world was hoping for a good U.S. harvest to replenish dangerously low grain stocks; this is no longer in the cards because of this Summer’s extreme weather. World carryover stocks of grain will fall further at the end of this crop year, making the food situation even more precarious. Food prices, already elevated, will follow the price of corn upward, quite possibly to record highs.

Limited Encouragement In The Latest Update Of The FAO Food Price Index

Yesterday, the Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO) of the United Nations released it’s monthly update on global food trade pricing. The overall “Food Price Index” that combines all categories did decline slightly, but less than the previous month. The index is still substantially higher than it was at a comparable period during the last cycle.

Aflatoxin: A Toxic Potential of Climate Change

One of the most toxic and carcinogenic threats in the human food supply is a natural chemical called “aflatoxin”; the chance that it will contaminate a crop is enhanced by drought and/or insect damage – both conditions expected to be more common with the onset of climate change.