http://www.nationofchange.org/farmers-go-wild-1328632147
…The words “wild” and “farming” may seem at odds. In the last century, with the development of petroleum-based pesticides, herbicides, and fertilizers, farms were increasingly modeled on industry. “Fencerow to fencerow,” mono-crop farming emphasized high production and minimized the importance of biodiversity. Farmers ripped out vegetation, cut down forests, shot predators, and filled in wetlands and streams. Today, agriculture is a major cause of the habitat loss that puts endangered species at risk.
Practitioners of wild farming, also called conservation-based agriculture, seek to reverse industrial agriculture’s devastating effects on wildlife by adopting farming methods that support nature. They envision a landscape where farms meld into the environment and mimic the natural processes that surround them. If wild farming sounds like organic farming, that’s because both are based on a similar vision: that farms should be managed as natural systems. Most wild farmers employ organic practices, like nontoxic pest management, composting, and crop rotation, all of which encourage biodiversity…(more)…
Filed under: Ecology, Environment, Food & Diet, Gardening, Health on February 8th, 2012 | No Comments »
http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-europe-10942618?utm_source=Ode+Newsletters&utm_campaign=6596892879-daily-rss&utm_medium=email
By Hugh SchofieldBBC News, Paris
A private honey store is now de rigueur for some top hotels and restaurantsTourists are not the only ones swarming down the Champs-Elysees and through the Luxembourg gardens this summer. Thanks to a renewed interest in apiaries, Paris is fast becoming the urban bee-keeping capital of the world.
The city now boasts some 400 hives and the number is growing steadily. Some are on the balconies of family apartments, others in public parks or on the roofs of famous buildings…
…Driving the trend is growing public awareness of the crisis in rural bee-keeping caused by the collapse in bee numbers. Oddly, city bees are not just immune to the health problems facing their country cousins – they are also far more productive…(more)…
Filed under: Ecology, Environment, Food & Diet, Gardening, Technology on February 3rd, 2012 | No Comments »
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 Jessica Reeder, News Analysis: What do coffee growers in Ethiopia, hardware store owners in America, and Basque entrepreneurs have in common? For one thing, many of them belong to cooperatives. By pooling their money and resources, and voting democratically on how those resources will be used, they can compete in business and reinvest the benefits in their communities.
The United Nations has named 2012 as the International Year of Cooperatives, and indeed, co-ops seem poised to become a dominant business model around the world. Today, nearly one billion people worldwide are cooperative member-owners. That’s one in five adults over 15 — and it could soon be you…(more)… |
Filed under: Ecology, Food & Diet, Gardening, Money, Technology on February 2nd, 2012 | No Comments »
http://www.cnn.com/2012/01/30/world/europe/green-wall-clean-air/index.html
London (CNN) – Vertical gardens are cropping up all over cities these days, transforming drab urban facades into vibrant jungles of color.
These lush expanses have found their way onto the walls — both inside and out — on numerous sites in recent years revitalizingpublic buildings, hotels, offices and even a multi-storey car park in Netherlands.
Aside from their pleasing aesthetic qualities, vertical gardens could also deliver more practical benefits says Mark Laurence, creative director at Biotecture, a UK company who design and build green walls….(more)…
Filed under: Ecology, Environment, Food & Diet, Gardening, Technology on February 2nd, 2012 | No Comments »
http://www.cnn.com/video/#/video/world/2012/01/29/eco-solutions-indonesia-bamboo.cnn
Sustainability in a bamboo
cathedral
CNN|Added on January 29, 2012CNN’s Anna Coren looks at the advantages of sustainable building materials and agricultural products.
One of the world’s largest bamboo structures is home to an eco-friendly, fair trade cocoa facility. (See link for video)
Filed under: Ecology, Environment, Food & Diet, Gardening, Technology on February 2nd, 2012 | No Comments »
http://www.nytimes.com/2009/07/05/magazine/05allen-t.html?pagewanted=all
By ELIZABETH ROYTE
Published: July 1, 2009
Will Allen, a farmer of Bunyonesque proportions, ascended a berm of wood chips and brewer’s mash and gently probed it with a pitchfork. “Look at this,” he said, pleased with the treasure he unearthed. A writhing mass of red worms dangled from his tines. He bent over, raked another section with his fingers and palmed a few beauties.
…Show Allen a pile of soil, fully composted or still slimy with banana peels, and he’s compelled to scoop some into his melon-size hands. “Creating soil from waste is what I enjoy most,” he said. “Anyone can grow food”…
…Uncannily, Allen makes such efforts sound simple — fun even. When he mentions that animal waste attracts soldier flies, whose larvae make terrific fish and chicken feed, a dozen people start imagining that growing grubs in buckets of manure might be a good project for them too. “Will has a way of persuading people to do things,” Robert Pierce, a farmer in Madison, Wis., told me. “There’s a spirit in how he says things; you want to be part of his community”…(more)…
Filed under: Ecology, Environment, Food & Diet, Gardening, Health on January 23rd, 2012 | No Comments »
http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?f=/c/a/2012/01/10/BUTI1MNFD7.DTL
Think of the pickup truck from Via Motors as an electric generator on wheels. The truck, unveiled Tuesday at the North American International Auto Show in Detroit, runs on electricity. But it also can supply electricity – enough to power whole houses….
…To illustrate the point, Pruett fired up a circular saw plugged into one of Via’s trucks. ”If you’re a contractor, think about rolling to a work site and being able to plug that into your vehicle and run it off your truck all day long,” Pruett said….
…Each Via truck has saved PG&E about $2,700 per year in fuel costs, when compared with a conventional pickup, Pruett said. The utility has about 3,500 similar vehicles in its fleet, and converting all of them would save PG&E about $9.5 million each year. The trucks, Pruett said, also require far less maintenance than their gasoline-powered peers….(more)…
Filed under: Environment, Technology on January 23rd, 2012 | No Comments »
http://www.nationofchange.org/farmers-everywhere-small-still-beautiful-1326898695
There is battle raging across the world over who can better feed its people: small-scale farmers practicing sustainable agriculture, or giant agribusinesses using chemical fertilizers and pesticides.
It was small-scale organic farmers growing rice for themselves and local markets in the Philippines who first convinced us that they could feed both their communities and their country. Part of what convinced us was simple economics: These farmers demonstrated substantial immediate savings from eliminating chemical inputs while, within a few harvests—if not immediately—their yields were close to or above their previous harvests. From these farmers, we also learned of the health and environmental benefits from this shift….(more)…
Filed under: Ecology, Environment, Food & Diet, Gardening, Health, Technology on January 23rd, 2012 | No Comments »
http://wwwp.dailyclimate.org/tdc-newsroom/2012/01/green-cement
By Miranda C. Spencer Jan. 23, 2012
PHILADELPHIA – The source of 5 percent of global carbon dioxide emissions is hiding in plain sight, in the sidewalk beneath our feet. It is cement, a key ingredient of concrete, the most widely used building material on the planet. And manufacturing conventional “Portland” cement releases nearly a ton of the greenhouse gas for every ton produced – some 3 billion tons in 2010.
And that figure is about to balloon….
…Such “alkali activated” cements are one of the most promising alternatives to Portland cement, the IEA notes, in part because they rely on ubiquitous materials such as industrial waste.
Tests showed that the Drexel duo’s cement is as durable as Portland but emits 95 percent less CO2. “You’ve found a way to bake bread without the oven,” Moseson said one impressed investor remarked. That energy-saving trick means this cement could cost about 50 percent less to produce, according to their calculations.
Alkali-activated cements are not new. Research suggests that ancient Egyptians used a lime-based concrete to build the Pyramids, and industry has been trying to develop practical versions since the 1950s…(more)…
Filed under: Ecology, Environment, Technology on January 23rd, 2012 | No Comments »
http://www.treehugger.com/corporate-responsibility/patagonia-becomes-california-benefit-corporation.html
On the first day that California-based companies could change their corporate status to become a Benefit Corporation, TreeHugger Person of the Year 2011-nominated Patagonia further put its principles into practice, reregistering yesterday morning with a new, greener, socially-aware corporate status.
Though a number of other corps (the full list is below) took advantage of the new corporate status in California—passed into law last October and coming into effect on Jan. 1—Patagonia is perhaps the most vocal of the group….
What’s A Benefit Corporation?
As for Benefit Corporation itself, there are three prime directives: It has to 1) create a material positive impact on society and the environment, 2) expand fiduciary duty to require consideration of non-financial interests when making decisions, and 3) report on its overall social and environmental performance using recognized third party standards….
Filed under: Ecology, Money on January 7th, 2012 | No Comments »