Now that we have baked our cookies and trimmed our trees,now that we have wrapped our gifts and planned our dinners,now that we have hung stockings, sent greetings and set tables,assembled toys, trimmed wicks, written Santa and hung wreaths,the time has come to abandon it all,if only for a moment.Hallelujah…
Going through my email this morning turned up the latest from farm policy. White House has laid out a graphic there that speaks loads about the disconnect between reality and what should be our Subsidy in this country... I was really inspired by the diversity and nutritiousness of the crops…
Reading Mark Bittman's blog this morning I saw this lead-in to a link I had to follow: Here’s the thing. A lot of stuff isn’t directly about food, but TB – that’s tuberculosis – is becoming, has become, antibiotic-resistant. And a lot of antibiotic resistance may be because there are…
RALEIGH, N.C. – For the past three years, American consumers have been on a shopping diet. They cut nonessentials from their shopping lists. They’ve made do. They’ve thought twice before buying. And yet, they’ve continued to open their wallets for natural and organic products. via Recession-racked shoppers still spend on…
Another reason to change our methods... A ground beef recall for more than 545,699 pounds of meat has been expanded to states from North Carolina to Maine on fears of E. coli contamination. Fairbanks Farms of Ashville, N.Y., expanded the recall on Monday for ground beef produced between Sept. 14…
To a rancher like me, who raises cattle, goats and turkeys the traditional way (on grass), the studies show only that the prevailing methods of producing meat — that is, crowding animals together in factory farms, storing their waste in giant lagoons and cutting down forests to grow crops to feed them — cause substantial greenhouse gases. It could be, in fact, that a conscientious meat eater may have a more environmentally friendly diet than your average vegetarian.
Eating a hamburger should not be a death-defying experience. Too often it is. via Editorial - Toxic Hamburgers - NYTimes.com. This is where Food Policy and Health Policy come together. And the American people get taken for a ride by the corporate penny pinching policies and the lack of enforcement…
I grew up with a strong support for the power of technology...But the abuses perpetrated in the name of technological advancement of agriculture in the past few decades have left a foul taste in my mouth. It appears I share that distaste wit Verlyn Klinkenborg... There is no disputing the…
Something I keep pushing in the healthcare reform debate...Agriculture is key to real reform. Recently a team of designers from M.I.T. and Columbia was asked by the foundation of the insurer UnitedHealthcare to develop an innovative systems approach to tackling childhood obesity in America. Their conclusion surprised the designers as…
Nicholas Kristof, writing in his column, had what I think is probably the best definition I have ever seen of the state of our agriculture... I think I figured out the central problem with modern industrial agriculture. It’s not just that it produces unhealthy food, mishandles waste and overuses antibiotics…
I have been incredibly blessed to be able to combine this love of calloused hands with dramatic and verbal skills. And that is why I promote direct marketing. Too often parents whose children express an interest in farming squelch it because they envision dirt, dust, poverty, and hermit living. But…
I saw Patry's post about the medicinal use of red wine in the treatment of influenza... Patry Francis Red wine may prevent swine flu, which is the absolute only reason I drink it. http://www.anotherwineblog.com/archives/4253 I checked my stock and decided I needed to make a "medicine" run...Off to Spec's we…
Just recently, the small-business boogeyman came up in the debate over the estate tax -- specifically, whether it is unfair to impose a tax on estates in excess of $7 million per couple (the level this year) or whether the first $10 million of every estate should be exempt from…
I know we are all holding out great hopes for biofuels, but these nagging pieces keep showing up in the papers... The False Hope of Biofuels: "Biofuels such as ethanol made from corn, sugar cane, switchgrass and other crops are being touted as a 'green' solution for a large part…
Here's another article on the sustainable foods culture. The tie is to the book by Michael Pollan, The Omnivore's Dilemma. Looks like another trip to the booksellers for me. Everthing I keep reading about "Omnivore" makes me want to check out the book. Common Ground: The Shortest Food Chain: "In the…
It looks like if there is a common thread running through recent posts it is the idea of buying local. My concern was originally in the way of food. I feel a bit leery of the commercialization of the organic movement. Call me a “Luddite” but when the big Agri-Business…
'Organic' Loses Its Freshness: Until recently, organic practices were sneered at by those in academia, in government and in chemical agribusiness -- now called 'conventional agriculture.' Thanks to a fast-growing demand for organic food, the sneers are now reserved for those who practice organics on a small scale. Long accustomed…
