Food and Climate Change

The most interesting area in my line of research that’s been occurring recently is the link between Climate and Food. This is actually the main direction of Anna Lappe’s Organization, Take a Bite, and has been a subject of my former work in the US and Costa Rica (See some of my work on the subject: Coffee and Carbon Footprint of Farms, Life Cycle abstract). It’s something that I’ve been working on for a long period, and is finally coming into it’s element. I will be working to make sure this makes it into climate change legislation. It’s a pretty serious link of the Climate Crisis puzzle, as we currently emit almost a third of global emissions based on food, putting a price on carbon would make it more sustainable in other areas too. Unfortunately it’s marred in bad lobbyists and the corporate profit motive of farmers, but Climate Change is working with sustainability is working with popular morality here. If Carbon gets a value, it’s going to be another progressive (benefits the poor) incentive to care for the earth using organic management and planting trees.

It does not eliminate all emissions from fossil fuels (but agriculture does consume a lot of fuel). Only alternative energy can do that. But alternative energy does not help the rural poor immediately. Sustainable land management payments do. Sustainable farming can appear difficult to implement, especially for large farmers, because it has to be democratic and fair and can take some time. It is a resilient way of producing many kinds of food, but does not rely on fossil fuel instead growing plants on sun and human energy, which costs less. It can store much more carbon in soil using no-till and biochar and in the trees, which for coffee especially was a huge benefit (life is made of Carbon!). For an accounting of the specific norms of transition benefit, please see my research in the projects page (right).

Organic farmers are sequestering 2 tons of Carbon per acre using sustainable techniques. The Rodale Institute argues that if all currently tilled land were managed sustainably, the amount of reduced emissions and increased storage could equal 40% of our current emissions. Cheaply, and with existing technology. No other solution can offer that so far. (Fantastic source: http://www.rodaleinstitute.org/Bowman/20090213) Carbon stored in soils has been proven to be the most resilient and long-lasting change known. Carbon in trees is safe except by fire, and doesn’t get emitted even if you use it for furniture or a house. It’s a win-win solution, just involves maintaining trees.

Also organic farming also brings desirable benefits like improved ecosystems and rural livelihoods. For example, trees on farms (agroforestry) also offer an alternative source of income when they’re big enough to be cut into furniture or house repair. Practical, nice for the farmers, but climate activists need something that promises global reform. Climate policy cannot afford to include right now these side benefits, especially when the perils of climate change are already being felt. For activists who are interested in food and climate: something must be done about getting trees planted before we can talk to legislators about valuing the lifestyle benefits of organic and no-till farming (talk to the public about that).

To summarize, we worry about climate change because it affects thee well-being of people and wildlife. Solutions based on alternative energy, carbon storage and capture, etc. can prevent climate change, but it cannot provide immediate relief to the poor or habitat for the displaced wildlife. Sustainable land management, on the other hand, directly solves the emissions aspect of climate change, while incentivizes good care for the environment.

As always the best thing about food is that it’s a personal decision you can support that gives you better health, patience, appreciation, and enjoyment of life. See my related post for the Small Planet Institute about the Real Food Challenge, coming soon! Also see Anna Lappe’s Take a Bite site specializing on this, or my own Food Around Boston page.

Impact numbers of CO2e/kg, Organic transition, and references:

The community reality

It is a great time to be alive and thinking about things (observing changes). Now is really a tipping point for technology, community-led social change, and world progress in an economic sense. In this post I explain some of the projects I have found myself in here, and how they fit into a bigger picture. You know Agua Buena from my last post and [this link], now here is the present situation.

Julio

Check out the crazy new format! Inspired by twitter (follow me: http://twitter.com/eddiemill/), let me know what you think of it. Do you have time to read long posts?

Today’s post is about Julio, the man with the most beautiful farm in the world, my good friend and co-founder of a model farm that will change the world.

Change to the masses

Social systems are very interesting to me.

When we look at society, ecosystems, or our planet on a systems scale, it appears to be resilient, stable. In general, large systems are averse to change, and we’re happy to assume things to be constant. But every so often, catastrophic transformations take place in a very quick time period. Ecosystem collapse builds on itself, and suddenly total species live in a world completely foreign to them. Coral reefs may be going through a mass extinction from climate change within the next few months, as algae are suddenly multiplying thousandfold in the warmer water. If these “rainforests of the ocean” are coming to terms with large tipping points in their lives, what does that mean for the human environment 4 degrees warmer?

I believe that social systems are the same way. If you consider it, the bloom of algae happens once conditions exist for them to prosper. It’s not complex, it’s really simple. The old status quo (old-world economic systems) rely on the same nutrients (resource surplus) being there, and cannot backtrack nor adjust to new realities. The discipline now faces hard issues like backwards-incorporating ecological realities, social equality, or generational risk. While the bottom-liners turn a blind eye, these are the issues we must deal with! And that means the rules of the game have to change. Cultures don’t cut back on their own: As in the barrier reef, new conditions bring organisms to either adapt to the new conditions and multiply, or die with this global crisis, and good riddance. *Obama’s election means that overall this evolution will be positive.*

Socio-economic change: each person [and company] responding to new opportunities in a predictable way brings about systemic, evolutionary-level change.

Now I’m not saying that losing a reef is a good thing, it’s actually quite terrible to see things go and hurts a lot of people. But the example can be a good model for the one thing that can spread like bacteria: human word-of-mouth. Once a new reality emerges, there’s surprisingly little holding the former winners in place. What does this mean? Now will be the time when people question the validity of long-standing military-industrial-government rule, and now we finally have choice in what lives and dies. Even a small preference, shared over dinner/conversation/the web can become a huge impact. During a recession, climate meltdown, internet revolution and world political change following Obama’s inauguration, my bet is on the peasants to make out alive. The silent masses will have a say in the new world order.

For small farmers, why submit to the hierarchy traditionally imposed on you if you can become a natural farmer and change your family, your country and homeland? The answer is often that they haven’t had the choice. If a few leading industries can now make it possible for everyone to be a part of a new worldview, the system will follow. Enough people on the supply and demand side can create a new equilibrium that is more peaceful, sustainable and just.

Change to the masses: it’s coming in more ways than you think.

-Eddie Miller
http://eddiemill.wordpress.com/

International assessment on Agriculture Knowledge, Science, Technology and Sustainability

This changes everything.

This April, an independent project involving over 400 full-time researchers and 58 countries published a report. The full scope of the report is enormous, but you can view the summary here:
http://www.agassessment.org/docs/SR_Exec_Sum_280508_English.pdf

Some excerpts, which may echo well with what I’ve been saying here. (In fact the same thing that I observed from the farm 3 years ago, and have since dedicated my life to preaching…)