Jim Offner writes in The Packer,
“Buy local” is gaining prominence in the potato and onion businesses, according to marketing strategists.
“Buy local is an important piece that our industry participates heavily in,” said Tim O’Connor, chief executive officer of the Denver-based U.S. Potato Board. “There’s a lot of effort there. I see it used real well by retailers.”
Of course, the strategy comes with a natural impediment, O’Connor said.
“The challenge is it’s seasonal,” he said. “If a retailer in New York wants to feature New York-grown potatoes, they have a window they’re available (and) then they have to get them from somebody else. So it’s heavily used but is very seasonal in most markets.”
To read the rest of the story, click HERE.
Naomi Starkman reports on CivilEast.com,
Consumer Reports’ latest tests of canned foods, including soups, juice, tuna, and green beans, have found that almost all of the 19 name-brand foods tested contain measurable levels of Bisphenol A (BPA). The results are reported in the December 2009 issue and also available online. BPA, which has been used for years in clear plastic bottles and food-can liners, has been restricted in Canada and some U.S. states and municipalities because it has been linked to a wide array of health effects including reproductive abnormalities, heightened risk of breast and prostate cancers, diabetes, and heart disease.
After this year’s resurgence of the home veggie food garden, maybe next year’s trend should be home canning of the harvest from those gardens. Click HERE to read Starkman’s article on BPA in canned foods.
Photo credit: ConsumerReports.org
The movie Food, Inc. was released this week on DVD (and is probably available at your local or chain movie rental store.) Click HERE to find out how you can win one of the ten free copies of the movie that the producers are giving away to celebrate the release of the movie on DVD.
In 1973, I saw somebody on the Tonight Show with Johnny Carson expound on the health benefits of being a vegetarian. At that moment I became one myself. I haven’t eaten red meat since that time, but as my kids grew out of toddlerhood, we as a family started eating fish and chicken. Hence, I am a “beady eye vegetarian.” Still no red meat since 1973. So I can relate to this article…
Finlo Rohrer writes in BBC News Magazine,
Vegetarianism used to be simple – its protagonists foreswore the flesh of any dead animal. Today there are “veggies” who eat fish, and people who eat no meat but don’t call themselves vegetarians. What happened?
The conversation usually goes something a bit like this:
“Yeah, I’m a vegetarian.”
“But that looks like fish you’re eating.”
“Oh yeah, I eat fish.”
Confusion, perplexity and occasionally heated debate can follow as the “vegetarian” and their interrogator cover the issue of what is an animal and whether fish feel pain.
To read the whole story, click HERE.
Photo credit: BBC News Magazine
The editors of The New York Times write,
With food prices remaining high in developing countries, the United Nations estimates that the number of hungry people around the world could increase by 100 million in 2009 and pass the one billion mark. A summit of world leaders in Rome scheduled for November will set an agenda for ways to reduce hunger and increase investment in agriculture development in poor countries.
What will drive the next Green Revolution? Is genetically modified food an answer to world hunger? Are there other factors that will make a difference in food production?
Paul Collier, economist, Oxford University
Vandana Shiva, activist and author
Per Pinstrup-Andersen, professor of nutrition and public policy, Cornell
Raj Patel, Institute for Food and Development Policy
Jonathan Foley, University of Minnesota
Michael J. Roberts, economist, North Carolina State University
To read the complete New York Times‘ article, click HERE.
Industrial agriculture raises the country’s meat and dairy products in what can only be called animal factories. The living conditions of the animals has been well documented. The animal’s waste and where it ends up is documented in this New York Times article about a rural area near large dairy farms in Idaho. If you live near a large dairy, livestock feedlot or poultry factory, this article suggests you don’t drink the water from wells in those areas unless you like bacteria, nitrates and pharmaceutical drugs.
For a graphic video of the animal waste problem plaguing the areas around factory farms click HERE.
Photo credit: Damon Winter/The New York Times
Leonora Oppenheim writes in Treehugger.com,
Can you imagine being able to produce enough water in the Sahara to grow crops there? Can you imagine harnessing sufficient quantities of solar power to supply electricity to cities in Africa and cities in Europe? Can you imagine producing a sustainable bio-fuel that doesn’t impact on world food supplies? Charlie Paton, Michael Pawlyn and Bill Watts can and what’s more they can imagine all these happening in the same place at the same time.
This trio of visionaries launched the Sahara Forest Project: their proposal to combine two innovative technologies, Concentrated Solar Power and Seawater Greenhouses, to produce renewable energy, water and food in an area of desert known to be one of the hottest places on earth.
To read the complete article, click HERE. For an update on the project, click HERE.
Graphic credit: Treehugger.com
University of Maryland, Purdue University and the University of Colorado in Boulder researchers say regional surface temperatures can be affected by land use, suggesting that local and regional strategies, such as creating green spaces and buffer zones in and around urban areas, could be a tool in addressing climate change. The three universities collaborated on the study.
Among the study findings are:
* In general, the greener the land cover, the cooler is surface temperature.
* Conversion to agriculture results in cooling, while conversion from agriculture generally results in warming.
* Deforestation generally results in warming, with the exception of a shift from forest to agriculture. No clear picture emerged from the impact of planting or seeding new forests.
* Urbanization and conversion to bare soils have the largest warming impacts.
Click HERE for the Purdue University news release/summary of the study. For another summary of the study, click HERE.
Hydroponics Dictionary
