Abundance Circle • Story Connective

SUBHEAD: A volunteer effort to share the abundance of food between individual growers and gatherers.

By Rebecca Rhapsody on 23 April 2017 for Story Connective -
(https://storyconnective.podbean.com/)


Image above: Avacados and grapefruit offered by Judy and Matt sharing extra produce with to Abundance Circle on Maui through Vicki Levin. Still frame from video below by Story Connection.

Vicki Levin is a champion of locally grown food and community. She gathers up excess food produced by her friends' and neighbors' gardens and distributes it among them all.

It's called the Abundance Circle.

For example, when one member of the Abundance Circle has too many ripe oranges from their tree for their own household, they contribute the extra fruit to the Abundance Circle.

Vicki collects everyone's excess produce and distributes it to the group. In this way, the person contributing the excess oranges will get sunflower sprouts, kale, bananas, & more from the extra produce other Abundance Circle members give... free of charge!

It's not a trade and it's not a barter. Even when a member's garden doesn't have anything to give for a time, they still receive. Everyone just contributes whatever they have excess of to the Circle Abundance, and everyone benefits. Vicki's dream is for everyone to have even a small garden in their backyard.


Video above: Interview with Vicki Levin by Rebecca Rhapsody about the Abundance Circle on Maui. From (https://youtu.be/HD-j7VgKetI).

VIDEO CREDITS:
Interview
Rebecca Rhapsody at StoryConnective.org

Audio and video production
Loxley Clovis at StoryConnective.org

Ukulele score and performance
Rebecca Rhapsody at StoryConnective.org

Story Connective art and logo by
Sarai Stricklin SaraiStricklin.com

SPECIAL THANKS TO:
Vicki Levin and her Abundance Circle members

Artwork ‘Makamaluohonaokalani’
Marilyn Kahalewai at Kumukahi.org

Moku and Ahupuaa map of Maui 'Mokupuni O Maui"
Juan Wilson at IslandBreath.org

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Hudson Valley Seed Library

SUBHEAD: An interview with heritage seed bank founder Ken Green.

By Nasimeh Bahrayni-Easton on 20 December 2014 for Shareable -
(http://www.shareable.net/blog/interviewed-ken-greene-of-hudson-valley-seed-library)


Image above: Greene with Vandana Shiva, renowned environmental activist. Photo from Hudson Valley Seed Library and in original article.

In 2004, Ken Greene was working as a librarian in Gardiner, New York when he decided to go beyond the bounds of his own personal garden and take his passion for seed saving into a more public, community-based arena.

He began the Hudson Valley Seed Library (HVSL) out of the Gardiner Public Library, initially just adding the seed varietals to the library catalog as another item that patrons could "check out."

For four years, Greene ran the HVSL out of that location, but in 2008 he and his business partner Doug Muller moved the HVSL onto a farm in Accord, New York where it has remained ever since. Nowdays, the library catalog is online, the team has grown to include a dozen or so others in addition to Ken and Doug, and the library's membership boasts over 1,000 farmers and gardeners.

Shareable caught up with Greene to talk about his organization's roots, his passion for stories, and the future of seed libraries.

SHAREABLE: What inspired Hudson Valley Seed Library?
Ken Greene: I had become a seed saver in my own garden after learning about some of the global seed issues including loss of genetic diversity and consolidation of seed resources by the biotech industry. I wanted to make a small difference by taking responsibility for our local seeds and making sure they were preserved and protected.

But that didn't feel like I was doing enough, I wanted to find a way to share the seeds, and seed saving skills, with more people in my community. The more hands and gardens the seeds pass through, the more alive and protected they are for the future. I began to see seeds as having much in common with books- especially books in a library.

My deep appreciation for libraries and new-found passion for seeds were starting to become one. I began to see every seed was a story and felt the stories were meant to be shared. Growing a seed meant growing its story and keeping it alive. I saw that libraries keep stories alive by sharing them. So, adding seeds to the library catalog seemed logical, necessary, and important.

Just as our library was making out-of-print books available to the community, we could also make heirloom seeds, many under the threat of extinction, continually available. Just as we were keeping ideas, imagination, and stories alive by sharing them in print, we could keep the genetics and the cultural stories of seeds alive by sharing them.

 Just as we trusted our patrons to bring back the books they checked out so that they could continue to be shared, I wondered if we could count on gardeners to save some seeds from the plants they grew to return to the library, keeping the seeds alive and creating regionally adapted varieties.

What was the community response? 
Initially people were confused about seeing seeds available to check out in the library. Luckily, the library director, Peg Lotvin, and a local farm intern who was one of the founders of BASIL, a Bay Area seed exchange, were very enthusiastic about the idea.

Over time with meetings, workshops, and putting in a seed garden around the flag pole on the front lawn, the seed library became an appreciated part of the public library- and the first of its kind in the country.

The year before I quit my job to farm seed full time we had about 60 active members in the seed library. The next year, when my partner Doug and I put the library idea online, we had 500 members.

Today we have a full seed catalog that anyone can buy homegrown, independent, organic seed from and we have an active seed saving community of over 1200 gardeners and farmers who participate in our "One Seed, Many Gardens" online seed library program.


A three pound heirloom tomato.  Credit: HVSL Facebook

Other than seed preservation, what other roles does the HVSL play in the community?
I never would have imagined that our tiny seed library would grow into a full-fledged seed company and take over my life! I'm now on the Board of Directors for the Organic Seed Alliance, give lectures and teach workshops about seeds all over the country, and we are the largest producer of Northeast grown and adapted seeds in the country.

What draws you personally to seed preservation?
I love nurturing our plants through their full life-cycles and sharing the joy, magic, and abundance of seeds with others. More than preservation, I'm drawn to the idea that plants are always changing, just as we are. In order to keep these seeds alive and in the dirty hands of caring growers we need to allow them to change with us.

HVSL also does lovely art commissions for its seed packets. What's the story behind that?
I believe that artist are cultural seed savers and seed savers are agri-cultural artists. I came up with the idea of working with artists after collecting antique seed catalogs to research what varieties were being grown in our region 50-100 years ago. These old catalogs are full of art- no photographs.

Just as I want to keep the tradition of saving seeds by hand, I wanted to find a way to continue the beautiful and compelling tradition of illustrated catalogs- but in a more contemporary way. Our packs help remind us that seeds are not just a commodity to be bought and sold- they are living stories. The diversity of the artwork on our packs (each one is by a different artist) celebrates the diversity of the seeds themselves.


Seed packets from the seed library.  Credit: HVSL Facebook.

A New York Times article about HSVL says you collect “cultural stories” as well as seeds. Can you speak a little more about that?
Every seed is a story. Actually, every seed is many stories. Genetic stories, human stories of travel, tragedy, an spirit. Some seed stories are tall tales, myths, or very personal stories from recent generations. We share many of these stories on our website as well as the stories of how we grow and care for the seeds in our catalog.

That article states that many of your members live in New York City.  Why do you think it's important to offer your services to cities?
Many of the gardeners (and farmers!) who grow with our seeds do live in urban areas. There are more urban growers of all kinds- rooftops, containers, community gardens- than ever before. Finding the right varieties to grow in the many micro-climates that urban gardeners experience means searching out a diversity of seed sources.

Conventionally bred seeds are meant to be grown on large industrial and chemical based farms. The heirloom and open-pollinated seeds in our catalog have more flexibility, resiliency, and the most potential for adapting to urban growing environments.

What does the future look like for HVSL - and for seed libraries in general?
Over time the Hudson Valley Seed Library has become a mission-driven seed company. Our seed library model has changed to better focus on sharing high-quality seed.

We based the new model on the popular “Community Reads” or “One Book, One Town” reading programs organized by book libraries all over the country where the whole town reads one book. By encouraging every member in the Seed Library to grow the same variety in the same season, we’ll be able to teach everyone how to grow, eat, and save seeds from the varieties.

We connect all of our gardens into one big seed farm--growing enough seeds of each year's Community Seed variety to share with friends, family, and our communities. Enough to last. We've also begun training small-scale farmers on how to integrate seed saving into their food farm systems- the more local seeds the better!

On another note, your farm used to be a Ukrainian summer camp?!
The land we live on and grow on is shared by a community of friends. Originally a Catskill "poor-man's" resort with a hotel, boarding houses, kitchen building, ball room and more, the property was bought by a Ukrainian cultural camp in the late 60s.

Our group bought it from adults who had been campers here. We're fixing up what we can save, tearing down and salvaging the structures we can't save, building soil, growing seeds, and preserving the wildness of the surrounding woods.


The Seed Library farm.  Credit:  HVSL Facebook.

Do you have any advice for anyone who might want to start a seed library in their own community?

Yes! Mainly- there is no one thing that is a seed library. There are now over 300 seed libraries, seed swaps, seed exchanges, and community seed banks all over the country. Each one is different from the next.

I recommend starting with a simple seed swap to see who in your community is interested in gardening and seeds and then letting the group develop their own way of sharing seeds and their stories. I help communities develop community seed saving groups and there are many more resources out there than there were 10 years ago when I started the Hudson Valley Seed Library.

And lastly, what is your favorite or most interesting new plant?
Always the hardest question! I love all of the 400 varieties in our catalog for different reasons. We have cultivated and wild flowers, vegetables, culinary and medicinal herbs, and some oddities just for fun.

For food I'm most excited about our Panther Edamame- a black open-pollinated nutty-flavored edamame that we grow in partnership with the Stone Barns Center.

For cultivated flowers I'm in love with Polar Bear Zinnia- a creamy white flower, for wild flowers I'm proud to now offer Milkweed to help stem the near extinction of Monarch Butterflies, and for herbs I love Garlic Chives which make the most amazing Kimchi.

You can connect more with the Hudson Valley Seed Library via their website or facebook.

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Seed Libraires and the Law

SUBHEAD: Setting the record straight on the legality of local seed libraries and exchanges.

By Janelle Orsi & Neil Thapar on 11 August 2014 for NewDream.org -
(http://www.newdream.org/blog/seed-libraries-take-on-the-law)


Image above: The Seed Library of Los Angeles is open for business on 18 February 2012 . From (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:Openforbusiness.jpg).

After the Pennsylvania Department of Agriculture cracked down on a community seed library, hundreds of seed libraries in the U.S. are suddenly wondering if they are breaking the law. According to PA regulators, in order to give out member-donated seeds, the Simpson Seed Library in Cumberland County would have to put around 400 seeds of each variety through prohibitively impractical seed testing procedures in order to determine quality, rate of germinability, and so on.

The result of the PA crackdown is that the library can no longer give out seeds other than those which are commercially packaged.

Quite ironically, this is in the name of “protecting and maintaining the food sources of America.” In this news article that went viral, regulators cited, among other things, that “agri-terrorism is a very, very real scenario.” In reality, seed libraries have emerged in an effort to protect our food sources and to ensure access to locally adapted and heirloom varieties.

The public’s access to seeds has been narrowing ever since 1980, when the Supreme Court ruled that a life-form could be patented. Since then, large seed companies have shifted away from open-pollinated seeds to patented hybridized and genetically-engineered varieties.

The companies generally prohibit farmers from saving and replanting the seeds, requiring that farmers buy new seed each year. In response to this trend, seed libraries give members free seeds and request that members later harvest seed and give back to the library in the future, thereby growing the pool of seeds available to everyone.

Seed Law Basics
It’s important to set the record straight about the legalities of seed libraries. Let’s begin with the basics: In every state, there are laws requiring seed companies to be licensed, test seeds, and properly label them. At the federal level, there is a comparable law governing seed companies that sell seeds in interstate commerce.

All of these laws exist for good reason: If a tomato grower buys 10,000 tomato seeds, the grower’s livelihood is on the line if the seeds turn out to be of poor quality or the wrong variety.

Seed laws, like other truth-in-labeling laws, keep seed companies accountable, prevent unfair competition in the seed industry, and protect farmers whose livelihoods depend on access to quality seeds. The testing and labeling of the seeds also helps to prevent noxious weeds and invasive species from getting into the mix.

In some states, the licensing, labeling, and testing laws only apply if you sell seed. In other states, such as California, the laws apply if you even offer seeds for barter, exchange, or trade. How do you define words like sell, barter, exchange, and trade? And how do they apply to seed libraries? Read on if you are ready to venture into interesting legal grey areas.

In at least one state (yup, Pennsylvania), even supplying seeds make you subject to at least some regulation. But the Pennsylvania seed law is about to be put to the test, and we think that regulators should have read their law more carefully.

Using the Letter of the Law
When you see a law enforced unfairly, read the letter of the law and see if you can find holes in it. Found one!

In Pennsylvania, supplying seed might make you subject to the requirement to get a license, which involves filling out a form and paying an annual $25 fee (Section 7103, Chapter 71 of PA Consolidated Statutes). However, the sections of the law (7104, 7105, etc.) that mandate testing and labeling only apply if you sell seed. Not “supply,” but “sell!”

Has anyone in Pennsylvania noticed this nuance since the whole kerfuffle with Simpson Seed Library began? Seed libraries in Pennsylvania could perhaps test this: Fill out the license form, pay the $25 fee, and continue to operate as usual.

If the PA Department of Agriculture demands testing and labeling of seeds, a seed library could try holding its ground until the regulators see their own error or until a court makes a determination that the library is not “selling” seeds.

(Note: We’re not giving legal advice here! Get legal advice from a PA lawyer, because breaking this law the first time could result in up to 90 days of prison time, and breaking it the second time can result in up to two years.)

Working Within Grey Areas
California and other states define “sell” to include exchange, barter, or trade. This broad definition helps to ensure that people can’t sidestep regulation simply because they aren’t using dollars to bargain. Bargaining is a key concept in all of this.

We have innumerable regulations designed to temper the potential harms that arise when people bargain in the context of commerce. Merchants have an incentive to seek high prices and to reduce their costs in order to get more.

When people transact within the “get more” frame of mind, it is far more likely they will cut corners, disregard risks, be careless, mislead people, and so on. That’s why regulations apply when people sell things, but rarely when people give things.''

Seed libraries have a “give more” frame of mind, which motivates the libraries to do right by their members and the community. They ask people to donate seed back to the library, but do so with the goal of giving away more seed. The letter of the law doesn’t tell us that seed libraries are clearly exempt from regulation, but the spirit of the law does.

When the application of a law is unclear, we must go deeper to hone our legal arguments. Although the libraries both give and receive seeds, there’s a strong argument that they do not, in fact, exchange seed in the way the California regulation envisions.

To find solid legal ground for this argument, seed libraries can borrow legal arguments from time banks. A time bank is an organization through which members do favors for one another and award one another a “time dollar” or “time credit” for every hour of service. People can use their time credits to reward favors they receive from other members of the network.

The IRS has acknowledged in private letter rulings that this activity is distinct from that of a barter exchange for two primary reasons:

1. the giving and receiving of favors happens informally, meaning that people get no contractual right to have their favor returned, and
   
   
2. the exchanges are non-commercial, as demonstrated by the fact that everyone’s hour is valued equally, meaning that people are not bargaining for services at market rate.

Similarly, seed libraries generally give and receive seeds on an informal basis, meaning that neither the library nor its members have a right or requirement to give seed. Members likely have a sense of responsibility to give back to the seed library, but the library cannot force them to do so. In addition, seed libraries give and receive seeds on a non-commercial basis.

People neither pay money for seeds, nor do they measure the value of seeds they give in proportion to what they get. You can learn more the about nuanced differences between giving, swapping, exchanging, and selling here and here.

Note that it’s important for seed libraries to ensure that their policies, languaging, and practices reflect what we’ve described in the above paragraph.

If the library makes people feel as if they are required to give seed later on or if the library is counting seeds in order to keep score somehow, then the library might actually come under the regulations. We have seen at least one seed library that has members sign a contract indicating that the member “shall” or “agrees to” donate twice the amount of seed that they checked out. This is risky.

We suggest that all seed libraries review their documents and revise paperwork in order to simply collect information from members about what kind of seed they received, what they are donating, their experience with the plant, and so on.

Crowdsourcing a Seed Law Library
Drawing upon the spirit of reciprocity that motivates seed libraries, we’d like to urge readers to take 30 minutes and give back by doing research on other states’ seed laws.

We’ve created a Hackpad where anyone can add links to state seed laws, copy and paste in key provisions, and add your comments and questions. Wanna take a crack at it? It’s very empowering to learn how to find and navigate laws.

The American Seed Trade Association compiled a list of state seed laws, but many of the links are broken, so you may need to access the laws by navigating through state agricultural codes. Commonly, state seed laws live in two places: 1) state statutes created by legislators, and 2) regulations created by the state department of agriculture. You need to review both.

We Still Need to Change These Laws!
Even though we have arguments that seed libraries are not subject to state and federal testing and labeling requirements, it would be ideal for our laws to say this explicitly. No matter what state you are in, you could look on either end of the political spectrum and probably find a legislator who would be sympathetic to these issues. You could ask a legislator to introduce a bill that has simple language such as:

“Notwithstanding any other provision of this [law, act, chapter, article], Seed Libraries shall be exempt from all licensing, testing, labeling, and other requirements of this [law, act, chapter, article]. ‘Seed Library’ shall be defined as a nonprofit, cooperative, or governmental organization that donates seed and receives donations of seed.”

Depending on how much discretion your state department of agriculture has with regard to the crafting of regulations, you could, instead, simply ask the department to amend the regulations.

Also, we recommend that seed libraries and other advocates write letters to the Association of American Seed Control Officials (AASCO), a national membership organization comprised of state seed regulatory officials. Among other activities, AASCO developed and maintains the Revised Uniform State Seed Law, the model law on which many states’ seed laws are based.

If AASCO were to expressly exempt seed libraries from regulation, several states would likely follow suit, since they often adopt wholesale AASCO’s recommendations. AASCO’s membership directory also contains mailing and email addresses for seed regulators in each state, so we recommend that everyone write to them as well.

If we change laws to create a clear legal space for seed libraries, we should perhaps also do so for small-scale seed enterprises. If current law requires a seed business to test 400 seeds of each variety, this privileges large seed companies, and effectively blocks farmers from starting small seed enterprises.

Further, the scale of operation should make a difference when it comes to achieving the goals of these laws. If a package of 100 seeds ends up being of poor quality or if it contains noxious weeds, the harm to the grower or to society is much lower than if the packet contained 10,000 seeds.

Likewise, seed sales that are conducted direct-to-consumer within a small geographic area present minimal risk of introducing new invasive or noxious species. Thus, when we change the laws, we should also create exemptions and lower compliance hurdles for seed enterprises that sell seeds in small quantities, direct-to-consumer, and/or within a confined region.

In the big picture, laws should not try to protect citizens from all imaginable harms nor should laws overreach into all areas of our lives. Every law requires a balancing act. Although driving a car is quite dangerous, people are allowed to do it, because society has decided that the benefit of mobility outweighs the risk of harm.

Similarly, during times of food insecurity, climate disruption, and genetic consolidation of the sources of our food (seeds!), the benefit of seed libraries is enormous as compared to the potential harm of a seed packet gifted within a community. Let’s make sure our laws get with the times!

• This article was written by Janelle Orsi and Neil Thapar of the Sustainable Economies Law Center, with input from Neal Gorenflo of Shareable, and Sarah Baird of the Center for a New American Dream.

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Some Koreans prepare for degrowth

SUBHEAD: Who knew that Seoul was a world leader in the sharing post-growth economy?

By Richard Heinberg on 12 November 2013 for Post Carbon Institute -
(http://www.postcarbon.org/blog-post/1949822-who-knew-that-seoul-was-a#)


Image above: Downtown Seoul, the world's most wired city,  seems the antithesis of a sharing, post-growth economic example. From (http://typeseoul.blogspot.com/2011/08/worlds-most-wired-city.html).

Did you know that Seoul, South Korea is one of the world’s key sites for post-growth economic re-development? No? Neither did I, until I saw for myself.

I was pleased to be invited to give the keynote address at a conference titled “Reshaping the Way We Live,” put on by the Seoul Youth Hub, held November 7-8. I had no idea what to expect, and was rather surprised when the event turned out to be one of the most enjoyable and eye-opening in recent memory.

First, some background on South Korea. The nation has an export-based industrial economy that has expanded rapidly in recent decades; however, its rate of growth has begun to slow and the youth unemployment rate is now north of 22 percent. Korean politics has also taken a worrisome turn: many citizens dispute the legitimacy of the most recent presidential election, which brought to power Park Geun-hye, the daughter of former dictator Park Chung-hee.

Meanwhile Korea’s energy situation could hardly be bleaker: the nation imports essentially all its oil, natural gas, and coal (Korea was once self-sufficient in coal, but production has declined dramatically). It gets some electricity from hydropower, but there is little room for expansion. The country’s 23 nuclear power plants are subject to increasing controversy since the 2011 Fukushima catastrophe in nearby Japan, as many Koreans fear they are now eating radioactive fish.

The Seoul Youth Hub evidently sees crisis as opportunity. Why else would they ask the author of The End of Growth to address a conference of 18-to-40 year-olds? I came to their attention through a protracted Internet search, but it helped that three of my books have been translated into Korean. Evidently the organizers weren’t shy about conveying a sobering message.

Though I hadn’t visited their country previously, I knew that Koreans have a reputation for being friendly and generous. If my experience is any gauge, the reputation is well deserved. The organizers put me up at a traditional Hanok Korean guesthouse (no chairs or television, just mats on the floor of a beautifully constructed, floor-heated, meticulously scrubbed little pavilion). Nearly all food provided during my stay was also traditional, and included a Buddhist temple meal with multiple courses of artistically crafted vegetarian morsels. Suffice it to say that I felt well taken care of and had a splendid time.

Now to the conference itself. Except for the opening keynote and a final wrap-up, the sessions were workshops led by eight collaborative groups (including ones from Hong Kong and Japan), each of which is a youth-led organization engaged in social innovation. You can find a list of participating groups at the conference website. The subjects explored ranged from cheese-making to innovations in democratic decision-making; in effect, it amounted to a multi-track laboratory for young people to explore adaptive responses to economic contraction.

Surprisingly, the event was free to the participants. The City of Seoul footed the bill, thanks to Mayor Park Won-soon (more about him in a moment).

The Seoul Youth Hub is a project of the Seoul Metropolitan Government, and its mandate is to help young people “design a future society” by providing a place where they can share and resolve their problems, experiment with a sharing economy, and “discuss specific policies regarding various agendas such as work-labor, housing, life safety net, business creation, youth politics,” and more. The Hub is also intended as a model and a networking center for similar projects throughout Asia. I highly recommend watching this short video.

The venue for the conference was the Youth Hub’s headquarters, which features movable walls, furniture made of recycled building materials, open and shared office spaces, informal dormitory nooks, a café, and learning co-laboratories. Altogether, there was far more going on here than I could take in during the two days of the conference, much less describe in a couple of paragraphs.

On the evening of the first day of the conference I met Mayor Park at his offices in City Hall, a twisty new steel-and-glass structure whose ground floor is devoted to citizen-led social innovation projects.

Copies of The End of Growth were on the Mayor’s meeting room table. Using an interpreter, we got right to it: he had clearly read the book and asked intelligent questions about it. What would I recommend that he and the City of Seoul do to prepare for the end of economic growth? It was a stunning question, given the circumstances, and he appeared eager to consider whatever suggestions I might offer.

I started rattling off a laundry list of ideas—supporting farmers’ markets, community gardens, and other staples of a local food system; discouraging cars while encouraging bicycling and public transport; raising energy building standards to the Passive House level; staging more cultural events to increase the happiness quotient among citizens.

When I finished, he recited examples of how he and the City have already begun doing nearly every one of these things. He was saying, in effect, “Check, check, check. Come on, what else have you got? Please tell me, and I’ll see if we can do it!” I suggested he find a way for the City to help bring Transition to Seoul (there are currently two official Transition Initiatives in Japan, none in Korea). He promised to do just that.

Whoa, I thought. Who is this guy? I looked up his Wikipedia listing later that night. Before becoming Mayor in 2011, Park Won-soon had a 30-year career as a human rights and social justice activist and spent four months in prison for some of these activities. In recent years he developed a chain of nonprofit “Beautiful Stores,” which collect donations of used items, repair them if needed, and sell them to raise money for the social enterprise movement. There are now over a hundred of these stores throughout Korea.

Hard to believe this man is the elected leader of the largest city proper in the world, with a population of over 10 million.

The organizers of the Youth Hub conference think the world of Mayor Park, and I can understand why. I’ve seen a lot of hopeful post-growth initiatives in a lot of places—usually citizen-led and modest in scale; never have I seen such visionary, intelligent leadership at the municipal government level within so large a city.

This is a country with a hard future ahead. Challenges with energy, the economy, and the environment are lining up (not to mention ever-present tensions with North Korea). Yet if efforts led by Mayor Park and the Seoul Youth Hub manage to flourish, things may go much better than they otherwise would. Perhaps other cities can begin to find inspiration here.

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