Whitewashed Hope

SUBHEAD: A message from indigenous leaders on permaculture and regenerative agriculture.

By several indigenous authors on 18 January 2021 in Resilience -
(https://www.resilience.org/stories/2021-01-18/whitewashed-hope/) 


Image above: An indigenous East Indian couple in indigenous clothing.
From (https://www.climatescorecard.org/2020/08/indias-indigenous-peoples-are-key-constituents-in-climate-action/).

A note from Resilience.org:
Our intention is to invite proponents of western ecological agriculture (e.g., regenerative ag / permaculture) to go deeper and encourage their peers to go deeper—to not just ‘take’ practices from Indigenous cultures without their context, but to also encompass the deeper Indigenous worldviews… inspiring a consciousness shift that hopefully will support us to go from a dominant culture of supremacy and domination to one founded on reciprocity, respect, and interrelations with all beings—including, of course, among all humans.

 Whitewashed Hope

Regenerative agriculture and permaculture claim to be the solutions to our ecological crises. While they both borrow practices from Indigenous cultures, critically, they leave out our worldviews and continue the pattern of erasing our history and contributions to the modern world.

While the practices ‘sustainable farming’ promote are important, they do not encompass the deep cultural and relational changes needed to realize our collective healing.

Where is ‘Nature’?

Regen Ag & Permaculture often talk about what’s happening ‘in nature’: “In nature, soil is always covered.” “In nature, there are no monocultures.” Nature is viewed as separate, outside, ideal, perfect. Human beings must practice “biomimicry” (the mimicking of life) because we exist outside of the life of Nature.

Indigenous peoples speak of our role AS Nature. (Actually, Indigenous languages often don’t have a word for Nature, only a name for Earth and our Universe.) 

As cells and organs of Earth, we strive to fulfill our roles as her caregivers and caretakers. We often describe ourselves as “weavers”, strengthening the bonds between all beings.

Death Doesn’t Mean Dead

Regen Ag & Permaculture often maintain the “dead” worldview of Western culture and science: Rocks, mountains, soil, water, wind, and light all start as “dead”. (E.g., “Let’s bring life back to the soil!” — implying soil, without microbes, is dead.) 

This worldview believes that life only happens when these elements are brought together in some specific and special way.

Indigenous cultures view the Earth as a communion of beings and not objects: All matter and energy is alive and conscious. Mountains, stones, water, and air are relatives and ancestors. Earth is a living being whose body we are all a part of. 

Life does not only occur when these elements are brought together; Life always is. No “thing” is ever dead; Life forms and transforms.

From Judgemental to Relational

Regen Ag & Permaculture maintain overly simplistic binaries through subscribing to good and bad. Tilling is bad; not tilling is good. Mulch is good; not mulching is bad. We must do only the ‘good’ things to reach the idealized, 99.9% biomimicked farm/garden, though we will never be as pure or good “as Nature”, because we are separate from her.

Indigenous cultures often share the view that there is no good, bad, or ideal—it is not our role to judge. Our role is to tend, care, and weave to maintain relationships of balance. We give ourselves to the land: Our breath and hands uplift her gardens, binding our life force together. 

No one is tainted by our touch, and we have the ability to heal as much as any other lifeform.

Our Words Shape Us

Regen Ag & Permaculture use English as their preferred language no matter the geography or culture: You must first learn English to learn from the godFATHERS of this movement. The English language judges and objectifies, including words most Indigenous languages do not: ‘natural, criminal, waste, dead, wild, pure…’ 

English also utilizes language like “things” and “its” when referring to “non-living, subhuman entities”.

Among Indigenous cultures, every language emerges from and is therefore intricately tied to place. Inuit people have dozens of words for snow and her movement; Polynesian languages have dozens of words for water’s ripples. 

To know a place, you must speak her language. There is no one-size-fits-all, and no words for non-living or sub-human beings, because all life has equal value.

People are land. Holistic includes History.

Regen Ag and Permaculture claim to be holistic in approach. When regenerating a landscape, ‘everything’ is considered: soil health, water cycles, local ‘wildlife’, income & profit. 

‘Everything’, however, tends to EXCLUDE history: Why were Indigenous homelands steal-able and why were our peoples & lands rape-able? Why were our cultures erased? Why does our knowledge need to be validated by ‘Science’? Why are we still excluded from your ‘healing’ of our land?

Among Indigenous cultures, people belong to land rather than land belonging to people. Healing of land MUST include healing of people and vice versa. Recognizing and processing the emotional traumas held in our bodies as descendants of assaulted, enslaved, and displaced peoples is necessary to the healing of land. 

Returning our rights to care for, harvest from, and relate to the land that birthed us is part of this recognition.

Composting

Regen Ag & Permaculture often share the environmentalist message that the world is dying and we must “save” it. Humans are toxic, but if we try, we can create a “new Nature” of harmony, though one that is not as harmonious as the “old Nature” that existed before humanity. Towards this mission, we must put Nature first and sacrifice ourselves for “the cause”.

Indigenous cultures often see Earth as going through cycles of continuous transition. We currently find ourselves in a cycle of great decomposition. Like in any process of composting there is discomfort and a knowing that death always brings us into rebirth. Within this great cycle, we all have a role to play. 

Recognizing and healing all of our own traumas IS healing Earth’s traumas, because we are ONE.

Where to go from here?

Making up only 6.2% of our global population, Indigenous peoples steward 80% of Earth’s biodiversity while managing over 25% of her land. Indigenous worldviews are the bedrocks that our agricultural practices & lifeways arise from. 

We invite you to ground your daily practices in these ancestral ways, as we jointly work towards collective healing.

• Learn whose lands you live on (native-land.ca), their history, and how you can support their causes and cultural revitalization.
• Watch @gatherfilm and Aluna documentary.
• Amplify the voices and stories of Indigenous peoples and organizations.
• Follow, support, donate to, and learn from the contributors to this post.
• Help republish this open-source post: https://bit.ly/IndigenousWorldViews

Contributors

• @CulturalSurvival / Galina Angarova
• Māori Waitaha Grandmothers Council & Region Net Positive / Tanya Ruka
• @NEN_NorthEastNetwork / Seno Tsuhah
• Society for Alternative Learning & Transformation & African Biodiversity Network / Simon Mitambo
• Center for Indigenous Knowledge and Organizational Development / Bern Guri
• @EarthIsOhana @LoamLove / Kailea Frederick
• Regenerative Agriculture Alliance.org / Reginaldo Haslett-Marroquin
• @Linda.Black.Elk / Tatanka Wakpala Model Sustainable Community
• @GreenstoneFarm_LA / Greenstone Farm and Sanctuary
• @CulturalConservancy / Melissa K. Nelson PhD
• @NatKelley
• @GatherFilm
• @AGrowingCulture
• @Terralingua.Langscape
• @FarmerRishi
• @KameaChayne

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Why Permaculture Puts Food First

SUBHEAD: It teaches you to think ecosystemically: no waste; cyclical; nourishing body and soul; steady state.

By Albert Bates on 5 November 2018 for the Great Change -
(http://peaksurfer.blogspot.com/2018/10/why-permaculture-puts-food-first.html)


Image above: There are seven popular food crops in this photograph of The Farm. From original article.

When I teach permaculture, and now having done more than 50 full design courses, I try to de-emphasize gardening.

I do that because I know that most other Permaculture teachers do precisely the opposite; they begin with drawing a chicken and then make mandala gardens and herb spirals. I don’t usually do that because to me Permaculture is much more. It is a regenerative design science.

It teaches you to think ecosystemically: no waste; cyclical; nourishing body and soul; steady state. It applies to every aspect of your life, and of civilization; from how we brush our teeth to how we build our cities and exchange value for value.

But Permaculture is also about looking ahead, over the fence, up to the sky, into the forest, and observing the grander patterns.

Anyone who takes that kind of moment these days will be bound to notice phenological signs and portents, the uptick in unusual weather events, a spreading refugee crisis, and some really nasty resource wars appealing to our ethnic tribalism.

“The switch from growth to decline in oil production will thus almost certainly create economic and political tension.”

 — Colin Campbell and Jean Laherrére, Scientific American (1998)

These times have been long predicted, from Malthus’ and Arhennius’ calculations of population and carbon dioxide, to Limits to Growth, The Population Bomb, and now decades of reports from the UN Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change. All of those, and more, are known knowns.

Kerry Emanuel told us about the hurricanes and superstorms in 1987. I predicted the spread of mosquitoes, ticks, and viruses in 1989.

In that same decade James Lovelock, Tim Lenton, Johan Shellnhuber and others were warning that after diverging 2º Celsius from the pre-industrial maxima the carrying capacity of global agriculture would no longer support more than two billion people, and possibly fewer than one billion.

Healthy humans cannot be decoupled from net photosynthetic productivity and that cannot be decoupled from favorable growing conditions; ie: the Holocene epoch of mild and predictable sunlight and rainfall over vast areas of favorable soil.

Last year, a distinguished group of scientists issued this warning:

… [B]iomass plantations with subsequent carbon immobilization are likely unable to “repair” insufficient emission reduction policies without compromising food production and biosphere functioning due to its space‐consuming properties. 

... the requirements for a strong mitigation scenario staying below the 2°C target would require a combination of high irrigation water input and development of highly effective carbon process chains. Although we find that this strategy of sequestering carbon is not a viable alternative to aggressive emission reductions, it could still support mitigation efforts if sustainably managed.

***

This leaves us with a rather clear, but hardly comforting overall conclusion: Holding the 2°C line seems only feasible if two sets of climate action work hand in hand. On the one hand, greenhouse gas emissions need to be reduced as early and as effectively as possible. 

In fact, an even more aggressive strategy than reflected by the [IPCC] RCP2.6 scenario should be pursued, aiming at the “induced implosion” of most fossil fuel‐driven business cases in the next couple of decades. 

On the other hand, CDR [carbon dioxide removal] can significantly contribute as a “supporting actor” of the mitigation protagonist, if it gets started and deployed immediately. This means that the biological extraction of atmospheric CO2 as well as the suppression of CO2 release from biological systems must draw upon all possible measures — whether they are optimal or not, whether they are high‐ or low‐tech. 

We therefore suggest fully exploring the pertinent options available now, which include reforestation of degraded land and the protection of degraded forests to allow them to recover naturally and increase their carbon storage, e.g., within the Bonn Challenge initiative or the New York Declaration on Forests. 

Further options range from up‐scaled agroforestry approaches to the application of biochar and various no‐tillage practices for food production on appropriate soils. 

Also, it becomes overwhelmingly evident that humanity cannot anymore afford to waste up to 50% of its agricultural harvest along various consumption chains or to go on operating ineffective irrigation systems.

All of those techniques —reforestation of degraded land, up‐scaled agroforestry, biochar, organic no-till, eliminating waste, and low-tech, broad dissemination — are the meat and potatoes of Permaculture.

In 2008, James Lovelock wrote:

Whatever we do is likely to lead to death on a scale that makes all previous wars, famines and disasters small. 

To continue business as usual will probably kill most of us during the century. Is there any reason to believe that fully implementing Bali, with sustainable development and the full use of renewable energy, would kill less? \

We have to consider seriously that, as with nineteenth century medicine, the best option is often kind words and pain killers but otherwise do nothing and let Nature take its course.

***

Had we heeded Malthus’s warning and kept the human population to less than one billion, we would not now be facing a torrid future. 

Whether or not we go for Bali or use geoengineering, the planet is likely, massively and cruelly, to cull us, in the same merciless way that we have eliminated so many species by changing their environment into one where survival is difficult.

Permaculture is not willing to go gentle into that good night. And this is why food is so core to its pedagogy.

As a movement it is training as many people as possible, from white-gloved suburbanites to war-ravaged refugees, how to garden.

It is showing, through gardening, not-merely self-sufficiency and survival in daunting times, but regeneration of soils, recapture of carbon, and ingenious means for restoring the natural balance that ultimately will be the way we end the crises we are now committed to experiencing.

And with any luck, we’ll also get to eat.


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Learning what to make of it

SUBHEAD: I begin to make restitution, to walk the walk after so many years of talking the talk.

By Paul Kingsnorth on 24 May 2017 for Dark Mountain -
(http://dark-mountain.net/blog/learning-what-to-make-of-it/)


Image above: "Small Holding" photograph from original article.

When we win, it’s with small things, and the triumph itself makes us small. What is extraordinary and eternal does not want to be bent by us.
– Rilke

Certain gardens are described as retreats when they are really attacks.
– Ian Hamilton Finlay

The most exciting thing in my life at the moment is a five gallon bucket full of human excrement.

I should explain.

I recently tore the flush toilet out of our family home and replaced it with a compost toilet which I built myself. It is of the most basic variety: essentially, we crap into a big bucket and cover the crap with sawdust, then when the bucket is full I empty the contents onto a compost heap, where it rots down over the course of a year.

At the end of that year, we should have a safe and nutritious compost to use on our fruit trees and bushes, on the fuel coppices of aspen and birch we’ll be planting this winter, and on the small native forest that we are planning to grow here for as long as we are healthy.

It’s a big job, something like this, and undertaking it has made me realize how much effort needs to be put into the most simple things, and that in turn has made me realize why the society I live in has become addicted to paying for complicated things instead, and how this has laid a great big elephant trap for us that we may struggle ever to get out of.

But I’m getting ahead of myself.

The first thing I did was to build a rectangular box out of planks and nails, and the remains of two kitchen cupboard doors which we didn’t need any more. There followed a lot of sanding and planing and painting and varnishing and swearing when things were the wrong length and hinges didn’t fit where they should have done.

This took a few weeks, on and off, but at the end of it I had quite a handsome varnished wooden structure with two shiny blue hinged covers and a toilet seat on top. A five gallon brewing bucket fitted underneath.

Then I had to build a compost heap: two, in fact, so that we could keep an annual cycle of compost from the toilet going. I bought some old pallets from the timber yard up the road and carted them home in my van. That was a couple of days’ work.

After I had finished, I stood back and admired them for about half an hour. I am a writer. I have never been a practical man, or have never believed I am, and I’m still at the stage where successfully completing a practical task fills me with astonishment.

Still, that was the easy bit. Ever tried taking out a flush toilet? It’s a messy job. In the end, a friend came round and devoted an afternoon to helping me to do it. He is a casually practical man, so the job went well. In the aftermath, big chunks of porcelain lay on the grass outside and all that remained in the bathroom was a blocked up outflow pipe and a gash in the lino. In went the compost loo, in went a bucket of sawdust, in went a wall hanging to cover the gaping holes, and voilà: a closed loop system.

The flush toilet, to me, is a worthy metaphor for the civilization I live in. It is convenient, it is easy, it is hygienic and it is wonderfully warm and dry. It is the most luxurious pooing experience known to man. You can do your business and never have to think about what happens next: never have to think about what happens to the feces and urine you have just produced, just as you probably never thought about the origins of the food which created it in the first place.

You can act, if you like, as if you have never produced it at all; as if you were far too civilised to have to engage in such base and primitive behavior. You can sit in the warmth, reading an amusing light-hearted book, then you can simply press a button, and you will never have to deal with your own shit.

What happens to a society that won’t deal with its own shit? It ends up deep in it.

A compost toilet is harder work. First you have to build the toilet and the compost heaps, and then you have to source a regular supply of sawdust or pine needles, which will keep the smells and flies away and give the compost enough bulk on the heap.

Most importantly, you have to empty the bucket when it gets full, which is every few days most of the time. This is the part of the job which really seems to disgust those of my friends and family who can’t understand why I have disposed of a perfectly good toilet and replaced it with something medieval.

But it’s also the part of the job that I enjoy the most. I’ve noticed myself getting almost excited as the bucket approaches being full. Emptying the thing on to the compost heap, covering it with grass, inspecting the progress of the heap so far, cleaning and replacing the bucket, putting a new layer of sawdust in the bottom: would you believe me if I told you this was a satisfying process? Anticipating being able to use the results on my own trees is almost thrilling.

If a flush toilet is a metaphor for a civilization that wants to wash its hands of its own wastes as long as they accumulate somewhere else, then a compost toilet is both a small restitution, and a declaration:

• I will not turn my back on the consequences of my actions. 
• I will not hand them over to someone else to deal with. 
• I will not crap into clean drinking water and flush it down a pipe to be cleaned with industrial chemicals at some sewage plant I have never visited.

I will fertilize my own ground with my own manure, and in doing so I will control an important part of my life in this world, and that control will give me more understanding over it. I will claw something of myself back. Even in the rain, even in winter, I will deal with my own shit.

---

In 2014, I emigrated. My wife and I moved with our two young children from urban England, where we had always lived, to rural Ireland. We bought ourselves a small bungalow with two and a half acres of land up a quiet lane. It was the culmination of a personal project we’ve been engaged in for more than half a decade: to find a way escape from the urban consumer machine we were both brought up in.

We wanted to live more simply; or perhaps just more starkly, because life here is rarely simple. Our kids were just getting to school age, and the idea of sending them to school to systematically crush their spontaneity and have them taught computer coding so that they could compete in the ‘global race’ made us miserable. We wanted to grow our own food and compost our own shit and educate our own children and make our own jam and take responsibility for our own actions.

This can all sound very cloying. Western middle class people going ‘back to the land’ is a modern cliché, and when we think we are hearing that story we tend to react in a particular way, positive or negative depending on our political or cultural persuasions.

Perhaps I am a cliché, but I’m not especially interested in other people’s expectations. I was brought here by many things, but one of them is a voice that has been whispering in my ear for years, and growing louder for the last few.

This voice tells me that I am one of the luckiest people on Earth. It tells me I am a middle-class man from a country grown fat on centuries of plunder, that I have a university degree, that I go to restaurants and have a laptop computer and an internet connection, and I can publish articles like this in magazines.

In other words, I am somewhere up near the top of the pyramid of human fortune. And that in turn means I am up near the top of the pyramid of human cupidity and destruction which is driving the natural world to the edge.

One of the driving forces in my life is a deep love of nature. If you ask me to explain precisely what I mean by that, or why it has such a grip on me, I won’t be able to. But I could tell you about profound experiences I’ve had in forests and mountains, about the joy that rises in my heart when I see a hawk circle or hear the roar of an untamed river, and the misery that sinks into it if I’m trapped in a city or on a motorway.

I could tell you about the occasional brief glimpses I get into the reality that I am a passing moment in an ancient, beautiful, terrifying whorl of life on a vast unknowable planet; that I am not an observer of it, but a part of its wide flow; that there is no such thing as outside.

This kind of thing is nearly impossible to put down on paper, as you can see. Once upon a time, many millennia ago, I suspect it would have been the default worldview, but today, it is a hard one to live with. The culture that I was born into is systematically dismantling the web of life itself, and as it does so it is dismantling my sense of meaning and many of the things that I love.

My status as a middle-class consumer in a Western industrialised country means that I am part of this problem, whether I want to face up to that or not.

This is what that voice whispered to me, as once it whispered to Rilke: you must change your life. I came here because I can’t justify my complicity any more. I feel a personal duty to live as simply and with as little impact on the rest of nature as I possibly can.

I’ve no interest in extending this duty to anybody else, or in preaching about it or politicising it, or in pretending that I am in any way pure or unsullied or even halfway competent yet at undertaking it. It is just a personal calling.

But perhaps it explains my joy at that full toilet bucket. I feel I am at last starting to do my bit, to make restitution, to walk the walk after so many years of talking the talk. I can’t write or talk about natural beauty, or natural anything, unless I’m trying to do as little damage to it as possible; and at this time in history, that means taking myself away from the heart of the beast. It means stripping back.

It means inconveniencing myself. It means paying attention.

• Dark Mountain co-founder Paul Kingsnorth’s new essay collection, Confessions of a Recovering Environmentalist, was published last month by Faber. It brings together 18 of Paul’s essays from the past decade, along with Uncivilisation, the original manifesto that got the Dark Mountain Project started. This is an excerpt from one of the essays in the book, ‘Learning What to Make of It’ 

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Permaculture in Hawaii

SUBHEAD: Permaculture works to keep the birds, insects, soil and surrounding nature content and ourselves fed.

By Juan Wilson on 26 April 2017 for Island Breath -
(http://islandbreath.blogspot.com/2017/04/permaculture-in-hawaii.html)


Image above: We at IslandBreath have attempted to do permaculture. Photo from our backyard efforts at creating a "food forest" that we have named "Akea Aina".  In this image are cacao, starfruit, avocado, papaya, cassava, coconut, breadfruit, banana, and mango. Photo by Juan Wilson.

Akea Aina consists of about 1.5 acres of land - a third of it is our property, a third rented from the Robinson family and another third is on Hawaiian public land.

The photo above show haole koa ("false" koa) trees in foreground. They are early adopters in yards on Hanapepe Valley but few people have let haole koa grow so large as they are usually considered weed trees.

Haole koa are hard and heavy wood good for fires and they are good nitrogen fixers. They provide light shade that sun-delicate plants can grow under. Beneath them are a row of cacao trees with fruit.

To the left and right of this photo are breadfruit trees and cassava. Beyond what you can see are beehives.

In the background, from the left is a starfruit tree, coconut, mango, papaya, avocado and more. That's only a small sample of what can be grown on a small farm.

Below is a brief video survey of permaculture efforts in Hawaii on various islands. By "permaculture" we mean intentional living arrangements on land that produces food and fertile land as a foundation of healthy local flora and fauna. This way of life means living "in nature".

That implies sustainable self sufficiency in food, soil, water and energy.      

Mokupuni o Hawaii
Introduction to the permaculture training programs offered at the  La'akea community on the Big Island, with teacher Tracy Matfin. Get a look at La'akea uses permaculture principles.


Video above: Permaculture Education Programs - La'akea, Hawaii in 2011. From (https://youtu.be/-XgpTaAfb7Q).

Mokupuni o Maui
Fruition Permaculture Design as he gives us a tour of Laulima Farm in lush Kipahulu, Maui, Hawaii. Jesse Krebs discusses the key permaculture design features of this beautiful tropical farm.


Video above: Fruit-based Veganic Permaculture on Maui in 2013. From (https://youtu.be/zG2JuTvq5e8).

Mokupuni o Molokai
SustAINAble Molokai and Geoff Lawton of the Permaculture Research Institute of America and of PRI Australia. We now have strategies to heal the land by slowing the course of water.


Video above: Heal the land, Harvest water, Grow food security on Molokai in 2013. From (https://youtu.be/P2Lp8YmJaag).

Mokupuni o Oahu
Growing your own food and being self sufficient is one of the best ways to give power back to the people and live in harmony with nature.


Video above: Permaculture with Paul Izak in Hawaii on Oahu in 2012. From (https://youtu.be/_WHG3NJEq90).

Mokupuni o Kauai
Paul Massey, the Director Regeneration Botanical Gardens gives a concise definition of what Kauai Food Forest is all about.


Video above: Permaculture in Kauai Part 2 in 2013. From (https://youtu.be/5pJrw9QuCB0).

There is no doubt in our minds that these methods of "farming" are the way to go here in Hawaii. It works to keep the birds, insects, soil and surrounding nature content and ourselves fed.

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The compost pile that changed NYC

SUBHEAD: We can’t forget that we can also make big change ourselves by starting small and local.

By Colin Beavan on 8 April 2017 for Yes Magazine -
(http://www.yesmagazine.org/people-power/It%20Started%20With%20One%20Brave%20Compost%20Pile%2C%20An%20Entire%20City%20Was%20Inspired%20to%20Change-20170415)


Image above: Compost piles like Kate Zadir’s popped up in other communities all around New York City. Photo by Cribb Visuals. From original article.

One thing that has bothered me a lot since the election is the idea in the air that we cannot change things while the current administration is in office. There is a pernicious idea that the government is so strong that nothing can be fixed or changed without first fixing or changing it.

Of course, we must work to change the government, but we must also not lose sight of the fact that we can change things in many ways—at the community, city, and state levels—and that each of us remains capable of making the world a better place, even as the presidential administration works against us.

To remind ourselves of this fact, I wanted to retell a story from my book How To Be Alive: A Guide To The Kind Of Happiness That Helps The World. It is the story of my friend Kate Zidar who, in the early 2000s, was one of many New York City residents who refused to wait for a change of government in order to get what they wanted for their communities—in this instance, a composting program to manage food waste.

Instead of waiting for a change in government policy, Kate started her own community compost pile in a corner of a city park. Compost piles like hers popped up in other communities all around the city. In 2013, seeing the benefits of these compost piles, Mayor Michael Bloomberg’s government finally announced that it would move toward a citywide curbside compost program.

Here is what Kate says about her story:

Back in the early 2000s, I was volunteering in a community garden in Williamsburg, in Brooklyn’s McCarren Park, and my focus became soil toxicity. There was a lot of dioxin and lead in the soil because of fallout over the years from a nearby incinerator. I wanted to replace the top layer of soil so we could grow food safely. 

Also, trucks carrying food waste and other trash in the solid waste management system screwed up the air quality in the area. So it made sense to both create good topsoil and divert food scraps from the waste stream by starting a community compost pile. 

In McCarren Park, there was a part of a dog run that was not used, so I “annexed” it. I wrote a letter to the parks commissioner including a map showing the location of my new compost pile—I also sent a flower bulb, hoping that would get his attention—and asked for permission. He never wrote back, but I kept a copy of my letter and I told anyone who tried to interfere that the parks commissioner knew about the compost pile. 

In addition, I used really heavy 55 gallon plastic drums to house the compost system. They could not be moved easily. My idea was to make it so the work involved in shutting the compost system down would be greater than whatever problem park workers seemed to feel it caused. 

At first it was just me hauling my kitchen scraps to the barrels. But passing foot traffic soon attracted random people dropping off their food scraps, too. Before long, a woman named Jo Micek started to help. She was a community organizer, and she knew how to raise funds. Pretty quickly, the compost pile was being run by a “dirty dozen.” (Get it?) 

Not long after that, there were more than 100 families dropping off their food scraps every week, and the compost project turned into a collective, not just run by me. Meanwhile, the compost went back into the community garden, home gardeners took it home, and eventually even the park workers began to use it around the park. 

Why didn’t we begin by going to the city government and asking them to start a compost pile for us?

Everyone who works in community gardens knows that the gardens start essentially by squatting on an abandoned, unused piece of land. You don’t start by working with the government—but by working with your community for improvements everyone wants. When you try to work with the city agencies, they stonewall the idea because they have a whole range of missions and obligations to consider. But you have only one: your garden or compost pile. 

I didn’t want to use my energy dealing with the bureaucracy. I wanted to compost. Plus, I knew the project would actually represent a community improvement. I didn’t want to ask for permission. I could always later ask for forgiveness. Ultimately, there was no way the parks department could stop it because it became so popular with the local community. 

This is one way to bring about broader city or social change. You don’t ask the government to do it. Instead, you gather with other citizens and you demonstrate to the government that it is needed, is wanted, and works. That is why New York is adopting curbside composting now. Because so many communities like ours demonstrated that composting is needed, is wanted, and works. 

Meanwhile, the personal benefits to me were the people I met and the friends I made. Also, I figured it out on my own. I didn’t know what I was doing, and I started it and saw it through. I developed my own system of doing something. Once you do that in one area of your life, then you can do it in all areas. It made me less uncomfortable with not knowing how to start.

Here is the moral of this story for me: We can, through our own lifestyles and our participation in communities and local and state governments, still initiate positive change. We don’t have to settle only for resisting negative change.


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A Soil Pilgrimage

SUBHEAD: Organic farming is the answer to drought and climate change and disintegration of civilization.

By Vandana Shiva on 15 October 2015 for The Asian Age -
(http://www.asianage.com/columnists/soil-pilgrimage-994)


Image above: Vandana Shive on "A soul Pigtimage". From (http://seedfreedom.info/campaign/terra-viva-our-soil-our-commons-our-future/).

Organic farming is the answer to drought and climate change. If we do not respect the soil and if we do not recommit ourselves to ahimsa, we can rapidly disintegrate as a civilization.

[Ashisma: circa 1875 - Without injury - Sanskrit,"a" without, and "himsa" injury]

I have just returned from a soil pilgrimage undertaken to celebrate the International Year of Soil and renew our commitment to a non-violent relationship with the earth, the soil and our society. On October 2, we started the pilgrimage from Bapu Kutir at Sevagram Ashram, Maharashtra.

My fellow pilgrims were those who have contributed over half-a-century of their lives to build the organic movement — Andre Leu, president of International Federation of Organic Agricultural Movements (IFOAM), Ronnie Cummins, director of the Organic Consumers Association (OCA) of the United States, and Will Allen, a professor and long-time organic farmer.

At Mahatma Gandhi’s hut, we took a pledge to stop the violence to the soil through chemical fertilisers and poisons and promote organic farming as ahimsa kheti. We dedicated ourselves to a transition from a violent, chemical, industrial agriculture that is destroying soil fertility and trapping farmers in debt through high-cost seeds and chemicals.

Vidarbha, for example, has emerged as the epicenter of debt-induced farmers’ suicides. It is also the region with the highest acreage of genetically modified organism (GMO) Bt cotton. Fields of non-Bt, native cotton — which is totally pest and weed-free — gives more yields than Bt cotton.

The Bt fields are being doused in pesticides because of pest outbreaks, since Bt is failing as a tool to control pests. Bt cotton fields are also being sprayed with Monsanto’s Roundup, a known carcinogen to control weeds.

There is no regulation of the poisons being used. Most of the GMO cotton seed is being blended and labelled for sale as vegetable oil. We are being fed GMO cotton seed oil, even though GMOs are not allowed in food in India. And while toxic oils spread without regulation, the new food safety rules have shut down the ghani (virgin oil press) that sold healthy and safe oils like flax, groundnut, sesame and mustard.

The oilcake is being fed to our cows. Those who kill others in the name of cow protection are silent on the fight against the toxic giants who are poisoning our “gau mata”.

The pilgrimage concluded at the Agriculture College, Indore, which started as Albert Howard’s institute on organic farming that contributed to the famous Indore process of composting.

Mahatma Gandhi came to know of the Indore process when he visited London to attend the Round Table Conference. Gandhi and Howard have shown that we can have a peaceful and respectful relationship with the soil and with each other.

Howard was sent to India in 1905 by the British Empire to introduce chemical farming. When he arrived, he found the soils were fertile and there were no pests in the fields. He decided to make the Indian peasant his professor and wrote the book An Agricultural Testament, known as the bible of organic farming.

Organic farming is the original example of “Make in India”. Howard’s book helped spread the organic movement to the US through the Rodale Institute and to the UK through the Soil Association, finding its way to far corners of the world.

The soil pilgrimage was our expression of gratitude to sources of organic farming in India — our fertile and generous land and Mother Earth that have sustained us for millennia.

Ecological and regenerative agriculture is based on recycling organic matter, and hence recycling nutrients. It is based on the Law of Return — giving nutrients back to the soil. As Howard wrote in The Soil and Health: “Taking without giving is a robbery of the soil and a banditry; a particularly mean form of banditry, because it involves the robbing of future generations which are not here to defend themselves.”

In taking care of the soil, we also produce more food on less land. Fertile soils are the sustainable answer to food and nutrition security. Organic agriculture is the only real answer to climate change.

The air pollution that has built up in the atmosphere is roughly 400 parts per million (ppm) carbon dioxide today. This is the reason for the greenhouse effect and climate chaos, including temperature rise. To cap the rise of temperature at two degrees centigrade, we need to reduce the carbon build up in the air to 350 ppm.

There is a need to reduce emissions and phase out fossil fuels, but it also requires reducing the stocks of excess carbon from the atmosphere and putting it back into the soil where it belongs. Here, organic, regenerative agriculture offers us the way out.

In the process, it also addresses food insecurity and hunger, reverses desertification, creates livelihood security by creating ecological security, and, therefore, creates the path to peace.

Above all, it allows a transition from the violent paradigm, structures and systems of capitalist patriarchy to the non-violent paradigm, structures and systems based on ahimsa, which include the well being of all.

Organic farming is the answer to drought and climate change. It is also a peace solution. If we do not respect the soil and our cultural diversity and if we do not collectively recommit ourselves to ahimsa, we can rapidly disintegrate as a civilization.

For me, organic agriculture is the dharma that sows the seeds of peace and prosperity for all. It helps us break out of the vicious cycle of violence and degeneration, and create virtuous cycles based on non-violence and regeneration.

Just as humus in soil binds soil particles and prevents soil erosion, it also binds the society and prevents violence and social disintegration. Since humus provides food, livelihood, water and climate security, it also contributes to peace.

Just as wet straw cannot be put on fire by a matchstick, communities that are secure cannot be put on fire by violent elements feeding on insecurity created by an economic model that is killing swadeshi and is only designed for global economic powers to extract what they want.

In taking care of the soil, we reclaim our humanity. Our future is inseparable from the future of the earth. It is no accident that the word human has its roots in humus — soil in Latin. And Adam, the first human in Abrahamanic traditions, is derived from Adamus, soil in Hebrew.

Mahatma Gandhi wrote: “To forget how to dig the earth and tend the soil is to forget ourselves.”

We must never forget that ahimsa must be the basis of our relationship with the earth and each other.

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Singing Frogs Farm

SUBHEAD: Their no-till system adds biodiversity; cleans groundwater, disease, and bugs, sequesters staggering amounts of carbon.

By Toby Hemenway 14 September 2015 for TobyHemenway.com -
(http://tobyhemenway.com/1172-checking-all-the-boxes-at-singing-frogs-farm/)


Image above: Chickens working a compost pile at Singing Frogs Farm. From (http://photobotanic.photoshelter.com/gallery-image/Singing-Frogs-Farms/G0000dKzGIfEV_MM/I0000Dp6eHVILwe4).

“Though the problems of the world are increasingly complex, the solutions remain embarrassingly simple.” These words from permaculture co-founder Bill Mollison rang in my ears recently as I toured Singing Frogs Farm near my home in Sebastopol, California. Owners Paul and Elizabeth Kaiser may have found solutions for some of the planet’s most urgent and intractable problems on their eight-acre, beyond-organic, permaculture-inspired no-till farm.

In just over four years, they’ve increased their soil’s organic matter content almost 400%, boosted biodiversity on their land, are grossing $100,000 per year on each of three acres of vegetables, and have won numerous awards for conservation and stewardship.

What’s their secret? “You have to have a system,” Paul says. This system starts with generous amounts of compost—about 60 tons per acre per year—which is far more than organic standards recommend. In fact, it’s so much more that some USDA Extension agents told Paul that because of it, he must be polluting the water table with nitrates and phosphates.

So Kaiser did the science: He measured the nitrate and other contaminant levels in the rain and soil water entering their farm, in the soil itself, and in the water leaving the farm. It turned out that the water exiting the farm was cleaner than the water coming in. So with their methods, we can put a check in the box labeled “creates clean water.”

All that organic matter holds water in the soil, too. Kaiser says that every increase in organic matter of one percent lets each acre of soil hold 16,500 gallons more water. His soil has leapt from less than two percent organic matter to more than eight percent, which means each acre can store about 100,000 gallons more water than before.

Thus the farm is far more drought-proof than a typical operation. On our tour, in the heat of early September and after months of no rain, I saw that the grass in the paths and roadways was still green. “We don’t irrigate our roads, obviously,” Paul reminded us. Another point for their methods: drought is much less of a problem for them.

All that compost stimulates tremendous growth in their crops, helping them out-compete weeds that are not as well adapted to such high fertility levels. Thus, weeding costs are low. Another checkmark for their techniques.

The Kaisers have also added over 3000 native plants to their farm, in hedgerows and edge plantings. This, plus the immense range of vegetables and flowers at the site, has stimulated incredible biodiversity: roughly double the number of bird species have been counted on the farm than in a comparable nearby area of native plants. I’ve often been tempted to say, in spite of the hubris this may hint at, that good design can help us do “better than nature.” Singing Frogs Farm suggests that this can be true.

The biggest triumph of the farm to my mind is carbon sequestering. The Kaisers do this very permaculturally: in multiple ways, with multiple benefits. First is composting, done by recycling farm waste and by importing material from the county composting program. The second is by not tilling. Paul is adamantly against tilling, which he likens to blasting the soil life with an earthquake, forest fire, hurricane, and tornado all at once.

Tilling burns up organic matter, dries the soil and ruins its texture, kills soil life, and lets soil blow away, among other evils. In their system, rather than till they keep plants in the soil continuously.

Here they are blessed by Sonoma County’s year-round growing climate but, in their microclimate, they get serious hard frosts. Paul explains that the rich organic matter and soil life protect their plants from the cold. “My neighbors have a milder microclimate,” Paul says, “But their plants turn to mush in cold weather that mine survive with no problems.”

To keep the soil constantly filled with plants, most of their vegetables are transplanted from starts.

This is the heart of the “system” that Paul talks about—a meticulously planned seeding and planting schedule for thousands of plants. As one crop matures the farm workers poke young starts underneath. When the plants are spent, they cut them off at the stem, leaving the roots to rot in the soil.

This adds still more carbon (and suppresses weeds, too). Data from Rattan Lal, professor of soil physics at Ohio State and a well-known expert on carbon sequestering, suggests that if the carbon content of most of the world’s farmland could be raised by two percentage points, we could sequester all the carbon pumped into the atmosphere during the industrial era.

The Kaisers have raised their SOM not by two but by six percent. Imagine if half the world’s farmers used their methods! So we can add “mitigates anthropogenic global warming” to the benefits of the Kaisers’ methods.

Though I could go on extolling the virtues of Singing Frogs Farm for pages more, I’ll add just one more important point: Because their system generates $100,000 per acre per year, they pay their workers nearly double the average farm wage for the county.

Also, unlike nearly every other CSA in the county, they grow year round, allowing them to keep most of their staff employed all year. So we can check the box “social justice” along with all the others.

The solutions to the world’s problems really are embarrassingly simple. The Kaisers’ no-till system boosts biodiversity; mitigates drought; cleans groundwater; protects plants from frost, disease, and bugs; sequesters staggering amounts of carbon; and pays a fair wage. If most farms used the Kaisers’ methods, we’d go a long way toward solving some of the most urgent challenges facing humanity. Imagine that.

You can learn more about Singing Frogs Farm at (www.singingfrogsfarm.com).


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No Dig Vegetable Garden

SUBHEAD: There are several styles of no-dig gardening, including straw bale gardening.

By Linda Ly on 5 March 2014 for Garden Betty -
(http://www.gardenbetty.com/2014/03/the-no-dig-vegetable-garden/)


Image above: Claw foot porcelain tub planter. From original article).

[IB Publisher note: This article wasn't posted for the cute claw footed tub, but for the thin, efficient, economic soil recipe that is described using mostly straw, alfalfa and newspaper.]

I started a new garden bed last fall, and I didn’t dig a thing. It actually would’ve been pretty challenging to dig anything, as I started the new bed in an old bathtub. In my backyard! Four months later, the first plants seeded are finally thriving, thanks to the longer days.

I inherited this vintage, enameled-steel clawfoot tub from the previous owners after I moved into my house a few years ago. They had it propped up under the feijoa tree on a stack of stones, and for many summers it was our repurposed party cooler, filled to the brim with ice and stuffed with cases of beer. But having the tub sit empty the rest of the year seemed silly, especially since we weren’t using it as an actual tub to wash anything in the garden.


Image above: Rusty clawfoot porcelain iron tub.

I envisioned turning it into a planter (especially a future planter for potatoes and sweet potatoes, where the tubers could be contained), but the massive size made filling it with good-quality soil a little cost-prohibitive, considering we needed to top off all our existing beds as well. I started looking into no-dig methods for building raised beds, which pile on layers of organic materials that decompose over a season to create humus-rich earth.

There are several styles of no-dig gardening, including straw bale gardening, lasagna gardening, and sheet mulching, but I was most intrigued with Esther Deans’ method, which appeared suspiciously simple. The Australian gardener and author promoted a style of no-dig gardening (you can still find her book online) that popularized no-dig gardens throughout the 70s and 80s, and inspired the ideas of permaculture designer Bill Mollison.

Deans’ method comprised a specific formula that started with newspaper and added fertilizer, alfalfa, straw, and finally compost. The layers could be built over a soft surface like grass or dirt — or even a hard surface like concrete, though the raised bed would have to be deep enough for deep-rooted vegetables to thrive.



Image above: No-Dig Gardening Chart.

I decided to try this method for filling my clawfoot tub, since straw and alfalfa are cheap and easy to come by at my local feed store, and I could use them to mulch and amend several other beds in the garden.

I started with about 10 sheets of newspaper layered in the bottom of the tub. In my case, they were less for weed suppression, and more for adding brown matter and providing food for the worms that will make their home in the tub.

Next came a generous dusting of fertilizer — I chose bone meal and blood meal, but animal manure or any high-nitrogen fertilizer would work. Rather than following the suggested application on the packages, I tossed in a few handfuls of each, then watered them in well. (A few handfuls is much more than you would typically use if you were fertilizing a bed, but in this case, the extra bone meal and blood meal is added to accelerate the breakdown of the layers.)

Then came the alfalfa. Alfalfa (also called lucerne hay) is the same stuff used as horse feed. It comes in bales that pull apart in 3-inch pads and makes an excellent base for a no-dig garden.


Image above: "Bale of alfalfa (lucerne hay)


Image above: Close uo of alfalfa.


With its super nutritious and high nitrogen content, it rots quickly, providing rich organic matter for plants and helping other materials decompose. I covered the bottom of my tub with two layers of alfalfa pads (about 6 inches), a few more handfuls of bone meal and blood meal, then soaked them thoroughly with a hose.

On top of the alfalfa, I added a thick layer of straw (about 12 inches, or double my alfalfa layer).

Straw is basically hay without the grains; it’s the hollow stems and dried leaves left behind after all the grains and seeds have been harvested. It’s not as nitrogen-rich, but breaks down quickly into compost and contains fewer seeds, meaning less weeds growing in your no-dig bed.

Really pack in and pack down the straw in your raised bed (even building the layer up to the lip), as it will greatly compress after a couple of months.


Image above: Bale of Straw.

Following the straw was another generous dusting of bone meal and blood meal, and another soak with the hose.

Finally, the topmost layer was a healthy addition of compost (about 3 to 6 inches). Whatever you use, it should be well rotted and teeming with microbes. This is the layer you’ll be seeding and planting in, so don’t skimp on the compost. Wet it down, and you’re ready to plant!

In a standard-depth raised bed, the ratio of layers would more likely look like this from the bottom up:

• 10 sheets of newspaper
• 3 inches of alfalfa (one pad)
• 6 inches of straw
• 3 to 6 inches of compost (or well amended soil)

Scatter bone meal and blood meal over each layer and saturate with water before adding the next layer. It might seem like you’re piling on a mountain of materials, but the alfalfa and straw will compress under repeated watering and reduce to about half their height by the end of the season.

The no-dig method also works for reviving an old raised bed; just omit the straw layer and add the rest on top of the existing soil. I had a bed sit empty and dry for a couple of months, and its soil had turned into heavy, compacted earth. I stacked on the newspaper, bone and blood meal, alfalfa, more bone and blood meal, then topped off with homemade compost, and sprayed each layer with water.


Image above: Neglected garden bed.


Image above: Alfalfa pads spread across raised bed.


Image above: Newly revived garden bed.

I didn’t plant in the bed, but watered it with the rest of the garden through winter and now have lush, aerated soil to plant in spring.

Going back to the bathtub, this is what it looks like today, planted with kale, turnip, and lettuce.


Image above: Leafy greens in clawfoot tub.


Image above: Portuguese kale.


Image above: Red lettuce.

I started everything from seed and they sprouted within a week. I watered like normal and did not fertilize the bed. (Though going into spring, I’ll be amending with fish emulsion or compost tea to replenish the nitrogen in the soil.)

I’ve read from a few sources that newly built no-dig beds work best with shallow-rooted plants until the layers break down into humus. But from the looks of it, my turnips (shown here in the foreground) are faring well so far.


Image above: Kale, turnips, and lettuce growing in bathtub planter.

I probably wouldn’t plant, say, carrots or daikon in a first-season bed as they’re very deep-rooted. I’d avoid planting peas and beans as they can be sensitive to the salinity in high-nitrogen fertilizers.
Excess nitrogen can also cause fruiting plants to produce lots of foliage but fewer flowers. By the second season, however, all that alfalfa and straw will have turned into rich black soil that’s ideal for all of those varieties.

Like any raised bed, you should top off and amend your no-dig bed every season with soil and compost. But once it’s established, maintaining it requires no real effort and reviving it (if you’ve neglected to plant or amend) requires no back-breaking digging. Simply build upon the layers again and let nature do the work.


Vintage bathtub planter.



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Climate Change SOS

SUBHEAD: Soil is the solution to the most important environmental story you will hear.  

By Sven Eberlein on 21 August 2012 for the Daily Kos -  
(http://www.dailykos.com/story/2012/08/21/1120065/-Climate-Change-SOS-Soil-is-the-Solution-or-the-most-important-environmental-story-I-ll-ever-write)



Image above: Agronomist Bob Shaffer shows long roots of a mustard plant. The roots carry nutrients and carbon deep into the soil. By composting 620,000 tons San Francisco residents and businesses returned nutrients to local farms and sequestered, or put back into the soil, 18,400 metric tons of CO2. Photo by Larry Strong, courtesy of Recology.

A few months ago I was working on an article about San Francisco's pioneering efforts to become the world's first zero-waste city by 2020.

Chronicling this journey toward a current nation-leading 78 percent waste diversion rate, a major focus of the story was on the city's mandatory composting program that has played a huge role in keeping over a million tons of food scraps, plant trimmings, soiled paper, and other compostable materials from clogging up landfills and releasing methane into the atmosphere.

I was particularly interested in the idea of the food cycle, and it was heartening to see just how far along the City by the Bay has come in closing it: each day 600 tons of sloppy goodness from hundreds of thousands of residents, businesses, and over 5,000 restaurants gets shipped to a local state of the art composting facility, from where it returns to residents’ dinner tables in the form of fresh, organic foods grown by local farmers who use the city’s nutrient-rich compost as fertilizer.
It wasn't until after the story was published that I was alerted to the most remarkable and possibly game-changing discovery about urban compost: its potential to offset 20 percent and perhaps as much as 40 percent of America's carbon emissions!

Please follow me below the light brown dung beetle underneath the tuber curtain to dig a little deeper...

Shortly after the article went live I received an email from Robert Reed, composting manager at SF's waste management company Recology, telling me how much he enjoyed the piece, but that there was one benefit of composting that I had failed to mention. He said that vineyards and farms were now using San Francisco's compost not just to grow fruits and vegetables, but to grow cover crops that pull carbon out of the atmosphere.
These were his exact words:

That is remarkable and a partial fix for climate change. If everyone did it and if we planted more trees on marginal soils, we could offset 20 percent of America's carbon emissions!

He also sent me some photos and descriptions that illustrate how this method has been applied by local farmers who've been planting cover crops with SF compost...
 
Image above: Cover crops being grown at Chateau Montelena with San Francisco compost. Please note the way the crops are planted between the rows of vines. The 8-foot-wide hallway, between the rows of vines, is previously unused agricultural space, high-quality ag space. Vineyard crews drill holes in the floor of the vineyard and put cover crops seeds in the holes. Then they apply compost made from food scraps collected in San Francisco over the floor of the vineyard. hoto by Larry Strong, courtesy of Recology.

Now, I had heard plenty about planting trees and forests to absorb CO2, but it takes a lot of open land to do that, so if indeed we could use already existing and unused farmland to sequester carbon, that would truly be a win-win situation. Working for one of the most serious (no)-waste management companies in the world, I trusted that Robert wasn't just making this up, but he insisted I didn't take his word for it and connected me with the people who have been studying and working with compost and cover crops for years.

First I got in touch with Fulbright Scholar and former Rodale Institute Research Director, Paul Hepperly. In his research, Dr. Hepperly found that applying food scrap compost to one acre of land can add 12,000 pounds of carbon to the soil in one year, taking it out of the atmosphere, while conventional farming — tilling the land, using commercial fertilizers, etc. — releases 3,700 pounds of carbon dioxide into the atmosphere per acre per year.

In a nutshell, what happens is that these cover crops like mustard, beans, anise, or wild iris grow long roots that carry carbon 14 inches into the soil. The nitrogen-rich urban compost itself also retains carbon, provides carbon to the soil, and helps enable the earth to store carbon.

| 
Image above: Vineyards in Northern California apply compost made from food scraps to grow cover crops such as mustard and beans. That stimulates microbial activity and helps turn farms into carbon sinks Photo by Larry Strong, courtesy of Recology.

According to Dr. Hepperly, one of the big problems with our present approach to the greenhouse gas issue is a lack of a holistic perspective. While we're trying to find ways to reduce emissions we have not looked at the enormous potential that sequestration of carbon and nitrogen in our soil has for counteracting not only agricultural emissions but the emissions for transportation and industrial sources.

To illustrate this point, all you need to do is look at the current dismal 3% nationwide composting rate. What this means is not only that we're letting 97% of our food scraps needlessly fill up landfills across the U.S. and release methane into the atmosphere, but we're squandering a huge opportunity to use a simple natural food cycle to pull loads of carbon back into the ground. Not to mention the restorative effect of returning carbon and nitrogen to our eroding topsoils and nutritional value to our food. It's full circle!

As amazing as this is, it didn't seem like rocket science to me. I mean, long before industrial agriculture and chemical fertilizers created the illusion of flawlessly chiseled vegetables magically appearing on Walmart shelves, farmers and the general population alike knew that compost is one of the most precious, life-giving resources on earth. My mom, who grew up in a rural area of Southern Germany, has always treated compost like gold. Any amateur gardener covets her food waste like a Momma Bear her cub.

So how did we get to a place where we're throwing away over 97% of all our food waste?
I got some of the answers to this question from Bob Shaffer, an agronomist based in Glen Ellen, CA, who's been compost-consulting with vineyards and farms all over California and Hawaii for many years and who is one of the main liaisons between Recology and the Northern California agricultural community. A former farmer himself, Bob told me that the practice of applying compost to cover crops is not only catching on among small farmers concerned about erosion and producing high mineral value food, but among big players like General Mills eager to restore their soils ravaged from decades of chemical fertilizers.

"We take our most precious land and we raise crops at great cost. We take our best people — well trained farmers, scientists, universities — into a system raising that food. We use chemicals and all that junk to raise it. Then we transport the food 2000 miles — another great cost — and then we cook it and throw much of it away!
If we allow this to go on any longer, not only are we poisoning ourselves with methane, which is a potent greenhouse gas, we fill up our landfills, which we don't have any room for, and we're not getting the most precious thing that we raise, high mineral value food, back into the soil where it belongs. Now that's a full-blown crisis."
- Bob Shaffer

The problem now, according to Bob, is that while Recology produces about 150,000 cubic yards of compost annually and supplies more than 200 Napa Valley wineries, the demand for this precious resource is getting so high, the dismal 3% national composting rate is causing severe shortages.
On one hand, this is exciting, as it shows that more and more growers are realizing the great benefits not only to their own soils and crops but their unique position in being part of the solution to climate change. Bob told me that some of the larger Big Ag companies like General Mills are even beginning to produce their own compost by designating entire fields to growing giant grasses like Miscanthus, switchgrass, and Arundo donax that not only sequester carbon in their deep roots but whose cuttings make for great nutrient-rich composting material. "We'll grow our own carbon," he says. It's a win win, because we don't have to transport it, we don't have to buy it, it puts carbon back where it belongs, back into the plant, and we chop the plant, compost it, and composting is the process that stabilizes carbon and nitrogen."

And yet, the scope of composting programs around the country is still so miniscule that we are missing one of the most natural and promising opportunities right before our eyes to sequester huge amounts of CO2 out of the atmosphere.

While San Francisco has led the way in showing what's possible with a mandatory composting program and a state of the art composting facility...

The composting program alone has diverted one million tons of waste from landfill disposal. By reducing methane, a potent greenhouse gas produced in landfills and by sequestering carbon in the topsoil of local farms, the program has created a total carbon dioxide equivalent benefit of more than 305,944 metric tons – equal to offsetting emissions from all vehicles crossing the Bay Bridge for two years (Greenhouse gas offsets based on a protocol set by the Climate Action Reserve).

...many municipalities poised to start their own composting programs find themselves running up against not only a perceived "yuckiness" factor among residents but a maze of arcane composting regulations that make it difficult to build new composting facilities. And no surprise, big pharma and producers of chemical fertilizers are lobbying against new facilities.

To all the people involved in municipal composting, this movement to drastically ramp up urban compost production to use as cover crops is the great untold story in the fight against a warming planet. As the devastating effects of climate change are manifesting at an ever increasing frequency and the calls for action are getting louder and stronger, we have an incredible opportunity to educate Americans about the relationship between soil, food, health, and climate and advocate for the common sense policies that will create urban composting programs, modern composting facilities, and an increasing number of farmers who use cover crops to restore their soils, and with it, the earth's ecosystem.

As for me, I have pitched this story to a number of major publications, with no response so far. I may not be the most credentialed writer to tell this story, but I know it needs to be told, so we can start getting the word out on this holistic, common sense, and all around beneficial solution to climate change.

Last I heard from Paul Hepperly, his research showed that it could be possible to offset up to 40 percent of greenhouse gases by utilizing more holistic farming practices.
Someone please tell the New York Times and 60 Minutes...

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Reducing Our Water Use

SUBHEAD: The existing water-based waste disposal economy is not viable. Recycling human waste is a necessity.

By Lester R. Brown on 3 November 2010 in Earth Policy Institute -
(http://www.earth-policy.org/book_bytes/2010/pb4ch06_ss5)


 

Image above: An example of a composting toilet. From (http://www.compostingtoiletreviews.com/types-of-composting-toilets).  

U.S. President Theodore Roosevelt once noted that “civilized people ought to know how to dispose of the sewage in some other way than putting it into the drinking water.” The one-time use of water to disperse human and industrial wastes is an outmoded practice, made obsolete by new technologies and water shortages.

Yet it is still common around much of the world. Water enters a city, becomes contaminated with human and industrial wastes, and leaves the city dangerously polluted. Toxic industrial wastes discharged into rivers and lakes or into wells also permeate aquifers, making water—both surface and underground—unsafe for drinking.

The current engineering concept for dealing with human waste is to use vast quantities of water to wash it away, preferably into a sewer system, where it may or may not be treated before being discharged into the local river.

The “flush and forget” system takes nutrients originating in the soil and typically dumps them into the nearest body of water. Not only are the nutrients lost from agriculture, but the nutrient overload has contributed to the death of many rivers and to the formation of some 405 “dead zones” in ocean coastal regions.

This outdated system is expensive and water-intensive, disrupts the nutrient cycle, and can be a major source of disease and death. Worldwide, poor sanitation and personal hygiene claim the lives of some 2 million children per year, a toll that is one third the size of the 6 million lives claimed by hunger and malnutrition.

 Sunita Narain of the Centre for Science and Environment in India argues convincingly that a water-based disposal system with sewage treatment facilities is neither environmentally nor economically viable for India. She notes that an Indian family of five, producing 250 liters of excrement in a year and using a water flush toilet, contaminates 150,000 liters of water when washing away its wastes.

As currently designed, India’s sewer system is actually a pathogen-dispersal system. It takes a small quantity of contaminated material and uses it to make vast quantities of water unfit for human use. With this system, Narain says, both “our rivers and our children are dying.” India’s government, like that of many developing countries, is hopelessly chasing the goal of universal water-based sewage systems and sewage treatment facilities—unable to close the huge gap between services needed and provided, but unwilling to admit that it is not an economically viable option.

Fortunately, there is a low-cost alternative: the composting toilet. This is a simple, waterless, odorless toilet linked to a small compost facility and sometimes a separate urine collecting facility. Collected urine can be trucked to nearby farms, much as fertilizer is. The dry composting converts human fecal material into a soil-like humus, which is essentially odorless and is scarcely 10 percent of the original volume.

These facilities need to be emptied every year or so, depending on design and size. Vendors periodically collect the humus and market it as a soil supplement, thus ensuring that the nutrients and organic matter return to the soil, reducing the need for energy-intensive fertilizer. This technology sharply reduces residential water use compared with flush toilets, thus cutting water bills and lowering the energy needed to pump and purify water.

As a bonus, it also reduces garbage flow if table wastes are incorporated, eliminates the sewage water disposal problem, and restores the nutrient cycle. The U.S. Environmental Protection Agency now lists several brands of dry compost toilets approved for use. Pioneered in Sweden, these toilets work well under the widely varying conditions in which they are now used, including Swedish apartment buildings, U.S. private residences, and Chinese villages.

For many of the 2.5 billion people who lack improved sanitation facilities, composting toilets may be the answer. Rose George, author of The Big Necessity: The Unmentionable World of Human Waste and Why It Matters, reminds us why the “flush and forget” system is an energy guzzler. 

One, it takes energy to deliver large quantities of drinking-quality water (up to 30 percent of household water usage is for flushing).

Two, it takes energy—and lots of it—to operate a sewage treatment facility. 

 In summary, there are several reasons why the advanced design composting toilets deserve top priority: spreading water shortages, rising energy prices, rising carbon emissions, shrinking phosphate reserves, a growing number of sewage-fed oceanic dead zones, the rising health care costs of sewage-dispersed intestinal diseases, and the rising capital costs of “flush and forget” sewage disposal systems. Once a toilet is separated from the water use system, recycling household water becomes a much simpler process. For cities, the most effective single step to raise water productivity is to adopt a comprehensive water treatment/recycling system, reusing the same water continuously.

With this system, which is much simpler if sewage is not included in the waste water, only a small percentage of water is lost to evaporation each time it cycles through. Given the technologies that are available today, it is quite possible to recycle the urban water supply indefinitely, largely removing cities as a claimant on scarce water resources. Some places faced with shrinking water supplies and rising water costs are beginning to recycle their water. Singapore, for example, which buys water from Malaysia at a high price, is already recycling water, reducing the amount it imports.

Windhoek, capital of Namibia and one of the most arid locations in Africa, recycles waste water for drinking water. In water-stressed California, Orange County invested in a $481-million treatment facility that opened in early 2008 to convert sewage into safe clean water, which is used to replenish the local aquifer. Los Angeles is planning to do the same. For more and more cities, water recycling is becoming a condition of survival. Individual industries facing water shortages are also moving away from the use of water to disperse waste.

Some companies segregate effluent streams, treating each individually with the appropriate chemicals and membrane filtration, preparing the water for reuse. Peter Gleick, lead author of the biennial report The World’s Water, writes: “Some industries, such as paper and pulp, industrial laundries, and metal finishing, are beginning to develop ‘closed-loop’ systems where all the wastewater is reused internally, with only small amounts of fresh water needed to make up for water incorporated into the product or lost in evaporation.”

Industries are moving faster than cities, but the technologies they are developing can also be used in urban water recycling. At the household level, water can also be saved by using more water-efficient showerheads, flush toilets, dishwashers, and clothes washers. Some countries are adopting water efficiency standards and labeling for appliances, much as has been done for energy efficiency.

When water costs rise, as they inevitably will, investments in composting toilets and more water-efficient household appliances will become increasingly attractive to individual homeowners. Two household appliances—toilets and showers—together account for over half of indoor water use. Whereas traditional flush toilets used 6 gallons (or 22.7 liters) per flush, the legal U.S. maximum for new toilets is 1.6 gallons. New toilets with a dual-flush technology use only 1 gallon for a liquid waste flush and 1.6 gallons for a solid waste flush. Shifting from a showerhead flowing at 5 gallons per minute to a 2.5 gallons-per-minute model cuts water use in half.

With washing machines, a European horizontal axis design uses 40 percent less water than traditional top-loading models. The existing water-based waste disposal economy is not viable. There are too many households, factories, and feedlots to simply try and wash waste away on our crowded planet. To do so is ecologically mindless and outdated—an approach that belongs to a time when there were far fewer people and far less economic activity.

Adapted from Chapter 6, “Designing Cities for People” in Lester R. Brown, Plan B 4.0: Mobilizing to Save Civilization (New York: W.W. Norton & Company, 2009), available on-line at www.earth-policy.org/books/pb4
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Building a Worm Farm

SUBHEAD: Instructions on building and maintaining a worm farm in your home. 
 

By Eric on 9 May 2009 for WannaVeg.org -  

(http://wannaveg.com/2009/05/03/start-a-worm-bin/)

Image above: A thriving worm farm in a plastic tub. From original article.

[Editor's note: The links between Part 1 & 2 of the original article are broken. All four parts are reconstructed here. For original Part 2 try http://wannaveg.com/2009/05/05/start-a-worm-bin-part-2]

PART ONE: REASONS TO WORM

So you want to be a worm farmer! What’s that, no…you don’t? Oh come on, what about all the free fertilizer and sparkling worm personalities? Kinda seriously, worms make for quiet, low maintenance and symbiotic pets.

Ok, well ‘pets’ may be stretching it, but vermi-composting (composting using worms) is a great way to reduce the amount of food waste you throw away and in return they will give you some fantastic, nutrient rich compost (castings). Did you know that food waste makes up about 12 percent of the total waste stream in the US? Now we can all take this simple step to reduce our environmental impact and our vegetables and other plants will love us for it. Plus…it’s fun!

When it comes to giving your worms a home, you have lots of options. There are all kinds of pre-fabricated bins out there and some municipalities will either give you a bin or subsidize one for you. I personally prefer to make my own bin because it’s easy and cheap to do. One other cool thing about keeping a worm bin…it doesn’t matter if you live in an apartment or a castle, there is a bin size sure to fit whatever space you have available.

Ok, I know what you’re saying. “I don’t want some stinky garbage can full of worms in my house…” and I don’t blame you! Believe it or not, your worm bin should not smell bad at all. In fact if it does smell bad, there is something wrong with it (we’ll talk about this later). The bin does have a pleasant “earthy” aroma similar to what you smell in a forest. It’s very tolerable and unobtrusive.

To recap: starting a worm bin will reduce food waste, create great fertilizer and make you the life of the party. There are no downsides to it!

PART TWO: HOW TO INSTRUCTIONS

Here’s a materials list of items you will need.

• 2 “Rubbermaid” type containers. 18 gallons is about the perfect size. Larger or smaller work well also.
• A bunch of newspapers
• 2 — 2×4, cut to fit into one of the containers
• 1 pound of worms, obviously, (red wigglers are the best for this) do a quick search on the Internet for someone that sells them near you. They run about $20-$25 for the pound and that’s all you will ever need to buy.
• About 1 pound of food scraps
• 1 drill
• 1 bucket of water

Step 1- Drill some drainage holes through one of the bins (20 should be good). Try to drill the holes about the same size as the larger worms. This will allow excess water to drain down into the bottom (drainage) bin as well as create air holes for air to get into the bin.

Step 2- Cut your 2×4 to fit inside of the lower bin. Now put the first bin (the one with the holes) inside of this bin creating a “nested” worm bin. This bin is a drainage bin for catching any excess liquid from the main bin. If there is liquid in this bin, just pour it on your plants…it’s called “worm tea” and makes for excellent fertilizer. Don’t worry about over fertilizing your plants with this either. Worm castings are very gentle on plant roots.

Step 3- Line the bottom of your bin with whole newspapers, paper bags, cardboard or any other natural material such as burlap, hemp, etc to create a temporary barrier to keep the worms from going through the drainage holes. I say temporary because eventually all the bedding and linings will be eaten by the worms.

Step 4- Shred up a bunch on newspaper about an inch or so wide. Dunk it I the bucket of water, ring it out and throw it in the bin. Fluff up the newspaper. This is the bedding for the worms. You’ll want about 4-6 inches of bedding in the bin.

Step 5- Now place your worms on top of the bedding.

Step 6- Now place your food scraps on top of the worms.

Step 7- Shred some newspaper again, but this time don’t wet it. This is the covering for the bin. Shred up enough to fill the bin to the top.

Flash forward 4-5 months….

Step 8- This compost is almost ready. It’s time to get the worms out of it and let the remaining worms “finish” off the job and eat whatever is left in the bin.

Step 9- To coax your worms out of the castings, push all the contents of your bin over to one side. On the other side we’ll lay down some fresh bedding. Follow steps 3-6 above for one side. In about a month or so, all your worms will finish off whatever food scraps are left in the castings and move over to the other side where the fresh bedding and food is. After that, you can remove the castings and use them to fertilize your plants or make worm “tea” for liquid fertilizer.

And it’s as simple as that. Don’t worry about not knowing everything at first, or making mistakes. It’s really simple to do and if you stick with it through one cycle, you’ll be a master! You’re now on your way to the wonderful world of vermi-composting. Congratulations!

PART THREE: TIPS AND FAQS

Some Helpful Tips:

1. Remember, go easy on the food at first. It’s very easy to overfeed the worms and although it won’t cause them any harm, the bin my start to smell or attract fruit flies. Check on the worms every 4-5 days to make sure they are doing ok and the food is being eaten (start adding more food). Don’t be afraid to continue to throw your scraps away for awhile, or you can freeze them in a container and thaw them out for later. In time your bin will be able to eat more as the population gets larger.
2. When the “covering layer” newspaper gets damp, just turn the damp paper up to the top of the bin and the dry paper down to bottom of the bin. This will allow it to dry out.
3. If the bedding and covering layer still seems too wet, you can also open the lid or take it off for awhile to allow it to dry out. I actually rarely cover my bins completely in the garage. Sometimes the opposite happens and my bin will be too dry. To combat this, I’ll just put the cover on tightly and wait a couple of days. The moisture will build back up inside.
4. As the bedding gets eaten, I like to gently “turn” the bin contents over to aerate it.
5. To feed the worms, simply lift up the covering layer and place the scraps on top. Re-cover with the layer of newspapers. Alternatively, I prefer to dig down a bit into the bedding and place the scrape into a “hole” I create. This helps to get the food to the worms a bit faster.
6. You should rarely, if ever, have to add water to moisten the bin. But if the bin is a bit dry, feel free to throw some in. The perfect consistency should be thoroughly damp, not dry or soaking.
7. Pickup some rubber dishwashing gloves to make dealing with the worms a cleaner process.

Here are the answers to some FAQs.
Q: What do I feed my worms? A: Almost any whole, uncooked, food waste. Here are some examples:

• Apple peels and cores
• Carrot peels
• Celery
• Egg shells
• Banana peels
• Lettuce stumps
• Pepper stems
• Herbs
• Bread
• Tea bags
• Coffee grounds
• I think you get it

Q: Ok, so what can I NOT feed my worms? A: This is actually a bit easier to answer. Worms can eat a ton of stuff, but there are a few things that you should not feed them, either because they take a long time to break down or are too acidic or harmful to the worms. These items include:

• Citrus peels or citrus fruit
• Meats, fish, tofu, beans or other proteins
• Cooked or prepared foods
• Dairy
• Onions
• Fruit rinds (watermelon, cantelope, etc)
• Anything with cooking oils on it, like salad dressings
• That’s about it!

Q: What temperature do my worms like to live? A: About the same temperature you and I like to live in. Avoid placing their bin in direct sunlight or cold temperatures. I keep my bin in my garage, but other people I know put their bins under their kitchen sink or on their covered patio. Just remember if you’re uncomfortable with the temperature, they are also.

Q: How many worms do I need? A: Good question. About 1 lbs should get you started, that’s about 500 worms. Worms do three things: eat, poop and make more worms. In about two or three months, you’ll have double or triple that amount of worms in your bin! Oh and don’t worry, they won’t overpopulate the bin. After your first compost harvest, you can share some of your worms with friends and help them get their own bin started!

Q: How do I keep pest such as fruit flies and other insects from filling up the bin? A: Although fruit flies won’t hurt anything they can be annoying. Try to bury the food under the newspaper, this usually keeps the pests at bay. For ants and other crawling insects, a little petroleum jelly under the edge of the bin should stop them in their tracks. Although, I have really never seen any ants in my bin.

Q: When can I harvest the bin for all of the castings (worm poop)? A: Usually the bin is ready to be harvested in four of five months. See instructions on how to separate the worms from the castings (in the final part).

Q: I live in an apartment and don’t have any plants, what should I do with all the castings? A: Well you can give them to your friends or you can “guerilla” compost in planters where you live. The trees and other plants will love you for it.

Q: Can I add grass, leaves and other yard clippings to the bin? A: Very sparingly. The newspapers serve as the “browns” and the food serve as the “greens” in our little micro-world. Too much yard waste can overwhelm the worms and start to rot before they can eat it all. If you have a lot of yard waste, you may want to consider starting a traditional compost heap and use the worm castings to augment that compost. They go very nicely together and will create wonderful nutrients for your yard.

Q: What about vacation? Does someone need to watch the bin while I’m gone? A: The bin can sustain itself for about 3 weeks without needing any attention.

Q: The bin is a little smelly, what should I do? A: This is usually caused by over feeding or the lack of air. So, just reduce one and increase the other.

Q: Ok, this sounds like tons of hard work. A: Hard work is not…but it is some work. I would plan to devote 20 or so minutes a week to maintaining the bin. Most of this is spent feeding and “turning” the bin over to help aerate the compost. Like almost anything, the more experience you get the easier it becomes. I find it relaxing and enjoyable!

Q: I have more questions. A: Google, Yahoo, MSN is your friend. Do a quick search, there is a wealth of information out there. Also, feel free to contact me!

See also:
Ea O Ka Aina: Thinking like an Ecosystem 8/12/10
Ea O Ka Aina: Greetings from the Annelids 8/5/10
Ea O KA Aina: Kauai Bucket Gardening 4/14/10
Ea O Ka Aina: What Works - Food 3/29/10
Ea O Ka Aina: Kauai Organic Farm Tour 1/18/09
Ea O Ka Aina: Our first pullet egg 1/13/10 (how we built our chicken coop)
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