The Difference Between Open Pollinated Seeds, Hybrids and GMOs
It is common for people who support or defend genetically modified foods (GMOs) to argue something along the lines of, “What’s the big deal? Humans have been genetically modifying plants for thousands of years.”
Unfortunately, this claim can only be made by someone who either doesn’t understand seed breeding, or who is outright trying to deceive you. Here’s why…
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How to Keep Monsanto Out of Your Garden
It’s that exciting, hopeful time of year again: All the seed catalogs have arrived and it’s time to plan your garden and buy seeds.
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Can Organic Farming Feed the World?
There are a lot of myths about our ability to “feed the world.” Many people think that without high-tech inputs like genetically engineered crops (GMOs), pesticides and synthetic fertilizers, we will have widespread famine as the global population mushrooms to 8 or 9 billion people over the coming decades.
Nothing could be further from the truth…
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What the Economic Crisis Really Means — And What We Can Do About It
This amazing, little twelve-minute video blew my head off the other day, and I wanted to share it with you. It’s about what our current economic crisis means to the sustainability of life as we know it on our planet, and the opportunity people are taking now to create a new, better way of life for everyone.
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Why We Should All Eat Locally Grown Food
Many regions have declared September “Local Food Month.” It’s not a national celebration yet, but let’s hope it doesn’t become one. Every month should be local food month, and here’s why:
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How You Can Help Stop Monsanto
Proposition 37, a citizen’s initiative on the California ballot this November, would mandate clear labeling of genetically engineered (GE or GMO) ingredients on all food packages. This has turned California into a battleground pitting consumer and farmer advocates against multi-billion-dollar agribusiness corporations.
And it may be the most important opportunity we will get to stop Monsanto and the insane and dangerous momentum of genetically engineered foods.
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How Riding Your Bike Can Change the World
What’s not to love about a bike? It’s low-cost transportation powered by renewable energy, a low-impact exercise for almost everyone in the family to enjoy, and an essential ingredient to creating cleaner, healthier, more sustainable cities.
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Can Shopping Change the World?
Here at Small Footprint Family, I often paraphrase Anne Lappé:
“Every dollar we spend is a vote for how we want the world to be.”
And, to a great extent, this is true—especially when it comes to food, for example. Were it not for consumer demand for unadulterated, whole, organic food, the Real Food movement would not exist, and farmers who raise organic produce, pasture-raised meat and eggs, and whole, raw dairy would still be very few and very far between.
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From Overpopulation To Sustainable Prosperity
I really love the infographic meme. When they are well designed, infographics are a spectacular way of sharing information and telling a story. Here’s my latest favorite, with my comments on how we can move from overpopulation to sustainable prosperity at the end:
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Grass Fed Beef Can SOLVE Global Warming
150 years ago, much of the Midwest was still covered with chest-deep prairie grassland, providing valuable food and habitat for billions of plant and animal species, including millions of elk, bison and deer. These lands also supported natural environmental processes like carbon sequestration and seasonal flood control.
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Why We Need to Label Genetically Modified Foods
Did you know that over 70% of foods in your grocery store contain Genetically Modified (GM) ingredients? The most common foods that are genetically modified, or “engineered,” include corn, soy, canola, sugar beet, and cottonseed oil, which can be found as ingredients in almost all non-organic packaged foods, and even in the food in most restaurants.
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13 Ways to Create a Sustainable Food System
In a deep recession with looming environmental problems that seriously threaten our continued comfort on this planet, “voting with our dollars” is simply not enough.
Not that anyone ever said it was. But we must not be deluded into thinking that by buying grass-fed meat, composting and carrying reusable bags to the market we are even scratching the surface on our food and environmental problems.
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Why a Credit Union is Better Than a Bank
These days, it’s almost impossible not to feel angry about the role that Wall Street and the Big Banks have had in crashing the economy and tanking the housing market. We seem to be living in a Robber Baron-era paradigm wherein the harder Americans work, the more into debt we collectively descend.
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S. 510 Could Kill the Real Food Movement
The U.S. Senate has been working on S.510, the FDA Food Safety Modernization Act, and they hope to have it on President Obama’s desk by Easter. The Act tries to address the worst problems in U.S. agriculture, but as it stands, the bill threatens to undermine the best things in U.S. agriculture—small farmers producing for local markets.
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Sh*tty Reasons to Eat Organic
With all the poo-pooing of organic food in the mainstream media lately, I thought I’d post this week on one little-known reason to eat organic that might convince even the most die-hard organic skeptic: Poop.
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