Last weekend, I went to the Sustainable Agriculture Conference held by the Carolina Farm Stewardship Association. Several hundred farmers, social workers, farmers' market coordinators, cooks, and others interested in the farm-to-fork chain met in Black Mountain, North Carolina.
This diary covers some of the great news that came out of the conference. Aside from the specific topics covered below, just seeing so many people devoted to nurturing the planet and providing great food was a thrill. If you are trying to develop progressive momentum in your community, please make sure you are reaching out to farmers and folks who work with them.
Read on for how organic farmers and shoppers fight global warming and how one non-profit is helping farmers' markets reach food-stamp recipents while another fights to put people before pesticides.
Fighting global warming: Dr. Tim LaSalle of the Rodale Institute gave the keynote talk Saturday about how organic farming can prevent neurological damage and sequester carbon, thus slowing global warming. He's now at the climate talks in Copenhagen, sharing this great news. Research by the Rodale Institute shows that using organic farming techniques encourages deep root growth, builds carbon and beneficial fungus in the soil, prevents erosion, and helps plants survive drought. He says:
Our side-by-side field trials—where we have been comparing conventional and organic agriculture for nearly 30 years—show we can produce corn and soybeans with an average yield the same as the conventional system, while building soil health and cutting energy use. In dry years, the organic system tends to even do better, thanks to improved water-holding capacity of the extra soil organic matter.
Right now, American farmlands under organic production represent just a sliver of the pie. Even so, the 2.4 million U.S. acres managed organically in 2005—just 0.5 percent of all U.S. cropland—captured an estimated 2.4 billion pounds of atmospheric carbon.
Imagine this: the carbon sequestration potential of 25 percent or even 50 percent of U.S. agricultural farmlands converted to organic production is 120 to 240 billion pounds per year, the equivalent of removing up to 42 million cars from the road!
So buy organic to encourage more farmers to go organic.
Helping the needy, local farmers, and local economies. Robert Andrew Smith showed how the Leaflight Foundation is coordinating work in North Carolina to help farmers markets accept food stamps (SNAP payments). The Leaflight Foundation has shown the farmers that customers are often nearby using mapping software to show the proximity of SNAP recipients to markets. They also simplify the application process and the administration aspects of receiving payments, helping to identify and spread best practices among the markets.
If the government would give stimulus money to programs like this, our nation would benefit in many ways.
Reducing use of pesticides. Toxic Free NC was named Non-Profit Organization of the Year for being, as its website says, "North Carolina’s only organization working to put people before pesticides." Recent victories include getting the state legislature to create an NC Sustainable Local Food Policy Council.
While Toxic Free NC focuses on North Carolina, its site is loaded with great information for everyone who wants to protect their families and planet from the damaging pesticides.