Making It Easier to Eat Local Food

NY Times, April 19, 2010
A recent Times article highlighted a growing problem for small farmers across the nation: too few slaughterhouses. Many farmers who have answered the demand for locally raised meat have been forced to scale back expansion plans because local processors can’t handle any more animals and the cost of driving their livestock hundreds of miles for slaughter is too expensive.

According to the Department of Agriculture, the number of slaughterhouses nationwide declined to 809 in 2008 from 1,211 in 1992, while the number of small farmers has increased by 108,000 in the past five years. Agriculture Secretary Tom Vilsack has acknowledged the imbalance. “It’s pretty clear there needs to be attention paid to this,” he said.

The lack of slaughterhouses is one example of how the rapidly growing local-food movement has taxed the existing food production and distribution networks. Some advocates of the small farmers have called for help from Washington. What role, if any, should the federal government play in creating better food processing and delivery systems?

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Easter Island : A Case Study in the Response to Resource Depletion

Source: Energy Bulletin (Ralph Faggotter)

This is a case study in which you are invited to answer the question, “What did the Easter Islander who cut down the last palm tree say while he was doing it?”

For a several years, I have been intrigued by this question which Jared Diamond asks us to consider in his book ‘Collapse’.

In fact, the question can be asked more broadly: “What were the thought processes and discussions amongst the inhabitants of Easter Island leading up to the removal of the last remnants of forest?” This could be seen, perhaps, as a hypothetical exploration, rooted in a real historical event, of “the psychology of resource depletion denial.”

I can’t help feeling that this is highly relevant to us today where the world seems shrunk to the size of a small island in the vast ocean of space. How could the islanders so knowingly have destroyed the life-blood of their island and their own future? How do you imagine the Easter Islanders behaved in those last few years before the last tree was felled?

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Washington envisage un déclin de la production de pétrole mondiale à partir de 2011

Source : Le monde, 23 mars 2010

Le département de l’énergie américain reconnaît qu’“il existe une chance pour que nous fassions l’expérience d’un déclin” de la production mondiale de carburants liquides entre 2011 et 2015 “si les investissements font défaut”, selon un entretien exclusif avec Glen Sweetnam, principal expert officiel du marché pétrolier au sein de l’administration Obama.

Cette alerte sur les capacités mondiales de production pétrolière lancée depuis Washington intervient au moment où la demande mondiale de pétrole repart à la hausse, et tandis que de nombreux projets d’extraction ont été gelés à cause la chute des cours du brut et de la crise financière.

Glen Sweetnam, qui dirige la division internationale, économique et des gaz à effet de serre au sein de l’administration de l’information sur l’énergie du DoE, ne dit pas que les investissements nécessaires feront “défaut”. Toutefois, la réponse au problème de savoir où, quand et dans quelles quantités des sources supplémentaires de pétrole pourront être mises en exploitation demeure largement “non identifiée” aux yeux du plus proéminent analyste officiel en matière d’énergie au sein de l’administration Obama.

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Push to Eat Local Hampered

Source: NY Times March 26, 2010

EAST MONTPELIER, Vt. — Erica Zimmerman and her husband spent months pasture-raising pigs on their farm here, but when the time came to take them to slaughter, an overbooked facility canceled their appointment.

With the herd in prime condition, and the couple lacking food and space to keep them, they frantically called slaughterhouses throughout the state. After several days they found an opening, but their experience highlights a growing problem for small farmers here and across the nation: too few slaughterhouses to meet the growing demand for locally raised meat.

In what could be a major setback for America’s local-food movement, championed by so-called locavores, independent farmers around the country say they are forced to make slaughter appointments before animals are born and to drive hundreds of miles to facilities, adding to their costs and causing stress to livestock.

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Couple trades corporate life for bakery

Source: Globe & Mail, March 17, 2010

Bruce Stewart earned his spurs in the food industry in the sales department of monolithic Kraft Foods – some might say the original purveyor of fast food.

Today, he is a champion of the slow food movement, running an organic bakery in a seaside village where he can cite the provenance of each type of grain running through his mill.

His own journey has helped transform Cowichan Bay, B.C., into a foodie destination, with the True Grain Bakery at the hub. With his help, the village was accredited last year as North America's first Cittaslow town – joining a cultural movement that started in Italy to push back against the fast-lane life.

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Bees in the City? New York May Let the Hives Come Out of Hiding

Source: NY Times, March 14, 2010

Kathleen Boyer suspects the mailman.

She said she could not think of anyone else in her neighborhood who would have complained about the two beehives she kept under a pine tree in her front yard in Flatbush, Brooklyn, leading the city’s health department to fine her $2,000 last fall.

“I was kind of surprised,” said Mrs. Boyer, an art director with a media company. “People see us in our bee suit and they’d bring their kids to watch us and ask us questions.”

New York City is among the few jurisdictions in the country that deem beekeeping illegal, lumping the honeybee together with hyenas, tarantulas, cobras, dingoes and other animals considered too dangerous or venomous for city life. But the honeybee’s bad rap — and the days of urban beekeepers being outlaws — may soon be over.

On Tuesday, the Department of Health and Mental Hygiene’s board will take up the issue of amending the health code to allow residents to keep hives of Apis mellifera, the common, nonaggressive honeybee. Health department officials said the change was being considered after research showed that the reports of bee stings in the city were minimal and that honeybees did not pose a public health threat.

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Backyard chicken advocates rally in Calgary

Source : CBC News

Chickens strutted on a Calgary sidewalk Wednesday night as about 100 people rallied for a bylaw change that would make raising the birds in backyards legal.

The rally, organized by the Canadian Liberated Urban Chicken Klub (CLUCK), was held outside a movie theatre in the neighbourhood of Kensington.

During the rally, some chickens pecked at the sidewalk, while others were in pens.

"I think that urban chickens have a place in the city. I think that there are so many positives that outweigh the negatives, I'm all for it," said Andrea Anon, who was in the crowd.

"Especially since this works in huge cities like Vancouver and Seattle, why can't we have it work in Calgary where we're even more agricultural friendly?" added Jennifer Cavanagh.

Some Calgarians raise chickens in their backyards, even though a city bylaw forbids raising livestock in most urban areas. There is an exemption for pigeons.
Bylaw officer suggests review

The head of the city's bylaw services, Bill Bruce, wants to take a second look at the issue.

"A lot of things have changed in the last couple of years with how people think about food and how they think about how food is raised. So I think it's probably an appropriate time for us to have a look. Is this bylaw current and appropriate or does there need to be some changes made?"

Two Calgarians have been charged with raising backyard chickens and have court dates set for next month.

Paul Hughes, a member of the CLUCK group who raises chickens in a shed, said he hopes that those cases will be adjourned until after the bylaw review, which he supports.

"We're 100 per cent co-operative with that [review] and we fully endorse that. We think that's a great idea. Let's get all the facts on the table, let's look at what other jurisdictions are doing."