3 Comments

1. DeAnander:

   Agh! OK, this is a big topic that I’ve been mulling over a lot during the last few months — not just NAIS but the mindset that goes with it.

   I would also adduce the “Leafy Greens Marketing Agreement” recently foisted/forced on California farmers in response to the Great Spinach Scare. In outline: E Coli contamination episodes are most likely due to CAFO activity in the central valley (i.e. concentration camps for cattle); the strain of E Coli found in the contaminated spinach is afaik identified as one common in CAFO livestock. However, the State and corporate power (are they really separable?) have decreed that the real threat comes from “having animals on a vegetable farm” and they are demanding the destruction of hedgerows and the extermination of all wildlife on leafy-green producing farms — in other words, total monoculture, no wildlife habitat, poison to destroy rodent, bird and frog populations, etc.

   This is recognisable as a variant of the Hermetically Sealed Boundary mentality that also manifests in the form of Apartheid laws, border fences and checkpoints, racial purity mania, biophobia, gender panic… a mania for total control and total enclosure as the pathway to “purity” and/or safety. A similar nuttiness attended the various recent outbreaks of avian flu — almost certainly traceable to pathogenic conditions which factory-farmed poultry suffer by the tens of millions — the blame was immediately shifted to “wild birds” and efforts were made to “close the borders” of industrial poultry farms, sterilise all human clothing and persons with access to the sheds, use more chemicals and drugs, etc. The possibility that the factory farming system itself was pathogenic was never on the table; the threat had to be relocated to some external, uncontrolled enemy which could be walled out or exterminated.

   All these hyperauthoritarian control bids are marketed as being “health and safety” precautions, i.e. “for our own good” — just as tighter surveillance and control of humans is marketed as a safety precaution to reduce the danger of infiltration, subversion, etc, by foreign devils.

   In point of fact, the mixed (animal and vegetable) farm is more robust, less vulnerable to disease, and far more productive than monocrop of any kind or even than vegetable-only farming. The very conditions loved by authoritarian/militarist culture — for example the raising of animals under industrial conditions or the schooling of children as an “efficient” factory operation — undermine the quality and sustainability of the activity: the animals are sickly and vulnerable, the children don’t learn much and are hard to “control”.

   Biotic systems and human cultures are fractal, porous, flexible, resilient, highly diverse and mixed, mongrel, piebald, entangled. The fantasy of separation, purity, clean and sharp edges, absence of ambiguity — is just that, a fantasy. And a damn dangerous fantasy at that — but highly profitable, as the futile pursuit of it entails the production and sale of a lot of stupid, dangerous, pointless Stuff and a lot of wasted time. This is the short and careless top-of-head version of a theme I’ve been wanting to explore for a long time, so pls excuse a certain surreal density of memes.

   12 February 2009, 11:50 pm

2. DeAnander:

   A friend of mine who is somewhat expert in California ag issues writes:

   Good blog piece! Sure is a lot that could be written about
   here. You could probably use some URLs and a few
   more facts of the case. See:

   http://www.caff.org/policy/leafygreen.shtml

   My impression was that the main place to be affected by
   leafy greens is the Salinas Valley, not the Central
   Valley. This is because Salinas Valley is leafy greens
   capital, due to coolness of climate. And it’s where the
   spinach outbreak happened in 2007.

   Thanks Irene for the corrections/additions.

   13 February 2009, 12:24 pm

3. Michael Anderson:

   Thanks for the heads up on this one….I get mail from these folks, but I must’ve had a “senior moment” here. Been reading Ed Black’s new book (a short one) called “Nazi Nexus”, and just finished the chapter on Jopseph Mengele, so De’s words about “The fantasy of separation, purity, clean and sharp edges, absence of ambiguity”, are ringing in my ears. BUT—something related to this….I was reading FTW this A.M., and this post from “Hawkeye” (aka Scott McGuire) who lives in Ashland, here in Oregon, to Mike Ruppert caught my eye:

   FROM HAWKEYE

   I love the idea of this thread with its own playlist so before I post here’s my background of choice: Beachcombing by Emmylou Harris and Mark Knopfler:

   They say there’s wreckage washing up all along the coast
   No-one seems to know too much, or who got hit the most
   Nothing has been spoken, there’s not a lot to see
   But something has been broken, that’s how it feels to me
   We had a harmony I never meant to spoil
   Now it’s lying in the water like a slick of oil
   The tide is running out to sea under a darkening sky
   The night is falling down on me and I’m thinking that I
   Should head on home, been gone to long…

   I have to put in my two cents here about the soil building idea and also tweak a few priorities.

   For those seriously interested in energy addiction recovery, the garden gate into the plant kingdom beckons wide. And as we remember and re-learn what-all it takes to feed ourselves, we’ll find soil building is only one part of the picture. Yet having ground to grow on, any kind of ground, is the third most important thing. Even crappy soil can be improved if you have the second most important thing, water. Carving up lawns is a great idea; strips of sod can be stacked back-to-back to make a superior compost called turf-loam. However, so many lawns are nothing but sponges saturated with herbicides and other toxic residues. The ground underneath must then be loosened, aerated and re-mineralized to grow anything decent out of it.

   The first most important thing, the thing you need to have if soil and water are going to be of any use to you at all, is seeds. I must disagree with all the rapture around gold. Right now we need to be investing in seed supplies. We must OWN the seeds if we ever expect to be able to grow the plants. I don’t care if you don’t yet know your ass from an asparagus; BUY the seeds right NOW for the plants you’re going to want to eat.

   Also, now is the time to purchase quality hand tools (the best ones are imported, American brands suck). A fork and spade, flat metal rake, hoes and scythes can all be rescued for a few hundred bucks. But if you don’t have seeds in your pocket, you won’t get very far in feeding anyone when you have to. If the S is really so close to HTF, then to hell with gold, you guys, buy greenhouses, windmills, bicycles, carts, tools, hoses, threshers, winnowers and PVC pipe! While gold may remain the standard between investors, seeds will become the currency between eaters. Invest in the Plant Stock Exchange!

   The thread about manure is not just talking shit. It highlights my favorite on the Top 10 List of Peak Everything, Peak Nitrogen. Ultimately, the only sources of plant-usable nitrogen that don’t come from natural gas, come from the Legume Family (elitist Soil Bankers) and the asses of animals. All of the manures have their virtues, however take caution with horse these days because of nasty heartworm medications passing right through. Not everyone will be able to have animals, but everybody can possess seeds of legumes to grow the fertility- building plants for the compost.

   The transitional ecosystems of our very near future must first take root in our hearts and minds before they will ever be able to express out of our hands and muscles. We will be able to grow whatever we need, but first we have to get tighter with the plants. For instance, forget about all the fuss around the cannabis flowers, we need to be growing the stalk for the fiber and the seeds for the oils. Any true patriots out there have seeds to the Jeffersonian strain? There are riches lying in the roadside ditches of the Midwest.

   Highly recommended: Anything by John Jeavons’ Biointensive growing methods. Comprehensive and concentrated knowledge, skills and wisdom. And a great seed catalog. Permaculture is a wonderful context for ultimate solutions, but we’ll all need some more grounded horticultural skills to get there.

   This year I’m organizing a CSA around my 2/3′s acre rented backyard.
   (Check out PeakMoment TV’s tour of my place:
   http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZOaPFt_ajvU#GU5U2spHI_4 )

   I will grow vegetables, flowers and herbs for 10 families, and they’ll pay the rent. We’ll also be giving away gardens to single moms and old ladies the way Dan Barker did for over a decade in Portland (over 1400 gardens for FREE). Home Gardening Project:
   http://www.jeffnet.org/~hgpf/

   If the game is really going to become about feeding ourselves, then the Mayans are right, it really is the end of time as we know it. The collapse will either happen within days, weeks, months or years, but they’re all just some dead Emperor’s slave- boxes. The recovery will happen during a growing season. Is it THIS one? If you think so, then get growing.

   Any post-petroleum life is going to be all about getting back on plant time. THIS growing season is our moment of now. The window of opportunity to harvest true wealth opens wide every spring. Peace is growing. Growing as much square footage as you can turn over within walking distance of where you live. No matter how small doesn’t matter at all. At this point all we can do is plant seeds anyway. And all the ideas for a better sustainable life are seeds right now. It’s up to us to sow them well and soon.

   13 February 2009, 2:39 pm

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