Food for Thought
Now and then something interesting comes along. We'll put it here for a while.
Perverse Consequenses
24 October 2010
Most of us are familiar with the idea that the average person in the developed world today will live longer and have an easier life than any average person in any society ever before. Yet this success -- this distance from misery, toil, and seasonal threat of starvation -- has made a counterproductive trend possible. The anti-technology food fashion in the developed world threatens the most vulnerable populations in the developing world when it leads to policies that prevent the transfer of modern agricultural techniques to our hungry cousins. The gap between "intentions" and "results" could not be wider than in sentencing millions to life on the razor's edge between subsistence and starvation.
LINK: http://www.foreignpolicy.com/articles/2010/04/26/attention_whole_foods_shoppers?page=full
Taking Care to Take Care
9 October 2010
We are serious about caring for our animals. Their well-being reflects on us. Here are some folks who feel the same.
Sights and Sounds of Seeding
9 October 2010
In the spring, this is how your sweetcorn will begin. It's also how a lot of other crops begin. Seeds are planted by the seeing machine (called a "planter") being pulled by the tractor. To plant the seeds in rows the machine opens slots that are about 30-inches apart, drops seeds in (every 8-10 inches or so for sweetcorn) and the slot is reclosed in the blink of an eye. The round tanks on the planter are for fertilizer to help the seedlings get off to a stong start. Behind them are rectangular boxes that hold the seeds, and behind them are slightly smaller rectangular boxes that hold insecticide. In most corn growing areas insecticide is used to prevent specific types of worms from killing or stunting the plants by eating off their roots or eating the seed. If the crop is raised as "chemical free" or "organic" the small boxes won't filled.
It looks like a field of dead grass because this particular field is being managed as a "no-till" system. The remains from the previous crop are left on top of the soil instead of being tilled into the soil before planting. When weeds need to be killed a herbicide is applied. The previous crop was grown to add nutrients, and as those dead plants decay the nutrients will be released into the soil. No-till also reduces moisture loss to evaporation, shades out weed seedlings, and holds the soil in place while the new crop grows.
Abundant, Steady, Nutritious.
27 June 2010
No matter your profession you can probably point to ways that technologies developed over the past 3-4 generations have transformed your work compared to that of your professional forefathers. From accountants to (what's a profession that starts with "Z"?) practically all of us produce more from our labor and resources today. Here's a video with some interesting past, present, and future productivity figures for agriculture.