Daily Loaf

What’s the buzz on the latest issues in the Green Community? Check out what you may have missed this last week:

Sustainable beer 101: A guide to growlers- Benefits of refillable beer jugs far exceed the lure of fresh tap beer.

Refresh your mind, body and spirit by reconnecting with nature- Living in such a busy world these days overloaded with technology leaves little time to get back to the basics and connect with the planet we live on. Take some time out of your busy schedule and reconnect with nature, which will balance you physically, mentally and spiritually.

Ronald McDonald gets a pie in the face from PETA protester- Ronald McDonald takes one in the kisser from a PETA protester who is against McDonald’s “controlled-atmosphere killing” of chickens.

St. Petersburg College and Tampa Bay green building chapter announce partnership- St Petersburg College’s Corporate Training Office announced a partnership with the Florida Gulf Coast Chapter (FGCC) of the U.S. Green Building Council (USGBC) to provide a comprehensive sustainable building operations training course based on the LEED for Existing Buildings: Operations and Maintenance rating system.
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With Food Inc. making such a buzz about the food that we eat and where it comes from, this independent film may also be one to watch.

King Corn tells the story of two friends, one acre of corn, and the subsidized crop that drives our fast-food nation.

As the film unfolds, Ian Cheney and Curt Ellis, best friends from college on the East coast, move to the heartland to learn where their food comes from. With the help of friendly neighbors, genetically modified seeds, and powerful herbicides, they plant and grow a bumper crop of America’s most-productive, most-ubiquitous grain on one acre of Iowa soil. But when they try to follow their pile of corn into the food system, what they questions about how we eat—and how we farm.

My favorite line from the trailer: “We aren’t growing quality – we’re growing crap!” Truer words were never spoken.

Video after the jump
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What’s the buzz on the latest issues in the Green Community? Check out what you may have missed this last week:

Steps to becoming greener: Reducing your waste, reusing and recycling: Joshua Poll gives some useful tips for ways to start reducing, reusing, and recycling things you thought you could just throw away.

Genetically engineering cows that will produce less methane, reducing greenhouse gases: Geneticists in Canada are trying to engineer a cow that produces less methane, resulting in less greenhouse gases, reports Brian Roberts.
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This post is partially a retraction and a correction. I have reported previously on how cow farts are filling up the atmosphere with greenhouse gas emissions in the form of methane. Apparently, its not the gas from the tail end of the cow that’s the problem. Its the belching. My bad.

Either way, it sounds like a premise for a bad episode of Captain Planet and a chain of visual images that eventually ruins lunch.
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I just read a blog arguing the problems versus benefits of organic food.  Though it covered the issue from different angles and had some interesting points, one part that I want to address is the idea that organic fields are 40% less productive than fields that use a bunch of chemicals. That isn’t true of any organic farmer I know personally – I’m not sure where this statistic comes from and I have my doubts it is accurate in any context.

I can say with certainty it is not accurate if a farmer uses any of a number of different organic growing methods such as biodynamic, biointensive, polycropping or permaculture techniques, all of which can produce higher yields than traditional agriculture at lower costs.

The problem with conventional agriculture — and the reason we have to import oil in order to grow corn — is because the way we grow our food is extremely unnatural.  Think of this: We literally kill every living thing in the field before we plant our crops!  To prepare a new field to plant corn, we would have to remove all the plants already growing there, and plow the soil under, which kills even many of the soil microbes that are essential for fertile soil.  All that organic matter that was just removed is what created rich soils in the first place.  Then we import a bunch of chemical fertilizers to feed the plants, because we stripped the place.  One could call that flora and fauna genocide, you know?  Every living thing? Is that really necessary? Read the rest of this entry »

A report in this month’s issue of the Journal of Horticultural Science (I’ve already read my copy!) explains how today’s veggies and fruits may be as much as 40% lower in minerals than the same produce from 50 years ago. Why?

One big reason is selective breeding that selects for bigger, prettier fruit that generally has higher concentrations of “dry matter” without a similar increase in nutrient content. But that’s not all. Read the rest of this entry »

A new report from the Congressional Research Service shows just how much — or how little — of Obama’s new $825 billion economic stimulus package is going towards agriculture and food programs.

$27 billion is slated for food-related issues, with the vast majority — $21 billion — going to bolster the nation’s food assistance programs, like food stamps, WIC and some school meals. In 2008, food stamp program (SNAP) costs rose nearly $4.5 billion to $37.655 billion. More than 28 million took advantage of SNAP last year, the largest number of participants since its inception. Considering the state of the economy, that upward trend looks like it’ll be getting worse this year.

Here in Florida, Read the rest of this entry »

Hi, I’m John Matthews. Last week, Brian Ries convinced me to blog for Creative Loafing concerning local foods. I’ve read some blogs, but never thought I would be doing this. But with the help of my lovely wife, Andrea, I hope I write a few things you will find informative and insightful.

To give you a little background on myself, in recent years I managed the Sarasota’s Downtown Farmers’ Market and facilitated the establishment of the ‘Farm to School’ program in Sarasota, Manatee and Charlotte counties. In May of 2008, I created the Suncoast Food Alliance to further connect area farmers with their community. I am currently the Chairman of the Florida Association of Community Farmers’ Markets. Whew, that was a mouth full, but I hope you can see that I have a passion for good food, good farmers and eating well!

When I came to Florida in 1999, I wanted out of agriculture. Read the rest of this entry »

Mark Bittman talks about his new book — Food Matters — at Cooking Up A Story. You might find it in the cookbook section — there are 75 recipes — but his main thrust is to educate people about how their food choices are affected by government policy, economics and marketing. And, in return, how our choices affect the world around us. Think of it as an In Defense of Food, but with Bittman’s trademarked, Minimalist style.

Video after the break: Read the rest of this entry »

In the past, whenever you’ve seen “Naturally Raised” stamped on a shrink-wrapped pack of chicken breasts, it’s meant zilch. Thankfully, the USDA is here to protect American consumers with new guidelines for using that content-less term. Kinda.

Ethicurean sums it up: Read the rest of this entry »

I love Alice Waters as much as the next worshipper of good food and local ingredients, but she’s best as an inspiration. An icon of a movement. Whenever she gets her hands dirty trying to foment grassroots change in the way America eats, Waters comes off a bit lofty.

She’s in DC this week with a cornucopia of big name chefs to try to get the word out about keeping it local. How? $500 dinners cooked by the chefs in the homes of Washington’s power elite: Read the rest of this entry »

TheWhoFarm is a grassroots initiative started to get Obama’s hands dirty by encouraging the new administration to plant an organic garden on the White House grounds. It’s a great idea that’s found a lot of traction among the usual crew of progressive food policy advocates, like Michael Pollan. The founders have been promoting the plan by driving a converted bus complete with rooftop organic garden across country, visiting farmers’ markets and the like along the way. You can sign the petition here.

Eat The View is a similar initiative. I suggest signing both. No matter how you feel about “organic” farming, anyone who wants a president more in touch with the food production system has to be supportive of a White House farm.

The most recent Government Accountability Office review (.pdf) notes that genetically engineered (aka GE, genetically modified or GM) food is getting into places where it doesn’t belong.

“Unauthorized releases of GE crops into food, animal feed, or the environment beyond farm fields have occurred, and it is likely that such incidents will occur again.”

So, what’s the big deal? Some genetically engineered foods reduce the need for pesticides and fertilizer, which should make them a darling of green-minded folk. Genetically modified crops can be a boon to developing countries that need more local, self-sustaining agriculture.

And really, isn’t cross-breeding just modifying the genetics of a crop old school style? (Several of these arguments can be found at the Monsanto corporate responsibility page.)

Perhaps… Read the rest of this entry »