Daily Loaf

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

Fixing sprawl and redesigning suburbia- Grant Rimbey CNU explores a possible strategy towards improving existing sprawl. Fixing the sprawl that we have, along with sprawl demolition and recycling, are strategies that could be employed in the future as a new green industry.

Nation’s largest solar facility to be in DeSoto County by next year- Florida Power and Light is currently building the nation’s largest photovoltaic plant in DeSoto County, a $173.5 million, 25 megawatt solar generating facility.

Fresh: New Thinking About What We’re Eating screening – What’s wrong with the mega-industrial food industry- Struggling small farms, problems with food safety rules and the mega-industrial food industry, and a film about all of the above.
Read the rest of this entry »

“I’m mad as hell, and I won’t take it anymore.” – Howard Beale (Peter Finch in Network, 1976)

Mad doesn’t get me anywhere by myself, so I need your help, too. I helped found and operate a farmer’s market in St. Petersburg, FL. But no, we couldn’t call it a “farmer’s market” with integrity because we couldn’t find any farmers. So the St. Petersburg Saturday Morning Market is a “fresh” market. After six seasons and well into the seventh, we got farmers – finally. Organic, local, and sustainably grown vegetables can be found at SMM. We are moving in the right direction.

It has been a struggle to find farmers to come to markets in Florida because small farmers are struggling, too. Why? In a state that has almost a year round growing season? First, while the US Department of Agriculture (The Fed) has an exemption for small producers/farmers, the state of Florida Department of Agriculture and Consumer Services (FDACS) does not! So, Florida’s small farmers are stuck with big creepy costly agribusiness rules – not fair.
Read the rest of this entry »

photo courtesy of chefgui.com

(CL has written about Tampa raw milk a few times — here and here – but it’s always nice to have a different perspective.)

The sale of un-pasteurized milk is illegal in most states, including ours. But with techniques reminiscent of the Prohibition era, aficionados use a Florida loophole to get their ways. Raw milk sale for human consumption is against the law; buying raw milk for your pet (wink, wink!) is, however, perfectly legal.

Call farmers and tell them Sparky, your Bichon Frise, would enjoy a gallon of raw milk, and they will Fed Ex it in no time. What happens at home, behind closed doors, well, happens at home behind closed doors.

Under the so-called “pet law”, approximately 1500 gallons of raw milk are delivered to the Tampa Bay area weekly. An underground, parallel micro-economy!

I talked to many farmers and raw-milk-drinking Bichon Frise owners. One chiropractic doctor, speaking on condition of anonymity, — and whose passion is “in how traditional cultures have used foods to maintain excellent health” — says he himself orders about a gallon a week, delivered in a co-op fashion to certain distribution points. Raw milk speakeasies? 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 »

Police in Switzerland have discovered a two-acre field of marijuana with the aide of Google Earth.

Swiss cops say that the marijuana field was discovered in Thurgau sometime last year while they were investigating a suspected drug ring.

Officers were using Google Earth to locate the exact address of two farmers they suspected of being involved in the ring when they came across a planation hidden in a field of corn.

“It was an interesting chance discovery,” Zurich police’s specialist narcotics unit Norbert Klossner told the Associated Press.

The police didn’t acknowledge whether they did anything to the field they found.

Read more at Ars Technica.