Let’s face it, we all like food. It has been the primary human occupation throughout humanities history. It is the primary drive for all of nature. Yet how many of us in the MDCs could actually find food if it wasn’t neatly packaged in a grocery store? Once we were all involved in acquisition of food. Then it became the occupation of a uniquely large group called farmers, and today it is the occupation for a small group of technical specialists using large machines and immense amounts of chemicals. As we move forward one of the first things we need to redo is how we farm food. First it need to be localized. This doesn’t mean that we need to forgo imported food, but what we eat has to be sustainable at the local level before we consider how to make sustainable imported exotic foods. The first thing we need to rethink is that farming is merely a 2-Dimensional system – flat fields. When we even think of fisheries we still think linearly and in 2D.
Vertical gardens are something that has been around for several years on the small scale. It is more than climbing vines up a trellis. It is a structured way of building layers of crops. This can range from a short wall to whole buildings with terraces of food on each floor. It can even happen in an enclosed warehouse if grow lights with the correct photosynthetic frequencies are used. The Blue and Red frequencies are ideal, with green and far red now being shown to also affect plant growth in the shaded areas of a plant. Even LEDs with appropriate color filters are great options to reduce electrical use on using grow lights. Greenhouses can be 3-dimensional in northern climes to produce food year round, and the problem of heating the greenhouses in winter is one that can be easily overcome with thermal solar and harvest-waste biomass heaters. What limits us is not ingenuity but investment and commitment to a new way of thinking about farming. We can move forward with the best of the past and the best of appropriate technology for the future – technology that already exists but merely needs implementing. In many places this is happening, even in China that still encloses farm land around the world. Until we say NO to antiquated thinking and profit driven corporate systems and place our own sovereignty first and foremost we merely accept the status quo and all the BS that keeps us in limited thinking. Look up the work of Rob Hopkins (Totnes, England) and what he is doing with relocalization of food and Energy as first steps to sustainable Living. One thing I haven’t seen yet is the idea of permaculture design in a 3-D environment. Yet, when one thinks of the layering within a forest, isn’t that a 3-D ecosystem we can also emulate?
“Permaculture founders Bill Mollison and David Holmgren observed the devastating effects that agriculture and human settlements were having on the ecology of their homeland and they asked the simple question, “How can we meet human needs by patterning human developments after natural systems, rather than destroying natural systems?”” The Urban farmer – Permaculture Design.
As Janine Benyus says in her Biomimiry Institute website, “Biomimicry is an approach to innovation that seeks sustainable solutions to human challenges by emulating nature’s time-tested patterns and strategies..” And, ““We’re awake now, and the question is how do we stay awake to the living world? How do we make the act of asking nature’s advice a normal part of everyday inventing?.” I find her use of the word inventing – we don’t have to invent, but to observe and to believe that our destiny is in OUR hands and not at the mercy of some bureaucratic hierarchy controlled by powerful interests intent on only profit and control. Innovators and Early Adopters around – when will we all become the Early Majority and join and support them.
3D farming in the ocean is yet another innovation occurring that has much promise. We are talking fish or seafood farming as we currently have them, but literally seaweed and mollusk farming. On 3-D platforms below the surface. One pioneer is Bren Smith of the New York Coast, “Imagine a vertical underwater garden: seaweed and mussels grow on floating ropes, stacked above oyster and clam cages below. Imagine a farm designed to restore rather than deplete our oceans – a farm growing local food but also biofuel and organic fertilizer.” It is amazing to realize that a 300ft by 300ft frame of seaweed can produce more than 24 tons of seaweed in as little as 6 months. Now think about hanging layers of mollusks below the seaweed and you have a wonderful filtration system that not only cleans the water but also removes excess nitrogen from eutrophicated systems (farm fertilizer pollution). These layers under the surface are also being shown to serve as pseudo reefs in that they give temporary habitat to many species of sea life – more than 150 close shore species by all accounts.
There is one other option of farming that might take a bit more encouragement – insects! When I used to lecture on this I would show my class of an African farmer with a can of Mopani worms in Tomato sauce – the farmer was obviously enjoying this delicacy. My class on the other hand gave the expected response – UUGGHHHH. I would then bring out a small bag of chili favored meal-worms I had obtained from a local health food store. The more ambitious students would try them and find them quite palatable. A friend of mine used to bring insect food to a local conference for people to try – breads and cookies and other small preparations. Some rather interesting textures along with a variety of flavorings. Besides the crunchy insect chitin the taste was mostly what was used to flavor the high protein food. While I love the juicy worm in my garden I’m not sure that for me that they will become a primary source of food in the future – but when you are hungry enough, I know that people have told me even the slugs slithering across the garden wall are good food. If you have eaten Escargot then you know what I mean. According to E.O. Wilson, about a third of the terrestrial biomass on the planet comprises of ants and termites so we should not poo-poo this source of food in the future. Much is dependent on foods we ate as we grew up. In the future, our foods may be determined by what grows in a localized area. First, we need to take back control of our food! With the latest Bayer-Monsanto merger, that may be the next major battle of our time.
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