Hello,
I hope this day finds you well! The new issue of Mother Earth News landed in my mail box this morning and Joel Salatin's article got me all excited and into writing mode. I've cross-posted this to the Community Gardens London website, which I try to keep up to date.
Very best regards!
Wise Woman
"Conscientious farmers need to do a better job of
explaining their proven, cutting-edge methods"
This is the message in Joel Salatin's newest post in
the Dec14/Jan15 issue of Mother Earth News.
"If I denounce genetically modified organisms
(GMOs), I'm naive and anti-science. If I disagree with a food-safety
policy that criminalizes an artisan who sells homemade yogurt to a friend at
church, I'm an anarchist."
Salatin says that healthful food producers and
environmentalists have to develop and use better language to explain and
promote what we do. When we denounce something, we have to spend time and
energy defending against the corporate cries against us.
Our time and energy is better used in promoting what
we know to be better. Find new language to say why we are for something,
use it with all the media-savvy we can, and get on with it.
What lexicon works? Salatin says "It has to be
big enough, innovative enough, sacred enough to capture the hearts of all types
of people"
We have to get away from the corporate/media promoted
idea that we want to go "back" to old farming techniques or, in the
case of environment issues, to non-technologic times.
Acknowledge that people don't want to go "back". Even
as we find ourselves media'd and consumer'd out - is it Christmas yet? - most
of us don't want to be thought out of date. And frankly, we don't want to
do all the labour we associate with "old-fashioned".
Food production systems are even more amazing than we
ever realized, and deserve respect and care.
We can promote that what's newest is based firmly on
the literal groundwork of generations of gardeners, farmers, and
environmentalists. And yes, this is all based on good science and its
practical applications can give food producers a living wage.
Salatin suggests we tell people that we want
"integrated food and farming rather than segregated". Then we
can speak enthusiastically about how the new farming understands the
interactions between soil microbiology and animal and plant health, and both
embraces and innovates technologies that save time and extend seasons. .
He goes on to explain about "food systems that
caress rather than conquer" and "healing rather than hurting",
and that up-to-date farmers don't use Grandpa's methods. We take his (or Grandma's!)
best practices and upgrade them with environmentally sound and practical
technologies and ideas.
And he reassures us that "getting a reaction is
what we need to do, because it means people are paying attention".
Altogether, a great read.
Note: New-Fashioned Food System s not online yet
because it is in the current issue, so a purchase of this excellent magazine or
a trip to the library may be in order. A visit to Mother Earth Newswebsite is always interesting and useful. It posts articles from back
issues, and its website carries articles on-line only and has blogs and forums
about important topics like raising chickens, food, and homesteading (lots of
great things even for urbanites). Several of Joel Salatin's books are in the London Public library
and his Poly Face Farm website is: http://www.polyfacefarms.com/
