Skip to Content.
Sympa Menu

market-farming - [Market-farming] Two Books in One Review!

market-farming AT lists.ibiblio.org

Subject: Market Farming

List archive

Chronological Thread  
  • From: Alliums <garlicgrower AT earthlink.net>
  • To: community_garden AT mallorn.com, listwfan AT iastate.edu, market-farming AT lists.ibiblio.org
  • Cc:
  • Subject: [Market-farming] Two Books in One Review!
  • Date: Fri, 03 Dec 2004 11:11:00 -0500

Hi, Folks!

I received these two books at the same time and they were so similar that it seemed to make sense to review them together.  If you'd like to use the review, let me know -- I retain copyright.  I'll never get rich this way, but my fame continues throughout the nation! :-D

Dorene

***************************************************

Bringing the Food Economy Home:  Local Alternatives to Global Agribusiness by Helena Norberg-Hodge, Todd Merrifield and Steven Gorelick, Zed Books, 2002.  ISBN:  1-56549-146-7, 140 pages.
 
Civic Agriculture:  Re-connecting Farm, Food and Community by Thomas Lyson, University Press of New England, 2004.  ISBN:  1-58465-414-7, 136 pages.
 
“But Still Try – For Who Knows What Is Possible” --- Michael Faraday
 
Like most science majors at Ursinus College, I read these words inscribed above the doorway of Pfaler Hall as I entered for biweekly tests and all-consuming finals.  Few of us, even today, could identify Faraday by his portrait, but almost all of us have found that his value of simply plugging away at one’s calling in the face of an uncertain future applies equally well to the student struggling to pass organic chemistry or the adult attempting to make a living by “non-traditional” means – especially those of us called to organic gardening/sustainable agriculture.
 
Although Bringing the Food Economy Home and Civic Agriculture were published two years apart, the history they chronicle – the rise of global agribusiness, its stunning success in economic terms, its hidden failures in ecological, food safety and rural life issues and the current rise of an “agriculture of place” or “civic agriculture” to remedy those failures – is pretty much the same.  Both books explain how the Industrial Revolution accelerated a trend to transform agriculture from a locally-sufficient economy based on home-produced goods and services traded with neighbors to a few cash-based commodity corporations dependent on maximum profits for stockholders.  Both books also explain the farmers’ markets, community support agriculture (CSA), “buy local” campaigns, community gardens, food co-opts and other local structures that have arisen to counter the concerns many have with the current corporate global food system.
 
For those who prefer the really big picture, Bringing the Food Economy Home, written by International Society for Ecology and Culture (ISEC) staffers based in the UK, concentrates on the global implications of a corporate food system and provides examples from both First and Third World countries.  While several US essays are included, many of the photos, charts and accompanying stories explaining familiar concepts are from sources that will be new to most US readers.  The book also includes extensive endnotes, a decent index, a chart of US and UK measurements and a resource guide of organizations to consult or join.
 
Civic Agriculture is part of the Tuft University series Civil Society:  Historical and Contemporary Perspectives. The focus, therefore, is more on US social history and how community-based agriculture increases social capital.  As Lyson, the author, is based at Cornell University, he provides an excellent historical context on how Northeast growers, who traditionally sold their products in local urban markets, have been able to resist somewhat (relative to the MidWest and far West farmers and ranchers) the pressures to “go corporate” and in the current century, preserve their land by embracing CSAs, farmers’ markets and other forms of civic agriculture.
 
And yet, buried beneath the earnest arguments about how growers and consumers alike can prosper through local food systems, both books admit that all these local efforts are barely making a dent (between 2 to 4% of food industry revenues) in global agribusiness’ economic clout and access to power to maintain that clout.  As Lyson states:
 
“Civic agriculture does not currently represent an economic challenge to the conventional agriculture and food industry and it is unlikely to pose a challenge anytime soon.  However, it does include some innovative ways to produce, process and distribute food.  And it represents a sustainable alternative to the socially, economically and environmentally destructive practices that have come to be associated with conventional agriculture.”
 
In other words, to those of us who strive to make a living in sustainable agriculture: “But still try, for who knows what is possible.”
 
Reviewed by Dorene Pasekoff, Coordinator
St. John’s United Church of Christ Organic Community Garden
Phoenixville, PA
 



Archive powered by MHonArc 2.6.24.

Top of Page