Healthy soil and sustainable growing

["Tradingpost" <tradingpost@lobo.net>]

That's it, Aliza. Except those cubicles were shipped out to India and China. 
But the concept of human labor on smaller holdings is simple and doable, and 
I know because I live it.

I don't need a tiller, because I only grow in fixed beds and don't walk on 
them so they don't get compacted and don't need tilling. And I can grow 
several times as much in intensive beds as single tractor rows can grow in 
the same space, meaning you don't need a huge garden to grow a lot. And since 
I don't need to pay for machinery (or chemicals or labor) I can clear more 
profit selling retail from 1/4 of an acre than a lot of cash crop farmers 
with a few hundred acres. Why? Because they're caught in the cost-price 
squeeze, with suppliers and middlemen telling them what they'll pay for 
inputs and machinery, and what they'll get paid for their crops, and because 
they're so big they have to pay labor. What's left for the farm family? 
Subtract all those big farm costs from the 10% of final retail price that 
farmers receive, and the typical farmer needs a job in town just to keep the 
farm. That is the official average. There's your food security.

The thing is, none of this is my own idea. I just figure out how to do it on 
a low budget in a hard climate and short season. We all have to adapt, don't 
we. But best growing and marketing techniques have been out there in books, 
magazines and on the Internet for ages. Millions can do it.

And hold me to this: millions will be forced to do it out of desperation. 
Forget 2012, it's here already for millions of unemployed. Save your seeds; 
they're going up again.

paul tradingpost@lobo.net

*********** REPLY SEPARATOR  ***********

On 2/23/2011 at 5:07 PM Aliza Vanderlip wrote:

>Well thats the crux of it isnt it.  Using human labor instead of
>machinery on smaller holdings.  Putting people to work making food
>instead of sitting bored in a cubicle selling stuff that folks dont
>need..........
>
>Blessings,