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market-farming - Re: [Market-farming] Fwd: SORCE: A new resource for organic agriculture in the South

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Chronological Thread  
  • From: Bill Scheffler <pureprairie AT gmail.com>
  • To: Unschooler AT lrec.org, Market Farming <market-farming AT lists.ibiblio.org>
  • Subject: Re: [Market-farming] Fwd: SORCE: A new resource for organic agriculture in the South
  • Date: Wed, 7 Apr 2010 08:23:14 -0500

If they can choose a time that does not conflict with the ACRES
conference, that would be a big help.  Or that a *north* event?  ;-)

Bill



On Mon, Apr 5, 2010 at 10:27 PM, Leslie Moyer <unschooler AT lrec.org> wrote:
Forward from another list I'm on:

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

Those of you who are plugged into the wider organic community are probably familiar with MOSES (Midwest Organic and Sustainable Education Services, which puts on the largest organic conference in the country every February in La Crosse, WI.  A fair number of us from the Midsouth attend that event. 

 

SORCE (Southern Organic Resource Center for Education) is a newly-forming entity that hopes to capitalize on what we’ve learned with MOSES and expand organic agriculture and local foods in the South.  Plans include an inaugural conference in New Orleans sometime around the first weekend in December, 2010.  A committee and been formed to move on this.

 

I’m attaching a blog post from Juli Brussel, currently A Program Leader for NH Cooperative Extension (She and her husband plan to move permanently to Missouri.)  However, if want to get further information on SORCE, the organizer at the heart of the effort is Sue Baird, 660-427-5555; gbaird AT iland.net; www.suebairdorgnics.com

 

Sunday, March 21, 2010

South of the North for Organics

On March 18, a bunch of people got together on a conference call. Nothing earth shattering about that. Happens all the time. But I could feel the earth move slightly—I know. I was there. The immediate result was we birthed a new entity…a brain child, a child of hope and determination for all southern organic farmers. Welcome SORCE to the world, folks. That’s Southern Organic Resource Center for Education. And it’s a whole new community—a virtual barn-raising. We are gathering our strength and our ideas and our needs about farming and eating organic in the south. And we invite you to the party.

Where is south? As Tevie Tillman from Georgia put it as this idea was being imagined into being in earlier this year…”It’s everywhere that is south of the north.” We had representatives from Arkansas, Tennessee, Missouri, Oklahoma, southern Illinois, Indiana, and lots more who were invited and couldn’t come…from Florida, Texas, Kentucky, Georgia…the list goes on. We are just the beginning. This is bigger than we are and this will grow.

At the heart of this child is our diversity. Who we are, our farming needs, our land, our weather, our soil, is just plain different! Different from northern lands and weather…different from northern soil…different from northern farmers---persnickety, sometimes, often times downright ornery.Droughty or drowning…dryland or flooded fields.

Each bioregion, each farm…has a unique personality that demands care and management. What works in higher latitudes often times just doesn’t work on southern farms. As organic farmers, we need to share what we know about taking care of this land so we grow along with it—grow and prosper. Along with our families, our communities and the people who eat what we grow or buy our organic cotton, our beef, our flowers and herbs.

Sue Baird, Missouri Organic Association, said that we need to come together and create a way to gather our strength, pool our knowledge, and give a voice to the organic south. We are building this organization because we share a love of the land wherever we are, a love that goes deep into the muck of a rice paddy, the red clay, the piney woods, the foggy mountains and dry hills, the muddy rivers and coastal plains, the green pastures and brown bayous.So here is the call, y’all! Welcome SORCE and stay tuned! We’ll be seeing you soon. There is plenty of good work to be done and it’s high time to be about it!

Posted by Juli Brussell at 2:17 PM

 

Posted at: http://www.villageraising.blogspot.com/

 


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Teaching a child not to step on a caterpillar is as valuable to the child as it is to the caterpillar.  (From the Organic Valley calendar, 2007)



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