North American Fruit Explorers mailing list at ibiblio

[Diane Whitehead <voltaire@islandnet.com>]

There is an interesting article in Saturday's Toronto Globe and Mail,  
but I assume the information is available elsewhere as well.

Europe has been paying farmers to turn their fields back into forest.   
Sometimes they plant deliberately, and sometimes abandoned fields  
revert on their own.

The newest afforestation program begins this month and has a budget of  
$3.6 million for the next six years to turn hundreds of thousands of  
hectares back into forest and encourage thousands of families to stop  
farming.  The EU will pay half the cost of reforestation and then give  
landowners $450 per hectare per year for 14 years (only 7 for fast- 
growing poplars) to manage the new forest.

I was surprised to read this, as I read a lot of gloomy forecasts in  
the 1970s that overpopulation would have us starving, so reducing food- 
producing areas seems foolish.

I can see that growing trees could be good, but I'd select food- 
producing trees, like nuts.


Diane Whitehead
Victoria, British Columbia, Canada
maritime zone 8, cool Mediterranean climate
mild rainy winters, mild dry summers