permaculture

[yarrow@sfo.com]

lawrence asked,
> Can we, acting collectively, actually make any difference?
>
> Is it for generations hence to deal with or should we start now?
>
> What do we do?


The number-one thing everyone can do is to eat lower on the food chain.

That, plus political action focused on removing 
subsidies and price supports for factory farming 
and monocultures, and shifting support to and 
promoting local food, small farms, organic 
agriculture and agroecology, school gardens, 
community gardens, and agroforestry, is the most 
productive action.

*****
From Eureka, CA
My Word by Martha Devine
Article Launched: 01/28/2007 04:26:17 AM PST


On Dec. 10 of last year, the environment editor 
of U.K.'s Independent Online posted a report from 
the United Nations Food and Agriculture 
Organization (FAO), asserting that “the world's 
top destroyer of the environment is not the car, 
or the plane, or even George Bush: It is the cow.”
According to the report, the world's rapidly 
growing herds of cattle have been identified as 
the greatest threat to the climate, forests and 
wildlife. And they have been blamed for a host of 
other environmental crimes, from acid rain to the 
introduction of alien species, from producing 
deserts to creating dead zones in the oceans, 
from poisoning rivers and drinking water to 
destroying coral reefs.
The 400-page report by the FAO, entitled 
“Livestock's Long Shadow,” also surveys the 
damage done by sheep, chickens, pigs and goats. 
But in almost every case, the world's 1.5 billion 
cattle are most to blame. Livestock are 
responsible for 18 percent of the greenhouse 
gases that cause global warming, more than cars, 
planes and all other forms of transport put 
together.
Burning fuel to produce fertilizer to grow feed, 
to produce meat, and to transport it -- and 
clearing vegetation for grazing -- produces 9 per 
cent of all emissions of carbon dioxide, the most 
common greenhouse gas. And their wind and manure 
emit more than one-third of emissions of another, 
methane, which warms the world 20 times faster 
than carbon dioxide.
Livestock also produces more than 100 other 
polluting gases, including more than two-thirds 
of the world's emissions of ammonia, one of the 
main causes of acid rain.
Ranching, the report adds, is “the major driver 
of deforestation” worldwide, and overgrazing is 
turning a fifth of all pastures and ranges into 
desert. Cows soak up vast amounts of water: It 
takes a staggering 990 litres of water to produce 
one liter of milk.
Wastes from feedlots and fertilizers used to grow 
their feed overnourish water, causing weeds to 
choke out all other life. And the pesticides, 
antibiotics and hormones used to treat them get 
into drinking water and endanger human health.
The pollution washes down to the sea, killing 
coral reefs and creating “dead zones” devoid of 
life. One is up to 21,000 square kilometers in 
the Gulf of Mexico, where much of the waste from 
U.S. beef production is carried down the 
Mississippi.
The report concludes that, unless drastic changes 
are made, the massive damage done by livestock 
will more than double by 2050, as demand for meat 
increases.
That's the bad news. The good news is that 
reducing our consumption of food derived from 
animals happens one meal at a time and that it is 
well within the power of each of us to make 
changes, however incremental, in our food choices!
I'm a firm believer that one can stay low on the 
food chain and still enjoy life. As a mostly 
vegan vegetarian, I know I am looking out for my 
health and the health of the animals I choose not 
to eat. And now, as it turns out, I'm saving the 
planet as well! (And what about not wanting to 
eat the products of cloned or genetically 
engineered animals? Another reason to go vegan!)
So get a grip on global warming by resolving to 
lessen your dependence on animals for food in 
2007.
Martha Devine lives in Arcata.