permaculture

[Bob Waldrop <bob@bobwaldrop.net>]

A brochure about our coop which as I read it now I see is minorly out of 
date (it says we have 2500 items for sale each month but we've had 
4,000+ for several months.

http://www.oklahomafood.coop/pdf/brochure1109.pdf

Here is an essay -- How to organize a local food coop --

http://www.oklahomafood.coop/organizing.php

Our producer procedures -- www.oklahomafood.coop/producers.php which 
include our product standards.  Don't discount the difficulty of 
defining what a "local food" or non-food item is that may be sold 
through your group.  In the beginning, I thought this was a no brainer, 
but I was very wrong about that, lol.

Our Articles of Incorporation
http://www.oklahomafood.coop/articlesofinc.php

Policy manual
http://www.oklahomafood.coop/policy.php

We have 4,299 products available this month.

Our membership page, which includes applications for the different 
classes of producers (food, non-food, prepared food, processed foods, it 
also has a description of the approval process for new producers.

http://www.oklahomafood.coop/okfoodservice.php

If you decide to do this, you should come here for one of our delivery 
days.  A lot of the groups that have started up have done that.  There's 
is nothing quite like seeing it in action.  Somewhere between 15-20,000 
different products, from 100+ producers, going out to 900 or so 
customers at 45 different locations, and we do that pretty much all in 
one day, with 6 part-time employees and about 100 or so volunteers 
(between the operations center and the 45 pickup sites).

Bob Waldrop

On 8/7/2012 4:11 PM, Cory Brennan wrote:
> Do you have any write ups about your cooperative Bob? Or how does one get 
> more data? We might be interested in our area.
>   
> Koreen Brennan
>
> www.growpermaculture.com
> www.meetup.com/sustainable-urban-agriculture-coalition
> www.meetup.com/createclearwater
>
>
> ________________________________
>   From: Bob Waldrop <bob@bobwaldrop.net>
> To: permaculture@lists.ibiblio.org
> Sent: Tuesday, August 7, 2012 5:03 PM
> Subject: Re: [permaculture] [permaculture-99] Dacha Movement: History and 
> Effects In Russia
>   
> Yes I'm reading and I tend to agree with Toby.  While I often say
> everyone should grow some food, I have a good vision of the limits of
> food growth in urban areas for most people, especially those who have no
> land or very little land.  I have 1/7th of an acre, and over half that
> is covered with buildings or concrete, and I raise food on the concrete
> in pots, but I am not raising anything like a full diet here and won't
> be able to do that either.
>
> Someone with a small balcony can raise some herbs and a half dozen
> tomato plants -- where is the rest of their food coming from?
>
> Well, if they are in Oklahoma City, or Tulsa, Lawton, Muskogee,
> Tahlequah, McAlester or one of the other communities served by the
> Oklahoma Food Cooperative, they could choose every month from more than
> 4,000 different food and non-food items offered by typically 100+
> producers, everything is made or grown right here in Oklahoma and sold
> by its producer through the Coop.
>
> THAT'S WHY I started the Oklahoma Food Cooperative in 2003.  I think it
> is a great, replicable model for developing urban food systems. There
> are nearly 20 other such cooperatives that have started via our model,
> including one in Australia and two in Canada.  Our unique contribution
> primarily I think is the conception of the organization as a hybrid
> producer/consumer coop, with both producers and customers as members.
> That meant that we could charge a lower price for a membership share,
> since the potential number of customer members is much larger than the
> number of producer members.  In our model, instead of the coop buying
> wholesale and selling retail, each producer is his or her own brand.
> They set their prices, we charge them 10% for selling through the coop,
> and the customers pay 10% for buying through the coop, so the coop gets
> 20% and the producer gets 80% of the food, a much better distribution of
> the money than is found in supermarkets.
>
> In general, I think permaculture designers should pay as much attention
> to invisible structures as we do to growing things, but that's not the
> way generally that things work out.   I always thought that Toby's move
> back to the city from a rural area marked a significant milepost in the
> development of the permaculture movement.
>
> We are evolving our way perhaps to becoming a triple hybrid as a
> worker-customer-producer cooperative.  If someone was just starting out
> doing this today, that's what I would recommend that they start with.
>
> List of "Oklahoma plan" cooperatives in other states --
> http://www.oklahomafood.coop/otherstates.php .
>
> Bob Waldrop, http://www.oklahomafood.coop
>
> On 8/7/2012 1:28 PM, venaurafarm wrote:
> > On 8/7/2012 10:02 AM, Toby Hemenway wrote:
> > > > If we want to survive . . . each and every family as much as
> > > > possible needs to be able to produce it's own food for itself, and
> > > > as many other people as possible.
> > Right on and thumbs up, onward relentless, let nothing stand in your way.
> >
> > > I don't need to grow my own food.
> > But there are millions of others who do need to grow their own food in
> > order to have a healthy diet, involve themselves in very worthwhile
> > activities as practitioners and learners. Many need to do this to put
> > food on their tables as they try to weather the poor economy, job loss,
> > keep their homes and land, keep transportation or seek working
> > alternatives (bus, bicycle, carpool), have adequate healthcare, etc.
> >
> > > I need to be part of a healthy
> > > network that does.
> > Those networks, if they exist, are not necessarily available to millions
> > of people and for a varieties or reasons. Let's hear more about your
> > networks. Who forms them, who is part of them and who keeps them going
> > and functionsl?
> >
> > The LL plan for America includes a computer/web/internet-based product
> > and services production, marketing and distribution network, PSPMDN.
> > It could be created and made to work and serve everyone participating,
> > no matter how small, as consumer or seller, barter, trade, donate, have
> > its own currency and be compatible and cooperative with the IRS.
> >
> > > While I'd love it if everyone gardened, a
> > > coordinated community food system
> > Where are they and how many are there; what is the projected future for
> > this resource?
> >
> > > is more resilient and allows more
> > > diversity than individual dachas, and fits better with American
> > > culture and land ownership patterns. The US has a very different
> > > history from Russia.
> > Not so. At all. You're conception of this is too fixed and limited
> > and too limited to the past.
> >
> > > And most yards are too small to produce "all our
> > > own food."
> > Straw man argument. They need to produce as much of their food needs as
> > possible, themselves. This can be done in pots or windowsills in
> > apartments, urban or suburban homes, rural homes and homesteads and
> > farms. How many thousands of books have been written encouraging people
> > to grow their own for table fare and health, and to share or sell. How
> > many tens of thousands of videos exist on YouTube demonstrating every
> > aspect of home food production and renewable energy, and cottage
> > industry possibilities. We need 21st Century Victory Gardeners
> > Practicing Permaculture. We need a nation of them. Think of the savings
> > in energy, materials and equipment.
> >
> > Its a mass movement already, a happening thing, thank providence.
> >
> > This is what permaculture is really all about down to its core set of
> > principles.
> >
> > > A single 18th-Century farmer could feed 50 people. Making the
> > > household, instead of the farm, the neighborhood or even the town,
> > > the core unit of a food system atomizes the community.  Let's not
> > > default to "go it alone." It reduces the many options for reaching a
> > > goal--meeting our food needs--to a single tactic: grow it all
> > > yourself. It means that this critical function is done only one way,
> > > with all the attendant hazards (what if you get hurt?) and reduces
> > > most people to serfs farming for a banker. It's part of the mix, but
> > > not the solution.
> > >
> > > The dachas are well worth looking at.  But severe food and economic
> > > disruptions tend to be brief in developed countries (see Argentina,
> > > Iceland, Weimar Germany, Mexico, etc.), stabilizing soon at a
> > > simplified level. So to redesign as though the unstable period will
> > > be permanent is unwise.
> > >
> > > While Russians were busy farming their 2.5 acre dachas all day, the
> > > oligarchs were seizing control of everything else. They still have
> > > it. Let's learn from that. We need to organize at a higher level than
> > > the household.
> > And the oligarchs, the cabal, corporations, etc. are not doing this now?
> > Stealing their investments, causing profound inflation and profiteering
> > from price rises (charge what the market will bear, law of supply and
> > demand), sending most American jobs overseas and not creating a
> > significant number of new ones to replace those lost, largely factory
> > and small local businesses ceasing operation in the face of competition
> > from chain stores selling imported goods (at inflated prices). And
> > people do not need to pull themselves up by their bootstraps, reorganize
> > their lives and livelihoods, seek self sufficiency, independence,
> > personal sovereignty, freedom, liberty, family security and access to
> > the basic necessities of live? Of course they do, now as much as ever,
> > including during the Great Depression.
> >
> > > Toby http://patternliteracy.com
> > This is a good thread, keep it going.
> > Are you reading, Koreen and Bob Waldrop?
> >
> > LL
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