Rise above plastics
Recent studies estimate that fish off the West Coast ingest over 12,000 tons of plastic a year. Find out how you can help turn the tide on plastic pollution at www.surfrider.org/rap.
Nasty stuff. For more on plastic’s impact on our health, check out the entertaining documentary film “Bag It.”
In one of my favorite talks from the last few years, TreeHugger.com founder Graham Hill identifies the three most effective ways to slash your carbon footprint. Together they make for a great New Year’s resolution for anybody who cares about living in a safe and peaceful world. As an added bonus, they’ll improve your health and save you time and money!
I highly recommend watching the video, but if you don’t have time here are the Cliffs Notes on high impact carbon reduction:
- Cut way down on meat consumption.
- Minimize your air travel.
- Switch to a renewable energy program.
Great video about rooftop gardening in NYC
Robyn O’Brien at TEDxMileHigh
Robyn O’Brien is a good friend of ours at the FearLess Cottage. Here she gives her powerful personal story of going from a Wall Street analyst to a mom who learned things about her kids’ food that she simply couldn’t unlearn.
It’s time for a food fight
This video is the first in a series featuring Jeffrey M. Smith on the risks of genetically modified organisms (GMOs) in our food supply. The videos were created by my FearLess teammates Alex, Isaac, Kim, Matt and Art.
Sweat the small stuff
The folks at GOOD present eight ways to reduce your impact on the planet and make your life a little better at the same time.
The GrowHaus
This post by Ellen Sabina originally appeared on JustMeans, a blog on sustainable business.
Finding healthy sustainable food in the middle of the city can be difficult, particularly in areas that qualify as food deserts. Such is the case in the Elyria-Swansea neighborhood in Denver, Colorado, where the nearest real grocery store is a Walmart supercenter that is three miles away. It’s industrial, it’s low income, it’s primarily Latino. But it also happens to be home to a very large greenhouse taking on a very large sustainable food project.
The GrowHaus is a brand new community farm, marketplace, and education center occupying an old commercial flower greenhouse. Thanks to the vision of a local developer, the greenhouse was bought and renovated to transform into a community garden of sorts, with space for neighborhood residents to grow their own vegetables, even through the winter.
In addition to providing affordable garden space for low income residents, the GrowHaus has begun to develop an indoor farm for market production based on the low-input/output models of permaculture. Until the staff creates a master plan for how to best utilize the greenhouse space (which is fairly huge), GrowHaus is also available for use by local sustainable food growers. Currently a small Colorado-based aquaponics company has three aquaponic systems up and running in the space, growing lettuce, chard, basil, tomatoes, perch and tilapia. The farm has begun testing the marketability of their produce and sells to a local restaurant. Eventually, however, the Growhaus hopes to expand to create a “Growasis” market, a place where area residents can come to buy affordable staples, like healthy, fresh, and organic produce, among other items.
Just as important as creating access to healthy, sustainable food for folks living in a food desert, the GrowHaus provides access to food literacy and education. The greenhouse hosts speakers on topics like urban permaculture, garden design, nutrition, healthy lifestyles, and food justice. This interactivity between the farm and the surrounding community is an important piece of creating a lasting and healthy impact. As the GrowHaus grows, it will also include job programs and internships for local high school students.
As the GrowHaus works to make this dream greenhouse a reality, it emerges as a striking example of the way food justice synthesizes all aspects of a truly sustainable food system on a local level. They not only seek to grow healthy, sustainable food, but are also paying as much attention to growing a sense of community, increasing the number of jobs, and providing a space for education.
To label or not to label?
This comic is so good, I’m not sure whether I should laugh or cry. At the FearLess Cottage, we’re not big fans of Monsanto and this little masterpiece perfectly illustrates the reason why. For one thing, they’re dominating the American food system with untested and potentially very dangerous genetically modified (GMO) foods. Stuff that’s been banned in many other countries because of serious health risks. But what really gets us riled up is the fact that Monsanto doesn’t want anybody to know about it. By working closely with the FDA, they’ve managed to keep GMO foods from being labeled as such. As a result, there’s no transparency and most of us are consuming the altered corn and soy products every day without even knowing it.
