Archive for ‘Beyond the Valley

What’s happening beyond the Hudson Valley and nationally in sustainable food and farming.

Neonic Updates from Both Sides of “the Pond”

By Judy LaBelle, Glynwood Senior Fellow

The European Commission and the USDA both reacted recently to concerns about Colony Collapse Disorder among bees and the neonicotinoid pesticides that have been implicated by many studies.

The contrast in the approaches to risk on the opposite sides of “the pond”–and the willingness to take action commensurate with seriousness of the environmental risk, even in the face of compelling but imperfect data–could not be more stark.

By December of this year, countries in the European Union must impose a ban on the use of neonicotinoid pesticides on crops that attract bees. The ban followed on the heels of a European Food Safety Authority study that concluded that neonicotinoid-based pesticides present an “unacceptable” danger to bees. The ban, enacted by the European Commission in late April, will remain in place for two years, allowing time for further study of the pesticide’s impact.

Meanwhile, the United States has declined to take any regulatory action relating to these pesticides, citing the need for further study.

Last fall the Colony Collapse Disorder Steering Committee, composed of representatives of several federal agencies, convened the National Stakeholders Conference on Honey Bee Health to “consider actions to promote health and mitigate risks to managed honeybees in the United States.” The USDA released the report from this Conference within days of the European Commission’s vote to impose a two-year ban.

The report states that: “Acute and sublethal effects of pesticides on honey bees have been increasingly documented, and are a primary concern.” Yet it places greater emphasis on the combination of a variety of factors, including parasitic mites, viruses, bacteria, nutrition and breeding.

Rather than calling for action now to reduce the impact of the pesticides on bee health, the report recommends further study, including on “the effects of pervasive exposure to multiple pesticides on bee health and productivity of whole honey bee colonies.”

As a next step, the Steering Committee plans to revise the CCD Action Plan, to synthesize the input from the Conference and outline major priorities for the next 5-10 years.

During this time, the pesticides can continue to be used.

As Bryan Walsh concluded in Time.com’s Ecocentric blog: “So what we may get in Europe and the U.S. is a de facto field test of the real impact of neonicotinoids… In two years, if American bees are still dying and their European cousins are thriving, we might just have our answers.”


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Connecting the Dots for the “Valiant Bestiary”

By Judy LaBelle, Glynwood Senior Fellow

One of the most remarkable images from the movie “Queen of the Sun” is of flying over mile after mile of California almond orchards–nothing as far as one can see but almond orchards.

This came to mind in response to a recent NPR piece entitled “Why California Almonds Need North Dakota Flowers (and A Few Billion Bees).” In the piece, Journalist Dan Charles described the troubled connection between the California orchards that now produce two-thirds of the almonds in the world and the fields of North Dakota.

To produce almost two billion pounds of almonds each year, California farmers rely on bees that are trucked in. At the time of the NPR interview, a stunning 1.6 million bee hives had been delivered.

After the brief almond bloom, beekeepers like Zac Browning truck the bees to “the fringes of rural America, where we can stay away from pesticides, where we can find wildflowers.” For years, they have gone more than 1,000 miles to North Dakota, where large expanses of land had been set aside by farmers receiving compensation through the Conservation Reserve Program (CRP).

That is changing rapidly. In just the past five years, the amount of CRP land in North Dakota has declined by about a third as farmers have responded to high market prices for corn. Concerned government scientists have begun to study whether bees placed next to corn fields are as healthy as those that can graze the mixed vegetation on CRP land. Beekeepers are concerned about whether their businesses can survive.

This report also brought to mind The Forgotten Pollinators, written by Stephen L. Buchmann and Gary Paul Nabhan nearly 20 years ago. In his introduction, Edward O. Wilson wrote, “Eighty percent of the species of our food plants worldwide, we are informed, depend on pollination by an animal, almost all of which are insects. One of every three mouthfuls of food we eat, and of the beverages we drink, are delivered to us roundabout by a valiant bestiary of pollinators.”

Two decades later, these pollinators continue to be undermined on all sides, by loss of habitat, increasing use of pesticides, disease, and other factors that are not yet well understood. Commercial beekeepers, who once anticipated losing 5-10% of their hives each year, have lost 40 to 50% of their hives in the past year.

Finally, the surprising connection between the California almond producers and the North Dakota farmers, brought to mind the scene from “Big River” in which shrimpers traveled up the Mississippi to urge Midwestern farmers whose runoff was causing the “dead zone” in the Gulf to change their fertilizing practices to help restore the resource the shrimpers rely upon.

The need to connect the dots in the food system has never been more critical. Policies or actions that are intended to have one purpose have profound unintended consequences–sometimes nearby, sometimes far away, and often hard to detect or prove.

Yet even when we can connect the dots, taking action based on what we learn is not easy. A recent example from Europe helps make this point: after a report from the European Food Safety Authority cited the neonicotinoid-based pesticides as presenting an “unacceptable” danger to bees, the European Commission considered a proposal to suspend their use for two years to allow further study. The proposal, fought by the companies that dominate what has been termed the “billion dollar market” for these pesticides, was not adopted when considered earlier this month.

In the US, environmental and consumer groups–and some beekeepers–have long attempted to force the US Environmental Protection Agency (US EPA) to undertake more studies of the impact of pesticides that may be “bee-toxic,” in particular the neonictinoid-based pesticides, before continuing to allow their widespread use. In late March attorneys from the Center for Food Safety filed suit on their behalf against US EPA seeking to compel it to take action.

It is clear that more work is needed on both the scientific and policy fronts to protect the “valiant bestiary” on which most of our food supply depends. At the same time, it is also clear that the ecological health and resiliency upon which our food supply depends is enhanced by the expansion of regional food systems based on practices that do connect the dots–that build soil health, conserve water, and protect the health of pollinators while producing fresh and healthful food for consumers.


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Land Trusts, Farming, and the Hudson Valley

By Judy LaBelle, Glynwood Senior Fellow

Our colleague Erik Hoffner, from Orion Magazine, has written a terrific post for grist.org on the rapidly growing involvement of land trusts in the local foods movement. We are delighted to see this, since Glynwood’s own efforts to encourage land trusts to support sustainable agriculture extend back over nearly a decade.

As described in Erik’s post, land trust activities run the gamut from purchasing agricultural land to protect it from development, to leasing conserved land to farmers, to creating incubators to support the development of new farmers, to operating farms directly as part of their stewardship and educational programs.

In spite of these land conservation activities, the market price of agricultural land in many parts of the country still exceeds its value for agricultural use.  We look forward to learning more about how land trusts are trying to address this issue and make land affordable for farmers long-term, which is the focus of a national survey of land trusts recently undertaken by our colleagues at The National Young Farmers’ Coalition.

Glywood began to encourage land trusts to support sustainable agriculture back in 2004, when we held a convening titled “You Saved It, Now What?”, which brought together local officials, land trust professionals, farmers and other national experts to discuss how land owners could be encouraged to make conserved land available for productive agricultural use.  This led to a 2007 convening of the leading land trust professionals from across the country designed to identify best practices in working with agricultural land.   The resulting report: “Land Trusts and Agricultural Land: Saving Farmland or Farming?”, was the basis for a workshop at the Land Trust Alliance national Rally in 2007 and continues to be widely circulated to encourage land trusts to promote the productive use of protected farmland.

The Hudson Valley, which is the primary focus of Glynwood’s work, is blessed with a strong network of regional, county and local land trusts.  Glynwood works directly with many of them to encourage and support their engagement in the effort to strengthen our regional food system.  An important current example of this effort is our partnership with The Open Space Institute to create a farm business incubator on agricultural land OSI has conserved in the heart of the Valley.   Stay tuned as this project is implemented!


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“Understanding Restaurant Systems” at NOFA-NY

This weekend, Glynwood’s Culinary Director, Jason Wood, will be presenting at the Northeast Organic Farming Association of New York’s 31st annual winter conference. He will join food and farming experts of all stripes with the hopes of collaborating, educating, and inspiring the next wave in sustainable agriculture. The theme for this year’s conference: Resilience.

Photo via NOFA-NY, click to view website.

Photo via NOFA-NY, click to view website.

His three-hour workshop, “Understanding Restaurant Systems,” will educate farmers about growing, marketing, and selling to restaurants. This presentation builds on Jason and co-presenter Gabe McMackin’s deep experience managing restaurant kitchens over the course of their careers. The goal of this education is to equip farmers using sustainable growing practices to meet institutional demand for fresh, local produce. By building strong relationships with restaurants, hospitals, universities, business parks, and public cafeterias, farmers will have more demand, more diversity, and ultimately, greater resilience.

In her announcement for the 2013 conference, NOFA-NY’s Executive Director Kate Mendenhall described the theme as follows:

Organic farmers are no strangers to adversity. 2012 was a year of extraordinary economic and environmental upheaval…Yet our farmers once again plowed on (pun intended). For the unsung role organic farmers play for our health, our communities, our culture, and our very survival, together we want to recognize and celebrate their remarkable resilience.

Since its formation in 1983, NOFA-NY has been a tremendous resource for farmers in the region. Glynwood has a deep affinity for NOFA-NY’s mission and has long supported its work. Each year, Glynwood sponsors its apprentices to attend the NOFA interstate council’s summer conference, where Director of Farmer Training Dave Llewellyn has presented many times. With this presentation, Jason Wood will continue the tradition and start a dialogue that we hope will help New York farmers for years to come.


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TEDxManhattan Registration Now Open!

On Saturday, February 16th, 2013, TEDxManhattan “Changing the Way We Eat” will be held at the Times Center in New York City. This one-day TEDx event will explore the food system as we shift to a more sustainable way of eating and farming.  The goal of “Changing the Way We Eat” is to create new synergies, connections and collaborations across disciplines, to unite different areas of the food movement, and to introduce the TEDx audience to the exciting and innovative work being done in this field.   The Glynwood Institute for Sustainable Food and Farming is the lead sponsor for TEDxManhattan.

How to Participate : 

1. Apply to Attend

The TEDxManhattan event will be curated and audience members hand selected so that attendees are a balanced mix of academics, researchers, health professionals, farmers, foodies, chefs, advocates, foundations, public figures and TEDsters, ensuring a diverse audience that can facilitate new ideas and synergies with each other.  To learn how to attend  “Changing the Way We Eat,” please visit www.tedxmanhattan.org/apply.   If you are selected to attend the event, the ticket price will be $135.00.

There is no official deadline for registration, but the event has sold out with hundreds of people turned away each year, so please apply early.

2. Host a Viewing Party
In an effort to have as many people as possible participate in TEDxManhattan, the day will be webcast live for free.  TEDxManhattan encourages individuals and groups around the country to set up their own viewing parties. Details about hosting a viewing party can be found on the website at www.tedxmanhattan.org/viewing-parties.  If you are interested in hosting your own event, please email TEDxManhattan@gmail.com.

Confirmed speakers to date are:

  • Fred Bahnson, Wake Forest University School of Divinity
  • Simran Sethi, Journalist, Author and Educator
  • Maisie Greenawalt, Bon Appetit Management Company
  • Anna Lappe, Small Planet Institute
  • Annemarie Colbin, Natural Gourmet Institute
  • Peter Lehner, NRDC
  • Bill Yosses, White House Pastry Chef
  • Gary Hirshberg, Stonyfield Farm
  • Karen Washington, South Bronx Community Activist
  • Ann Cooper, Food Family Farming Foundation

Several additional speakers will be announced shortly.

To learn more about TEDxManhattan, please watch our promo video from the first year at www.youtube.com/watch?v=AGrhHQmI4_o.

The TEDxManhattan website – www.tedxmanhattan.org/ and Facebook page – www.facebook.com/tedxmanhattan will offer regular updates on speakers and other TEDxManhattan news.  You can also follow us on Twitter @TEDxManhattan.  https://twitter.com/tedxmanhattan

For more information, please visit www.TEDxManhattan.org.

About TEDx, x = independently organized event

In the spirit of ideas worth spreading, TEDx is a program of local, self-organized events that bring people together to share a TED-like experience. At a TEDx event, TEDTalks video and live speakers combine to spark deep discussion and connection in a small group. These local, self-organized events are branded TEDx, where x = independently organized TED event. The TED Conference provides general guidance for the TEDx program, but individual TEDx events are self-organized. [Subject to certain rules and regulations.] For more information about TED and TEDx, please visit www.ted.com.

What is The Glynwood Institute for Sustainable Food and Farming?
The Glynwood Institute for Sustainable Food and Farming – www.glynwoodinstitute.org is a nonprofit program working to help shift the US food system to regional sustainable through innovative communications and marketing strategies.  The Glynwood Institute is a division of Glynwood, a Hudson Valley based non-profit organization whose mission is to save farming.  TEDster Diane Hatz, co-founder & director of The Glynwood Institute and previously founder of Sustainable Table, executive producer of The Meatrix movies and a founder of the Eat Well Guide, is the organizer and host for TEDxManhattan.


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Raising Awareness: Food Revolution Day & Dinner and Some Ed

Food Revolution Day is the Jamie Oliver Foundation and Jamie Oliver Food Foundation’s first-ever global day of action. It is a chance for people who love food to come together to share information, talents and resources; to pass on their knowledge and highlight the world’s food issues. It’s about connecting the community through events at schools, restaurants, local businesses, dinner parties and farmers’ markets. The Foundations want to inspire change in people’s food habits and to promote the mission for better food and education for everyone.

Dinner and Some Ed is an effort to raise awareness (and to enjoy!) local sustainable food by hosting a meal and showing a TED or TEDx video on food and farming. “Dinner” is a relative term- this can also be done as a brunch, lunch, picnic, or potluck. The key is just to have a computer or a mobile device where you can watch the talks while enjoying delicious, sustainable food.

Dinner and Some Ed came out of a project called Tedibles at TEDActive in Palm Springs, CA, in 2012. It is an effort to bring sustainable food to the extended TED community (meaning anyone who’s ever watched a TED talk).

Food Revolution Day on May 19th is the perfect time to host your first dinner and to join the global movement.

How can you get involved? Simple:

Step 1: Host a Dinner Party on Jamie Oliver’s Food Revolution Day site
Step 2: Name your dinner “Food Revolution Dinner and Some Ed”
Step 3: Plan a meal
Step 4: Invite friends
Step 5: Watch TED/TEDx videos 

Have fun!

Use your imagination when planning your meal – host a potluck, invite your local farmer, or have guests bring recipes along with their dish and include where they sourced their ingredients. Visit Dinner and Some Ed’s What To Do page for ideas and more information.

Our Pick of the Month videos are:
Jamie Oliver: TED prize wish: Teach every child about food
Laurie David: Dinner Makes a Difference
Dan Barber: How I Fell in Love with a Fish
Birke Baehr: What’s Wrong with Our Food System

Watch these or your own combination of videos while enjoying some great tasting food, and be sure to check out our site for more information or to submit a review of your dinner!

 


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Watch TEDxManhattan “Changing the Way We Eat” LIVE online on January 21, 2012

Did you know that last year, over 14,000 computers tuned in from locations all over the globe to watch the live simulcast of the first TEDxManhattan “Changing the Way We Eat.” This Saturday, January 21, 2012, the second TEDxManhattan “Changing the Way We Eat” will be held at the Times Center in New York City.  There, 20 leaders in the field will explore the issues, impacts and the innovations happening as we shift to a more sustainable way of eating and farming. And anyone around the world can share in this exciting day by watching the live webcast at www.livestream.com/tedx from 10:30am – 5:15pm eastern standard time or by attending one of the local viewing parties happening across the country.  It’s easy, it’s free, and it will be both informative and inspiring.

If you’d like to be among like-minded individuals to tune into the talks, you may want to stop in at one of the local Viewing Parties being held from Portland, Oregon to Houston, Texas and even Marseille, France.  To find a list of Viewing Parties and to connect with them, visit the Viewing Party map on the TEDxManhattan website.  Click on one of the map pins in your area to get detailed information on the where and when.  All of the viewing parties are free, and many will feature local speakers who will talk about what’s happening in your community.

This is also wonderful opportunity for people around the world to connect online with each other and the sustainable food movement via these social media tools:

We hope you watch with us and join in the conversation. To learn more about the day and the speakers, visit www.tedxmanhattan.org


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Bring TEDxManhattan “Changing the Way We Eat” 2012 to your Hometown via a Viewing Party

In February of this year, over 14,000 computers tuned in from locations all over the globe to watch the live simulcast of the first TEDxManhattan “Changing the Way We Eat.” On Saturday, January 21, 2012, the second TEDxManhattan “Changing the Way We Eat” – an independently organized event, licensed by TED – will be held at the Times Center in New York City. This one-day event whose lead sponsor is the Glynwood Institute for Sustainable Food and Farming, will explore the issues, the impacts and innovations happening as we shift to a more sustainable way of eating and farming and help to create connections and unite different areas of the food movement.

And while not everyone may be able to attend the local event, communities around the world can share in this inspiring day by hosting a viewing party of the live webcast in their hometowns.

WHERE can you host a viewing party?

In your home, a school, a library or other non-profit location, as well as restaurants (certain restrictions apply). And so that as many people as possible participate in TEDxManhattan, the TEDx team has made it simple to host your own viewing party, complete with a video and links to a Viewing Party Tool Kit, which outlines rules and ideas.

There’s a world-class line-up of speakers that are sure to inspire you and guests, including:
• Fred Kirschenmann, farmer, Distinguished Fellow at the Leopold Center for Sustainable Agriculture at Iowa State University, and President of the Stone Barns Center for Food and Agriculture in NY
• Mitchell Davis, vice president, the James Beard Foundation, cookbook author and food journalist
• Wenonah Hauter, Executive Director of Food & Water Watch
• Gary Oppenheimer, founder/executive director of AmpleHarvest.org, CNN Hero, Master Gardener, Huffington Post 2011 Game Changer, winner of the 2011 Glynwood Wave of the Future Harvest Award
• Michelle Hughes, Director of GrowNYC’s New Farmer Development Project

WHY host a Viewing Party?

Local viewing parties are opportunities for people around the world to connect with each other and the sustainable food movement. While events revolve around the speakers in NYC, organizers are encouraged to invite local speakers and plan activities to engage their participants during breaks. TEDxManhattan Viewing Party Coordinator Jane Orgel reports that there are already over three dozen viewing parties set up from California to Vermont, and in global communities in France and Canada.

To learn more about TEDxManhattan “Changing the Way We Eat,” to read about the complete line-up of speakers  and to learn more about host a viewing party, visit www.tedxmanhattan.org.  You can also follow on facebook and twitter:  www.facebook.com/tedxmanhattan and @tedxmanhattan.

What is  TEDx and TED?
In the spirit of ideas worth spreading, TEDx is a program of local, self-organized events that bring people together to share a TED-like* experience. At a TEDx event, TEDTalks video and live speakers combine to spark deep discussion and connection in a small group. These local, self-organized events are branded TEDx, where x = independently organized TED event. The TED Conference provides general guidance for the TEDx program, but individual TEDx events are self-organized. *TED is a nonprofit organization devoted to Ideas Worth Spreading. Started as a four-day conference in California 25 years ago, TED has grown to support those world-changing ideas with multiple initiatives. For more information about TED and TEDx, please visit www.ted.com.

TED is a nonprofit organization devoted to Ideas Worth Spreading. Started as a four-day conference in California 25 years ago, TED has grown to support those world-changing ideas with multiple initiatives. The annual TED Conference invites the world’s leading thinkers and doers to speak for 18 minutes. Their talks are then made available, free, at TED.com. TED speakers have included Bill Gates, Al Gore, Jane Goodall, Elizabeth Gilbert, Sir Richard Branson, Nandan Nilekani, Philippe Starck, Ngozi Okonjo-Iweala, Isabel Allende and UK Prime Minister Gordon Brown.


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TEDxManhattan Challenge Finalists

TEDxManhattan “Changing the Way We Eat” planning is well underway, with 14 speakers confirmed, the venue in place and food details underway. We’ve also chosen our five finalists for the TEDxManhattan Challenge – we challenged people last year to work in their community anywhere in the United States on a project related to sustainable food and farming.

We received around 40 applications from all over the country and have narrowed it down to the final five. The winner will get to speak live from stage at the 2012 TEDxManhattan event. If you would like to vote for your favorite, please email your choice by December 5th to TEDxManhattanChallenge@gmail.com.

We’re also encouraging everyone to set up a local viewing party to watch the event live – if you’d like to watch, please tune in to our broadcast on January 21st at www.livestream.com/tedx. Better yet, set up a viewing party in your neighborhood and invite friends over to watch the talks with you. You can find out more information about viewing parties and setting one up at http://tedxmanhattan.org/viewing-parties/.

The five TEDxManhattan Challenge finalists are:

1. Natasha Bowens, The Color of Food – http://thecolorofood.org/home.html She’s spent the past year creating a space for farmers and food activists of color to connect, work together and share stories, history and traditional knowledge. The Color of Food is a space to raise the voices of communities of color in the movement for food justice.

2. Rick Nahmias, Food Forward – http://foodforward.org/ In 2.5 years they have become Southern California’s largest backyard harvesting for the hungry NPO. Food Forward organizes corps of between 3 and 300 volunteers to harvest excess food from private homes and public spaces, donating 100% to the hungry.

3. Amie Hamlin, New York Coalition for Healthy School Food – http://www.healthyschoolfood.org/ New York Coalition for Healthy School Food has been working with the New York City Office of SchoolFood (they spell it as one word) in a formal partnership for the last few years to develop and introduce plant-based entrees to serve as the protein component in school lunches. They are doing this in 18 schools and have a waiting list of 48 schools.

4. Howard Hinterthuer, Veteran’s Food Production Project
http://www.wuwm.com/programs/news/view_news.php?articleid=9474 Their organic therapy project for veterans, now in its fourth year, is transitioning into a food production program designed to supplement and eventually replace food that they currently purchase through vendors.

5. Billy Mawhiney, Fresh Mitchell – http://freshmitchell.info/ Fresh Mitchell is a group aimed at changing the way rural Mitchell, South Dakota, eats. They began marketing their Farmers Market, got accepted for SNAP and credit cards, and began a CSA through a 5th generation farm about 30 miles away (called the Goosemobile). They recently hosted their first Fall Harvest Celebration, a night of Old Fashioned fireside stories from the South Dakota food movement to raise funds for an edible classroom, demo area for the market and CSA support.

Please email your favorite finalist by December 5th to TEDxManhattanChallenge@gmail.com.


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TEDxManhattan “Changing the Way We Eat”: How You Can Join the Conversation on February 12

If you are one of the many Americans who want to help change the way we eat in this country, you will want to tune in to TEDxManhattan on Saturday, February 12.  Listen to an amazing array of speakers, all big thinkers in their field, each of whom give short, thoughtful talks about how we can shift our industrial food system to one that provides fresh, locally produced food for everyone, all in the TED spirit of  ’ideas worth spreading’.

So you don’t live in Manhattan?  Well, the good news is you can still be a part of this inspiring day!  TEDxManhattan has helped over 100 communities in the US and Europe set up local viewing parties, where you can get together with like-minded people in your community to watch the event live; many cities will have local farmers, officials and food advocates there to speak about what’s happening in your own region, and most will serve locally grown foods at their party.  To attend a local viewing party in your area, visit http://tedxmanhattan.org/viewing-parties/ for information.

Can’t make a Viewing Party but want to be a part of TEDxManhattan?  You can take part from the comfort of your own home.  Just turn on your computer, go to www.livestream.com/tedx between 10:30am – 6:30pm eastern, and tune in.

TEDxManhattan will feature inspiring thought leaders at the cutting edge of their industry, each of whom will talk about the importance of finding new ways to redefine the way we grow and eat food from their perspective and field of expertise.  To learn about the speakers, their work and to view a schedule of when they will be giving their talks, go to www.tedxmanhattan.org/event.

We hope you will join The Glynwood Institute for Sustainable Food and Farming for this exciting day of  learning, listening and sharing.


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