“Who brought their own wheelbarrow?” Rob Jones asked the group of 20-somethings gathered on a muddy North Carolina farm on a chilly January Sunday. Hands shot up and wheelbarrows were pulled from pickups sportingLed Zeppelin and biodiesel bumper stickers, then parked next to a mountain of soil. “We need to get that dirt into those beds over there in the greenhouse,” he said, nodding toward a plastic-roofed structure a few hundred feet away. “The rest of you can come with me to move trees and clear brush to make room for more pasture. Watch out for poison ivy.”

Bobby Tucker, the 28-year-old co-owner of Okfuskee Farm in rural Silk Hope, looked eagerly at the 50-plus volunteers bundled in all manner of flannel and hand-knits. In five hours, these pop-up farmers would do more on his fledgling farm than he and his three interns could accomplish in months. “It’s immeasurable,” he said of the gift of same-day infrastructure.

It’s the beauty of being Crop Mobbed. Continued here.

Growing locally: Demand for natural foods spurs expansion of Kalamazoo food co-op

By Kathy Jessup | Kalamazoo Gazette

February 21, 2010, 11:59AM

KALAMAZOO — Nearly 40 years ago, it was an informal, do-it-yourself system.
A handful of friends looking for more natural foods would leave change in a cup and scoop whole grains and flour from containers stored in local basements and living rooms.

That alternative to grocery stores has ridden a consumer wave for organic, locally grown, preservative-free foods to become the People’s Food Co-op, with annual sales of nearly $1million.

The customer-owned Co-op on Kalamazoo’s South Burdick Street has outgrown its 784-square-foot grocery and announced plans to build a new facility at 507 Harrison St., in the River’s Edge mixed-use development. Construction of the 6,000-square-foot facility, a $1.7-million project, rests on the Co-op’s ability to raise more than $450,000 in loans and equity from its owner-members and an agreement with the city that includes brownfield reclamation benefits.

Chris Dilley, general manager of The Peoples' Food Co-op of Kalamazoo, pauses near the front of the store on Burdick Street.

Members already have pledged nearly $180,000, said Co-op general manager Chris Dilley. Once patronized by food purists willing to travel to get farm-fresh goods, Dilley said the Co-op has seen an increasing number of customers willing to pay more to buy organically grown produce, eggs and meats from chemical-free animals and fresh produce from farms within 100 miles.

The partnerships have paid off for area farmers such as a Vicksburg greenhouse that developed a market for its winter raspberries. Co-op shareholders are seeing 10- to 12-percent annual returns in dividends and food discounts on their capital investments in the grocery.  

“We’re a grocery store, but what makes us different is the ownership and how we capitalize,” Dilley said.  “The owner is not an individual or a family, but now 760 individuals and families in the community who channel their vision of what they want to see offered.”

To become a part owner, an individual pays a $250, one-time fee that can be made through monthly or annual payments.  That qualifies the person for store discounts and a share of annual profits.
Dilley said the Co-op’s membership spiked by 50 percent in 2009 from 2008, which he attributed to better customer service and staff stressing the value of its products.  Consumers also are increasingly factoring “health and environmental concerns” into their food choices, he said.

“We offer an option that gets back to those values again,” Dilley said. “We’ve done the homework and made the choices, and customers say quality and nutritional value are worth paying for.”

Continue reading here.

Urban farms ready to sprout in B.C. area

Lack of fresh, cheap foods spurs new push

Elizabeth Willis • The Enquirer • February 14, 2010

An urban farming initiative is taking root in the Battle Creek area.

Across the nation, consumers have been increasingly concerned about the lack of fresh and affordable foods grown locally.

In Detroit, Flint, Ann Arbor, Denver, Seattle and elsewhere, volunteers have learned to cultivate nutritious foods from vacant urban land. They have found the fruits of the labor are more than just tomatoes and peas.

Community gardens can help reduce crime and blight. The food produced can be donated to hungry families or sold to benefit the neighborhood. Urban farms have the potential to stimulate positive change by bringing neighbors together, said Jeremy Andrews, a community outreach associate with the Battle Creek Community Foundation.

For these reasons, some Battle Creek area residents interested in gardening have formed a networking group, Sprout Urban Farms, to support the volunteer creation and maintenence of community gardens locally.

The seed of an idea could sprout this spring with the coordinated cultivation of several new and revived urban farms in Battle Creek. Andrews is working behind the scenes to connect people interested in leading the effort.

"There are a lot of people in the city who care about healthy food," he said. "There are backyard gardeners who want to garden for others."

Already, Sprout Urban Farms has more than 250 members on its Facebook fan page.

At an informational meeting Jan. 27, about 80 people attended and voted on areas where they'd like to see the new group focus.

Most people wanted to help develop a plot garden close to their homes or have a place where they could donate extra produce grown at home.

"They were saying, 'I don't want to have to compost good food,'' Andrews said.

The group is exploring ways to distribute produce in an efficient way, possibly through the Food Bank of South Central Michigan and its network of food pantries. Contined here.

I never thought I'd see this day. My luddite tendencies and concern for our society's addictive internet habits have prevented me from doing this until now. The more I thought about it, though, the more I realized that Facebook could be used as a valuable tool to connect people to the farm and to each other in the community. I hope you may find it useful. Currently, I have created four discussion topics, including Recipe Swap, CSA Box Sharing, Vegetable ID'ing, and Gardening Q's. If you have any other ideas for how Facebook could be useful, please share them with the farm. Here's the link.

Here's a quick video of Michael Pollan on Oprah discussing the impact of subsidies on our food system and getting back to the basics of eating real, healthy foods...

January 25, 2010, 4:14 pm

Seems like a good idea...From the NY Times...

Kirsten Luce for The New York Times SWITCHED Children playing before lunch at Sharon Elementary School in Robbinsville, N.J. “Kids are calmer after they’ve had recess first,” the school’s principal said.

Can something as simple as the timing of recess make a difference in a child’s health and behavior?

Some experts think it can, and now some schools are rescheduling recess — sending students out to play before they sit down for lunch. The switch appears to have led to some surprising changes in both cafeteria and classroom.

Schools that have tried it report that when children play before lunch, there is less food waste and higher consumption of milk, fruit and vegetables. And some teachers say there are fewer behavior problems.

“Kids are calmer after they’ve had recess first,” said Janet Sinkewicz, principal of Sharon Elementary School in Robbinsville, N.J., which made the change last fall. “They feel like they have more time to eat and they don’t have to rush.”

One recent weekday at Sharon, I watched as gaggles of second graders chased one another around the playground and climbed on monkey bars. When the whistle blew, the bustling playground emptied almost instantly, and the children lined up to drop off their coats and mittens and file quietly into the cafeteria for lunch.

“All the wiggles are out,” Ms. Sinkewicz said.

One of the earliest schools to adopt the idea was North Ranch Elementary in Scottsdale, Ariz. About nine years ago, the school nurse suggested the change, and the school conducted a pilot study, tracking food waste and visits to the nurse along with anecdotal reports on student behavior.

By the end of the year, nurse visits had dropped 40 percent, with fewer headaches and stomachaches. One child told school workers that he was happy he didn’t throw up anymore at recess.

Other children had been rushing through lunch to get to the playground sooner, leaving much uneaten. After the switch, food waste declined and children were less likely to become hungry or feel sick later in the day. And to the surprise of school officials, moving recess before lunch ended up adding about 15 minutes of classroom instruction.

In the Arizona heat, “kids needed a cool-down period before they could start academic work,” said the principal, Sarah Hartley.

“We saved 15 minutes every day,” Dr. Hartley continued, “because kids could play, then go into the cafeteria and eat and cool down, and come back to the classroom and start academic work immediately.”

Since that pilot program, 18 of the district’s 31 schools have adopted “recess before lunch.” Continue reading here.

by Mark Steil, Minnesota Public Radio

Madison, Minn. — America's vast stretches of farmland are a big resource in the fight against global warming because their soil traps carbon. But not all farmers believe changing their ways to help in that fight would be profitable.

The global warming bill the House passed last summer gives farmers incentives to manage their soil to trap carbon, one of the main factors in global warming.

"The less we can have a carbon footprint, I think the better we are."

Carmen Fernholz, an organic farmer in western Minnesota, does things a little differently from most other farmers. For instance, he plants radishes in the late summer after his main crop harvest, but the radishes will never be harvested for food. Instead, he leaves them in the ground all winter long.

"In the spring as the temperatures warm up, [the radishes] start decaying and disappearing," Fernholz said. "And in this decay process it's slowly releasing the nutrients that it scavenged the previous fall."

Those nutrients will help fertilize next year's crop. But the radishes also help fight global warming. Through photosynthesis, the radishes convert carbon dioxide, a greenhouse gas, into organic plant matter.

When the radish dies and decomposes, the carbon in the plant also remains stored in the soil. Fernholz said the nutrient benefits are his main objective in planting the radishes, but he also likes knowing they help reduce greenhouse gases.

Carmen Fernholz

"The less we can have a carbon footprint, I think the better we are," said Fernholz. "So yes, there's no question that's where I'm looking at, in those directions."

If the U.S. House has its way, there could be a lot more farms like Fernholz's in the future. The House passed a bill last summer aimed at reducing global warming, and the Senate will take up the legislation soon.

The House bill would pay farmers to manage their land to store carbon -- the carbon is "sequestered," in agricultural parlance. Fernholz said the legislation signals a change in the world of farming.

"I think the fact that it did pass is definitely a positive," said Fernholz.

Some say legislation doesn't go far enough

Tillage radish

Some farmers worry the bill will raise the cost of agriculture and possibly put them out of business. Others, like James Dontje, say the House bill doesn't go far enough. Continued here.