Someday I pray, we won’t remember that animals were once harvested like timber or timber mowed down like invasive weeds but respected as the holy givers of sustenance they were intended. My mother, the-gardener-extraordinaire, used to tell me:  “Mother Nature is very forgiving of our best efforts and intentions but she does not tolerate disrespect.”

Factory animal farms are neither respectful, honorable or healthy.  Connect the dots, folks, and get over it! Until then (may I live that long but time is not on my side) I offer some news reports and opinions on the origins of the current ‘canary in the coalmine’ — swine flu and the Smithfield Farms connection.

Tom Philpott opened this can of worms on Grist. See his article here.

Another blog post citing a Biosurveillance timeline of the outbreak.

Mysteries about the swine flu are explored in this article from the Associated Press.

Some insight on CAFO’s for your dining pleasure.

[Even the Dept. of Homeland Security, Open Source Report for August 13, 2007 has something to share]

August 10, 2007 Agence France−Presse — Pig farms to shut down in Romania. Eleven unauthorized pig farms belonging to U.S. company Smithfield in Romania are to be shut down following an outbreak of swine fever, the head of the national sanitary and veterinary authority said Friday, August 10. The agency will also send a veterinary doctor to each of Smithfield’s 25 farms in western Timis county to monitor whether sanitary standards were being respected and to oversee the killing of some 40,000 pigs from the two farms where the outbreak occurred, ANSVSA director Radu Roatis said. Veterinary authorities found this week that 11 Smithfield farms had not been authorised to operate in Romania. Swine fever was detected during the 8 week in two farms in western Timis county belonging to Smithfield. One of them did not have an authorization to operate. Source: http://news.yahoo.com/s/afp/20070810/hl_afp/romaniausfarmhea lth_070810132622;_ylt=Ajp_F5IIjjT5TdT1stampleJOrgF

And finally from the CDC…note that swine flu has been around a long time, according to their report.

Smithfield Farms website page

PS:  I’m NOT against kissing pigs. We raised them on our organic farm and they were intelligent, loving, funny, gentle, bonding animals we treated with respect. I’m uncertain I could raise animals for food sacrifice/slaughter again but I know that humane treatment is possible.

If only all pigs could live the kind of life portrayed above…

The underlying goal of this website has always been offering another avenue for ending hunger, for leveling the field so ALL can benefit from the abundance of this Earth. In the following article written by one of my personal heroines, France Moore Lappe, [included in today's post in its entirety] you will see  just how possible it is even for large cities to reverse hunger and poverty…if there is the compassion and the WILL to do so. Not surprising for me, the person who engineered this system in the third largest city in Brazil is also a woman.

Austin (TX) Capitol Area Food Bank campaign, 2008 (http://www.austinfoodbank.org/)

The City that Ended Hunger

A city in Brazil recruited local farmers to help do something U.S. cities have yet to do: end hunger.
by Frances Moore Lappé, YES! Magazine

Friday, March 13, 2009

“To search for solutions to hunger means to act within the principle that the status of a citizen surpasses that of a mere consumer.” City of Belo Horizonte, Brazil

In writing Diet for a Small Planet, I learned one simple truth: Hunger is not caused by a scarcity of food but a scarcity of democracy. But that realization was only the beginning, for then I had to ask: What does a democracy look like that enables citizens to have a real voice in securing life’s essentials? Does it exist anywhere? Is it possible or a pipe dream? With hunger on the rise here in the United States-one in 10 of us is now turning to food stamps-these questions take on new urgency.

To begin to conceive of the possibility of a culture of empowered citizens making democracy work for them, real-life stories help-not models to adopt wholesale, but examples that capture key lessons. For me, the story of Brazil’s fourth largest city, Belo Horizonte, is a rich trove of such lessons. Belo, a city of 2.5 million people, once had 11 percent of its population living in absolute poverty, and almost 20 percent of its children going hungry. Then in 1993, a newly elected administration declared food a right of citizenship. The officials said, in effect: If you are too poor to buy food in the market-you are no less a citizen. I am still accountable to you.

The new mayor, Patrus Ananias-now leader of the federal anti-hunger effort-began by creating a city agency, which included assembling a 20-member council of citizen, labor, business, and church representatives to advise in the design and implementation of a new food system. The city already involved regular citizens directly in allocating municipal resources-the “ participatory budgeting” that started in the 1970s and has since spread across Brazil. During the first six years of Belo’s food-as-a-right policy, perhaps in response to the new emphasis on food security, the number of citizens engaging in the city’s participatory budgeting process doubled to more than 31,000.
The city agency developed dozens of innovations to assure everyone the right to food, especially by weaving together the interests of farmers and consumers. It offered local family farmers dozens of choice spots of public space on which to sell to urban consumers, essentially redistributing retailer mark-ups on produce-which often reached 100 percent-to consumers and the farmers. Farmers’ profits grew, since there was no wholesaler taking a cut. And poor people got access to fresh, healthy food.

When my daughter Anna and I visited Belo Horizonte to write Hope’s Edge we approached one of these stands. A farmer in a cheerful green smock, emblazoned with “Direct from the Countryside,” grinned as she told us, “I am able to support three children from my five acres now. Since I got this contract with the city, I’ve even been able to buy a truck.”

The improved prospects of these Belo farmers were remarkable considering that, as these programs were getting underway, farmers in the country as a whole saw their incomes drop by almost half.

In addition to the farmer-run stands, the city makes good food available by offering entrepreneurs the opportunity to bid on the right to use well-trafficked plots of city land for “ABC” markets, from the Portuguese acronym for “food at low prices.” Today there are 34 such markets where the city determines a set price-about two-thirds of the market price-of about twenty healthy items, mostly from in-state farmers and chosen by store-owners. Everything else they can sell at the market price.
“For ABC sellers with the best spots, there’s another obligation attached to being able to use the city land,” a former manager within this city agency, Adriana Aranha, explained. “Every weekend they have to drive produce-laden trucks to the poor neighborhoods outside of the city center, so everyone can get good produce.”

Another product of food-as-a-right thinking is three large, airy “People’s Restaurants” (Restaurante Popular), plus a few smaller venues, that daily serve 12,000 or more people using mostly locally grown food for the equivalent of less than 50 cents a meal. When Anna and I ate in one, we saw hundreds of diners-grandparents and newborns, young couples, clusters of men, mothers with toddlers. Some were in well-worn street clothes, others in uniform, still others in business suits.

“I’ve been coming here every day for five years and have gained six kilos,” beamed one elderly, energetic man in faded khakis.

“It’s silly to pay more somewhere else for lower quality food,” an athletic-looking young man in a military police uniform told us. “I’ve been eating here every day for two years. It’s a good way to save money to buy a house so I can get married,” he said with a smile.
No one has to prove they’re poor to eat in a People’s Restaurant, although about 85 percent of the diners are. The mixed clientele erases stigma and allows “food with dignity,” say those involved.

Belo’s food security initiatives also include extensive community and school gardens as well as nutrition classes. Plus, money the federal government contributes toward school lunches, once spent on processed, corporate food, now buys whole food mostly from local growers.

“We’re fighting the concept that the state is a terrible, incompetent administrator,” Adriana explained. “We’re showing that the state doesn’t have to provide everything, it can facilitate. It can create channels for people to find solutions themselves.”

For instance, the city, in partnership with a local university, is working to “keep the market honest in part simply by providing information,” Adriana told us. They survey the price of 45 basic foods and household items at dozens of supermarkets, then post the results at bus stops, online, on television and radio, and in newspapers so people know where the cheapest prices are.

The shift in frame to food as a right also led the Belo hunger-fighters to look for novel solutions. In one successful experiment, egg shells, manioc leaves, and other material normally thrown away were ground and mixed into flour for school kids’ daily bread. This enriched food also goes to nursery school children, who receive three meals a day courtesy of the city.

“I knew we had so much hunger in the world. But what is so upsetting, what I didn’t know when I started this, is it’s so easy. It’s so easy to end it.”

The result of these and other related innovations?

In just a decade Belo Horizonte cut its infant death rate-widely used as evidence of hunger-by more than half, and today these initiatives benefit almost 40 percent of the city’s 2.5 million population. One six-month period in 1999 saw infant malnutrition in a sample group reduced by 50 percent. And between 1993 and 2002 Belo Horizonte was the only locality in which consumption of fruits and vegetables went up.

The cost of these efforts?

Around $10 million annually, or less than 2 percent of the city budget. That’s about a penny a day per Belo resident.

Behind this dramatic, life-saving change is what Adriana calls a “new social mentality”-the realization that “everyone in our city benefits if all of us have access to good food, so-like health care or education-quality food for all is a public good.”

The Belo experience shows that a right to food does not necessarily mean more public handouts (although in emergencies, of course, it does.) It can mean redefining the “free” in “free market” as the freedom of all to participate. It can mean, as in Belo, building citizen-government partnerships driven by values of inclusion and mutual respect.

And when imagining food as a right of citizenship, please note: No change in human nature is required! Through most of human evolution-except for the last few thousand of roughly 200,000 years-Homo sapiens lived in societies where pervasive sharing of food was the norm. As food sharers, “especially among unrelated individuals,” humans are unique, writes Michael Gurven, an authority on hunter-gatherer food transfers. Except in times of extreme privation, when some eat, all eat.

Before leaving Belo, Anna and I had time to reflect a bit with Adriana. We wondered whether she realized that her city may be one of the few in the world taking this approach-food as a right of membership in the human family. So I asked, “When you began, did you realize how important what you are doing was? How much difference it might make? How rare it is in the entire world?”

Listening to her long response in Portuguese without understanding, I tried to be patient. But when her eyes moistened, I nudged our interpreter. I wanted to know what had touched her emotions.

“I knew we had so much hunger in the world,” Adriana said. “But what is so upsetting, what I didn’t know when I started this, is it’s so easy. It’s so easy to end it.”

Adriana’s words have stayed with me. They will forever. They hold perhaps Belo’s greatest lesson: that it is easy to end hunger if we are willing to break free of limiting frames and to see with new eyes-if we trust our hard-wired fellow feeling and act, no longer as mere voters or protesters, for or against government, but as problem-solving partners with government accountable to us.

Frances Moore Lappé wrote this article as part of Food for Everyone, the Spring 2009 issue of YES! Magazine. Frances is the author of many books including Diet for a Small Planet and Get a Grip, co-founder of Food First and the Small Planet Institute, and a YES! contributing editor.

The author thanks Dr. M. Jahi Chappell for his contribution to the article.
Walking Through Fear: interview with Frances Moore Lappé.

Want to learn more about hunger? Please visit the website for this movie.

Women are now 52% of the population on the planet. Our power base is expanding. And those women are growing stronger, more vocal and more political every day.

This International Women’s Day, I invite you to join my Pulsewire group to acknowledge the most valiant, creative, irrepressible, amazing and productive women from around the world who plant grains and vegetables with one hand and hold the tattered remnants of their families and community together with the other. Please join me at Outrageous Gardeners Worldwide with your stories, or links or suggestions.

Women have always been the backbone of community because we create community through our children, our often unacknowledged but essential wisdom and our tireless seeking after ways to improve life not just for ourselves but for our children. Take time today to consider the women you know and their contribution not just to your life but to others and see how wide a circle of influence they create in the many small, quiet and enduring acts of  power.

“Empowering female farmers worldwide is important to ending world hunger and enhancing the quality of life among rural populations,”  Canadian Federation of Agriculture President, Bob Friesen.

World population, which is currently 6.5 billion, is growing at 76 million annually, with an expected peak at 9.5 billion by 2070.

For the first time, global population estimates this year show that more people live in cities than in rural areas. The Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations projects that almost all of the population growth between 2000-2030 will be urban.

By 2020, according to the International Resource Centre for Urban Agriculture and Forestry, some 75 percent of the world’s city dwellers will live in developing countries – many of them in poverty. Already in parts of sub-Saharan Africa, according to the UN, almost three-quarters of city residents live in rapidly growing slums. And this isn’t a migration of rural poor to the cities. These are groups impoverished by living conditions within the urban setting which prevents access to basic needs such as clean water, sewers, education and food production or the availability of fresh foods.

This is a scenario which will become more common I feel in days and months ahead. And living in the United States does not mean we are exempt. Residents of inner cities and marginal income areas have suffered from a lack of access to quality fresh foods for decades. It’s just that more of us may become aware of this problem in the months ahead.

One answer to over-crowding in our cities and to the wasted space atop business building, schools, hospitals and yes, parking garages (while we still have them) is to create garden oases.  And one of the quickest and most cost-effective ways to do that is with childrens’ wading pools. Back in the mid-1990’s, Dr. Job Ebenezer was then Director of Environmental Stewardship and Hunger Education for the Evangelical Lutheran Church in Chicago, Illinois. Dr. Job (as I refer to him) initiated an experiment in food growing on the rooftop of the church’s parking garage. Practical, compassionate, inventive and determined, Dr. Job is a true hero in service to his community.

The hope was that the roof top garden would serve as a role model for creative use of urban space throughout the country. Dr. Job proved the feasibility of growing vegetables in plastic wading pools, used tires and feed sacks. Urban gardeners at the ELCA offices in Chicago harvested nearly 1,000 pounds of vegetables from approximately 40 wading pools and a dozen of used tires and feed sacks. Here are his figures from those years:

Comparision of vegetable yield data between ELCA, U.S. and Wisconsin Farms

*National & Wisconsin data from the United States Department of Agriculture

Utilizing items often found in landfills or behind vacant buildings, Dr. Job created lush rooftop gardens and growing areas for senior citizens and the financially stressed, enrolling them in therapeutic gardening for their souls and enlarging their fresh food pantry at the same time. It doesn’t take alot of money to create a garden like this. Another benefit of wading pools is that they’re long-lasting and you don’t have to worry about previous contamination. With wading pools, you can garden on a roof top, a parking lot, in driveways or on patios. Both wading pools and used tires can provide a great deal of nourishment in a relatively small space.

Here’s how to create your own wading pool garden (based on Dr. Job’s directions and recommendations:)

WHAT YOU NEED: 

Child’s recycled 6’ or smaller wading pool – even if it’s split on the bottom it can still be used

Drill and ¾” or 1” bit

Compost

Soil/growing medium

Seeds or seedlings

A support for growing beans or vining vegetables

Access to water – rainbarrel, greywater

Riser—pallets or pavers and strong struts of used lumber

HOW TO:

Carefully drill 3/4″ to 1″ holes every 12-18″ around the circumference of the pool, 2″ up from the bottom of the pool. You’ll need to drill 4-5 holes. These holes allow for excess drainage while creating a reservoir below the holes, where water can accumulate to be utilized by the plants later. If the pool has splits or holes on the very bottom, you can place a sheet of plastic inside the pool before filling it with the soil mix.

2. Set up the wading pools so they are perfectly level. You can set them on pallets if necessary. But locate the pool in its ultimate location, since once filled, this pool will weigh approximately 350 pounds. Not exactly portable.

3. Locate it to its best advantage—not too much or too little sunshine. Any downspouts or gutters nearby mean free water so place a 5 gallon bucket under it to collect rainwater and lay out paths for foot traffic.

4. Fill the pool almost to overflowing with your growing medium. Since different parts of the world have different resources, a little imagination and creativity is necessary. Your goal is soil that is firm, moisture retentive and nutrient rich. Try to use (or replicate) equal parts topsoil, compost and peat moss. This is Dr. Job’s recommendation to be used in the wading pool gardens:

The following mix will provide a good soil structure and allow for air movement and water infiltration. A good recipe for a container growing soil mix is one part compost or well-rotted manure; one part topsoil; one part leaf mold, or peat moss*, or like fillers such as: coconut fibers; ground-up newspapers (only vegetable based inks); alfalfa; or leaf mold.

(*Peat moss will make the soil lighter and will afford moisture retention qualities. But there are many who consider this use to be detrimental to the environment and consider peat moss a non-renewable resource. While suitable for container gardening, it is suggested that when other types of more locally available materials are available, they should be substituted for the peat.)

5. Water the soil thoroughly and then stick your fingers in to test the wetness. It should feel damp and cool all the way to the bottom. But be careful not to flood the pool.

6. Now you can sow your seeds or place your transplants directly into the pool. Press your seeds gently into the wet soil. Beets and chard seeds like to be pressed about an inch into the soil, while lettuces prefer to sit closer to the surface. You can scatter a light dusting of mulch over the seeds, to prevent the soil from drying out. When adding transplants, dig the roots deep into the pool, press the soil around the roots and cover the area with a good mulch. This will prevent the need for excessive watering, and the plants can survive drought conditions.

7. Vine crops such as cucumbers, melons, zucchinis, winter squashes will need a trellis or support device. Wire mesh, bamboo stakes, branches, a small fence, mattress springs, formed into a ring around the outside of the wading pool all make a great garden trellis.

8. Remember, for inter-cropping, plant your tall crops together in the center, or nearest the wall (if so placed).

9. When used on rooftops keep in mind that some roofs, especially older wood- framed roofs, might not accommodate the 350+ pounds that each pool might reach. Before you establish a rooftop garden, be sure to check with the building engineer regarding structural strength of the roof.

10. Enjoy your garden! Add compost as a mulch for a slow-release continual supply of nutrients. If you prefer you can use fish emulsion or a manure or compost tea every 2-3 weeks throughout the growing season. [More on these later.]

Share the abundant produce with your community and those in need. Sell the produce to local restaurants and re-invest the income with your community. Teach children skills as they experience the rewards of Mother Nature and a connection to the earth.

WHAT YOU CAN PLANT:

Nearly everything but the corn or maize family. The ELCA wading pools were intensively planted with a diverse blend of vegetables, annuals and herbs. Marigolds and basil were used as natural pesticides. These rooftop gardens produced 984 pounds of vegetables from a dozen or so pools in an area measuring 1,625 square feet. One pool alone yielded an average of 22.5 pounds of tomatoes, cucumbers, bell peppers, zucchini and a variety of greens. Will you have the same yield as Dr. Job? Try it and see and send me your results.

WHY WADING POOLS?

The plastic wading pool is the most cost-efficient container of its size available. At 6 feet in diameter and 12 inches deep, each one provides approximately 28 square feet of growing area for under $40 for container, soil and seeds, and is capable of producing up to 40 pounds of produce per growing season. Wading pools can be placed in any areas that cannot be gardened conventionally, such as rooftops, patios, decks, sections of playgrounds, along railroad tracks, in brown fields. The wading pools are lightweight (before they are filled with soil), easy to situate, and last for many years without decay.

I have already heard stories of “scavengers” in the landfill hunting for wading pools after learning about these mini-marvels of food production. I suggest putting an ad on craigslist.com or your local freecycle instead! Happy gardening and blessed New Moon!

Our thanks go to Dr. Job Ebenezer for his generous sharing of this information, his time and his vision. Please see: http://www.arts4all.com/elca/ and visit his website www.technologyforthepoor.com to learn more about his current work with appropriate technology in many areas.

The freedom of man, I contend, is the freedom to eat.” — Eleanor Roosevelt (1884-1910)

The blogs will be overflowing today with intensely personal reflections on this historic date of January 20, 2009. And as tickled as I was to watch the former president fly away from Capitol Hill this morning (yes, I’ll admit I was screaming FASTER! FASTER! at the tv) there was something else that was mentioned several times by reporters and commentators that resonated even more profoundly for me.  It had nothing to do really with the color of skin of our new President, or his faith, or the long march to freedom long overdue people of color, or his promises to again live by the rule of law which sounded so delicious to my ears burned by 8 years of the Bush monarchy. No, what kept rolling over and over… …in my mind and heart was this:  that 44 times in 220 years, the office of commander in chief and president of this nation has been handed over miraculously without a coup, without dissent, without mob action, or threat.  Think of that.  How many countries can say that during their entire history, the change of command always took place peacefully and in full view of the populace?

Today, for the first time, the impact of that knowledge hit me in the heart as perhaps the most symbolic representation of the true power of this nation. I know some of us feel the 2000 election was stolen from Al Gore and we have had to deal with four assassinations in this country’s history plus a Civil War. But no incoming President has wrenched the office from the incumbent by killing him off or assembling tanks on the White House lawn and forcing him out at gunpoint.

There is within the framework of this system–however unwieldy, massive, often unresponsive and expensive–a tradition of a peaceful, respectful and orderly change from one administration to another. The torch is passed invisibly through a form of pomp and circumstance that provide us with a comfort so few other countries can imagine let alone experience.  I marveled at my own lack of that awareness before today.  How many Presidential inaugurations have I witnessed personally–without revealing my age? 11. As a young girl, I wept through the recording of the oath administered to Lyndon Johnson in 1963.  A product of the television era, I dutifully felt called to be at most of the others live or on the evening re-broadcasts. And now I’m sitting in front of this computer awestruck by something I have always taken for granted: the PEACEFUL and NON-VIOLENT transfer of power of the highest office of this nation. So THAT is what I celebrate today.

Perhaps I’m more aware of it now because of this service I have chosen: teaching people how to feed themselves under difficult circumstances. So much of what I read from my colleagues in other places revolves around their ability or inability to work in areas of civil unrest or war or famine created by dictatorships or coups or failed political systems.  How can a nation rise to its full potential, let alone survive, when it is constantly at war with itself? How can the wounds of poverty, hunger, epidemics, inadequate sanitation or unequal educational opportunities even become part of the conversation within a nation where all its resources are bled away by groups greedy to be top dog? And while we as a nation certainly have our own bloody ugly laundry to wash, we don’t burn down the laundromat to hide it. That is the powerful process that has allowed us to grow to the strength and dynamism that is a hallmark of this country.

So while so many of us justifiably are whooping and hollering and raising beer steins to toast our nation’s true coming of age with the installation of Barack Obama as President numero 44, I think I’ll sip tea.  Tea instigated the whole commotion that eventually birthed this country. And drinking tea stirs up for me the cherished beliefs and hopes entwined within these traditions that somehow survive to embrace and nurture us. Yes, I’ll make a little pot of Constant Comment and toast our today’s celebratory transition of power as well as all the dreams this president symbolizes for me personally.  So Mr. President, here’s to you, to us and your successful leadership–with a dash of sugar and a slice of lemon.

And tomorrow I’ll crank up the washing machine and go to work with you.

I also took the time to listen to several PhilosophersNotes downloads as a segue into the new calendar year.  I highly recommend these 20 minute uplifting messages first because they are profoundly inspiring teachings condensed from books on various financial, metaphysical and self-development subjects and second, because they are completely free (at least right now.)  As I set up about an hour’s worth of readings to listen to from Wayne Dyer, Eric Butterworth, David Koch and others, I jotted down various comments, quotes and ideas that attracted my interest.

When I looked back on what seemed like unconnected doodles on my spiral notebook, a pattern had emerged.  A pattern of thought, a pattern of purpose and a pattern for engaging in this work I’ve chosen for myself.  Two words stood out:  banish doubt.

While around us the news media, the politicians, the pulpit, mosque, temple, and consultants throughout the world all seem to be screaming the same message:  be afraid, be very afraid–for your money, your safety, your jobs, your sense of security, I know I need to take a different approach. Like Despereaux–the tiny mouse with the over-sized ears–being afraid just isn’t a very practical or interesting way to spend one’s life. And to gently move you out of whatever fear trap you are in, I recommend you get your free “De-Stress Kit” by the folks at HeartMath. Yes, it’s free!

When we live in fear, it’s too easy to believe that this four-month period or even the next year or two are going to decide not only the rest of my life but the fate of this entire planet.  Really? Let’s look at what the world has survived so far and think again.

So when I heard the following quotation read on PhilosophersNotes last night, I knew I had been gifted just the mantra I needed. Some words of wisdom to help me keep doing this work without any measure of certainty on how it will turn out. Here it is:  “Our doubts are traitors, and make us lose the good we oft might win by fearing to attempt.” ~ William Shakespeare.

“Our doubts are traitors…” yes they are and they should be treated as such, hung, drawn and quartered.  When we doubt–our abilities to heal, to improve the lives of others, that the next day can be better than today, that gardens can arise from nothing, that we have something to share–we become traitors to ourselves and others.  We withdraw and contract in fear rather than becoming more like brave-hearted Despereaux, who assessed then conquered the gauntlet of what seemed  a certain death-by-mousetraps. And cackled joyously when he realized he survived.  Doubt is never our friend for it turns on us, ridiculing our endeavors and our generosity and shaming our creativity.  A continuous diet of doubt eventually starves our hope as well. And then our soul.

Writing this blog is a constant reminder that I have been blessed for sticking it out and moving on.  I have been supported, mentored, cared for, assisted, nurtured,  and encouraged from the start from so many individuals, some of whom I’ve never met.  Why?  I believe it is because I refuse to give up or give in to doubt.  (Alright, most of the time.)  I never doubted the benefits but I have doubted myself and slowed down the process. But if not me, then who would do this?

For 2009, there is still much more to share and write about and so I’ve made myself this pledge:  to finish and upload my eBook (in just a couple of weeks) so all of these amazing gardens can be shared with many more people even more easily;  to make more gardens in more locations for more people to use; and to do an even better job of promoting the individuals and organizations who exemplify my new mantra.

I am humbled by and grateful for the accomplishments of  Margaret Trost of What If? Foundation, Hank Bruce and Tomi Folk of Hunger Grow Away and Job Ebenezer of Technology for the Poor.  Although you are constantly facing one or a barrage of mousetraps–less money donated, fewer resources, lack of support or just low energy–you know in your hearts you can leap over them…and that is why you succeed.

So here’s my challenge to myself and to all of you:  Banish Doubt!  Right now, today, erase doubt from your vocabulary. Instead practice being more like Despereaux:  Believing Big. Then practice leaping–fearlessly with confidence, gusto, generosity, love and joy. Happy New Year!

Remember this old maxim, KISS?  Keep It Simple Stupid? Well, Jimmy Keyes understands how critical it is in moving out of hunger if you k.i.s.s. I’ve never met Jimmy Keyes but I like him.  And I found myself in love with most of the folks he knows.

Jimmy Keyes is one of the gardeners introduced to us in the “filmic journey” by Meryl Joseph entitled City Farmers, a deeply moving portrayal of what takes place in gardens of the inner city of New York.  K.I.S.S. are the words I prefer to live by, parent by, garden by, landscape by and promote here on this website. Not because people are inherently stupid (certain Presidents excepted) but because we, in this more technologically advanced society, tend to gravitate towards ideas or concepts or actions that are more complex, costly and difficult to attain. (Did I just define capitalism?) We believe that more is better–even if it isn’t. Which explains to me why so few organizations purporting to be humanitarian and at the same accruing millions of dollars to deal with the growing worldwide hunger issues, haven’t really been able to accomplish long-term changes. It is that frustrating observation that put me into this website. And which keeps me researching and falling in love all over again with videos like City Farmers and the contributions of folks like Dr. Job Ebenezer, former director of Environmental Stewardship at the Evangelical Lutheran Church in downtown Chicago back in the 1990’s.  Dr. Ebenezer set out to prove how to utilize otherwise wasted rooftop space to increase available food production with recycled children’s wading pools.  Add to that the growing interest in community gardening and urban sustainability and well, you had a winner from the get go.

According to the article about community gardening on the arts4all website which promotes the ELCA project: “The demonstration garden has proved to be highly successful. In 1997, gardeners harvested 984 pounds of vegetables from 38 pools in an area measuring 1,625 square feet. One pool alone yielded an average of 22.5 pounds of tomatoes, cucumbers, bell peppers, zucchini and a variety of greens. This is equivalent to about 26,800 pounds. per acre, which far exceeds that of commercial yields in the state of Wisconsin and even the national 1996 average yields.” Pretty amazing for a piece of cheap molded plastic with holes in it and some compost and topsoil.  Now why can’t this happen in other places?

So this is my request for Thanksgiving: if you know a church organization, non-profit, homeless shelter, humanitarian aid organization in your community or on your email list, send them to this website and especially to this link. Today I focused on one of the cheapest, easiest to construct and maintain and richly abundant above-ground garden designs. It can work well in almost any climate and it’s created from a nearly ubiquitous and abundant material.  It’s not difficult. It takes just minutes to construct. There are plenty of folks on the ground from Dr. Ebenezer to Urban Gardening to E.C.H.O. who have been in the forefront of training and utilizing these systems for a couple of decades now.  So send this KISS to folks who can make a difference. And then try one for yourself!

• How do you spell the simplest, unrefined garden system that can be located nearly anywhere in the world? I bring you the “jeep” of gardens:  TIRES! (Or TYRES for those who write in funny English.)

You see them everywhere: along the road, piled next to garages, dumped in ravines, and some are even finding uses as walls for houses, outbuilding or fences. What else can you do with used tires? How about building ponds, compost bins or a GARDEN!

DID YOU KNOW?  Over 300 MILLION tires are thrown away each year and the United States accounts for nearly three-fourths of them. Even South Africa throws out a minimum of 129,600,000 kg annually (according to South Africa Trends) of the vulcanized circles and the pile just keeps growing according to the North American Recycled Tire Association. Approximately 33% of used tires are recycled or utilized in some form of energy recovery system. However, that still leaves a whopping 67% going to landfills—or worse.

Tires are one of the cheapest, most durable, long-lived, least costly garden containers around. Construction is fast and the growing results are phenomenal. They are portable and can be moved to track the sunlight or shade. Or easily moved from the path of marauding animals, thieves or vandals. According to Purdue University  and Washington State University there is very little concern for growing food in tires. However, the addition of a plastic trash bags or another thin plastic liner between the soil and the tire not only provides stability to the planting medium but also acts as an additional barrier to any microscopic elements such as metal shards, that might be absorbed. Construction is super fast. No tools are required—except for cutting the top open. Planting can take place immediately. This is the diagram supplied by Dr. Ebenezer:

Easy enough. You can also use other tires for compost bins (stack them as you add organic materials; pull off the tires one at a time; place it next to the first pile and toss the stuff from the first tire pile into the second and you’ve turned your compost.)

Author with tire gardens Sept.08

Many people swear by potato tires. Place your seed potatoes in your compost and growing medium in the first tire. As the potato seedlings grow add another tire above the first and more dirt. Repeat as needed (usually three tires is enough) and when you’re ready to harvest simply take down the tires one by one till you collect all the new potatoes. They may not be pretty but they certainly are effective and SIMPLE.

[Next time:  Dr. Job Ebenezer's "Wading Pool" gardens!]

Rooftop gardens in Havana, Cuba

Photo below is courtesy of Cuban Organic Support Group

It’s yet another piece of this movement in which I’ve registered myself and this website: true sustainability is about US, not about ME. I alone cannot sustain much. Sharing information and ideas–freely and easily–is, in my opinion, at the very core of this change called sustainability. Knowledge withheld or basic skills we teach at a premium price is not sustainability. It is within the collective of our skills and knowledge and experience that we create a safe, secure and nurturing environment. Here’s a video from the GOP on a community development initiative in South Africa. “In the inner-city of Johannesburg, The GreenHouse Project is turning one urban park into a seedbed for sustainable communities. The program takes a holistic approach to the city’s challenges, integrating green building and design, efficient and renewable energy, recycling, organic farming and nutrition.”

Why “outrageous” gardens? Because for me it’s outrageous that over 900 million people in the world are malnourished and 177 million of them are children (according to Bread for the World.) It’s outrageous that one child DIES every 5 seconds from the consequences of hunger. It’s outrageous to me that enough food is being produced in the world today to feed every man, woman and child yet the hungry must wait for our handouts of grains–and other expensive to maintain and costly to transport foodstuffs–when a nutritious supply of basic vegetables and small fruits may be only a discarded tire, burlap sack or plastic bag away.

As a life-long gardener and former organic farmer, landscape restoration consultant here in Albuquerque, a freelance writer, activist, and armchair researcher on gardening for more than three decades, I have looked at the various methods of food production and food security from all over the world. While the crisis widens worldwide on a nearly daily basis, the “answers” to poverty and hunger seem to become more complicated, take longer to implement and more costly. Martin Plaut wrote in a BBC report on Ethiopia recently, “The current crisis in Ethiopia is being lost in a swirling mist of competing figures.” He’s referring to the discrepancies between the aid agencies and the politics of that country over just how many people are in desperate need and who is paying what and when which is not solely an issue in this one heart-wrenching situation. It’s a common dilemma.  As a pragmatic woman of minimal means, I keep asking the same question in these situations: why not look to the easiest, most direct and cheapest method of feeding people? That is the question this website hopes to answer.

Here on Outrageous Gardens, you will find an expanding collection of the most effective, extremely low-tech and inspiring templates for food production from many sources. These have been field-tested by various agencies and organizations for their ease of construction and immediate implementation. These gardens are constructed from any available or  recycled materials or trash. They utilize minimal nutrient inputs and minimal water, preferably grey water. And because of their lightweight materials, fast construction and compact sizes, many are also mobile so they could be thrown on wagons or moved to higher ground if necessary. Readers will quickly realize that the notion of the family garden needing long straight, tilled rows in a large square of soil is pretty much compost here. This is about bringing food production right to your doorstep, right on your doorstep, to your tent flap or on your rooftop. ‘Get a yield,’ as we learn in Permaculture. Get food growing quickly and successfully to nourish the gardener and the family, then expand into market growing later, as health and stamina increase. That’s what this process is all about.

“When you make a difference with what you have, it expands.” ~ Lynn Twist, Soul of Money Institute (www.soulofmoney.org)