Review: Organic Farming & Sustainable Agriculture Book

"Cultivating a Movement: An Oral History of the Organic Farming & Sustainable Agriculture on California’s Central Coast"

Fresh, Local, and Organic

We are blessed with a generous growing season around the CA Central Coast, as well as a wealth of progressive thinkers and activists. So it’s natural that the Santa Cruz area, like certain other areas in the US, became a hotbed for development of organic farming and sustainable agriculture. Since the 1960s, local interest in political activism, research, and education, as well as organic farming itself, has helped to make organic farming and sustainable production practical for farmers and appealing for consumers throughout the US.

"Cultivating a Movement" chronicles this process of popularizing organic and sustainable agriculture by interviewing contributors to the movement from many backgrounds and walks of life. This volume is excerpted from a ten-volume set of transcribed oral histories on organic and sustainable farming. In turn, these ten volumes are part of University of California Santa Cruz (UCSC) Library’s ambitious Regional History Project, in which librarians are interviewing hundreds of Central Coast area movers and shakers, recording and transcribing their stories.

Top Ten Earth Friendly Organizations

The Blue Marble, courtesy NASA

Environmental Advocacy Groups and You

Happy Earth Day! We’ve come a long way since our first Earth Day in 1970. Certain pesticides have been banned, lead is no longer used in paints and gasoline, and wilderness areas have been protected. Consumers have learned to eat local foods, measure and reduce their carbon footprint, and avoid genetically engineered foods. There is still much to do. As technology develops, new toxic wastes and pesticides of unknown toxicity are introduced faster than we can keep track of them. Global warming and climate change are facts of life. What’s a concerned individual to do? How can we stay informed and protect our earth and our families, and still have time to work, play, and enjoy the environment that we’re protecting? How can we avoid becoming depressed about the state of our earth?

GMOs in Our Food: Call to Action

Photo © Yulan

We interrupt our regularly scheduled blog post for a word about GMOs and genetic engineering, and a call to action. Genetically engineered (GE) products, commonly called genetically modified organisms (GMOs), are in all sorts of processed foods in the US. Consumers don’t know which ones because the FDA has dismissed consumer requests to label GMO-containing products. However, within the next 40 hours, certain US Congresspeople (from both House and Senate) will send a statement to the FDA calling for labeling of genetically engineered food products. Contact your Senators and Representatives now to ask them to sign onto the Boxer-DeFazio “Dear Colleague” letter to the FDA about labeling GE foods.

Sustainable Seabass with Orange Ponzu Sauce

White Seabass, Orange Ponzu, and Greens

Recipe adapted from If it Makes You Healthy by Sheryl Crow

I was surprised to find out that some species of seabass are now sustainably fished. The term seabass is commonly used to refer to several species besides true seabass, so sorting out sustainability information can be confusing.

Both US east coast black seabass (a true seabass) and US west coast white seabass (really a croaker) populations have largely recovered from overfishing, so are environmentally friendly choices now.

Lemon Herb Sauce for Fish or Veggies

Lemon Sauce over California Sea Bass

Recipe by Mom, Dad, & Robin

Another recipe inspired by my parents. They’re both gone now, but in their day loved eating fish, befitting their New England heritage. One of their favorites was Atlantic swordfish. According to NOAA’s Marine Fisheries Service, both Atlantic and Pacific swordfish populations are now at sustainable levels and not in danger of overfishing.

Environmentally Friendly Kitchen Tips

Earth Image Courtesy of NASA

I am taking a break from menu planning and formal cooking (but not from blogging) for a couple of weeks as I work on cleaning out my recently deceased father’s house. Although my Dad didn’t know much about environmentalism, and likely would have considered it a subversive leftist plot, he was quite an organic gardener. He spent much of his youth living on a farm. As his engineering career soared, we moved from the country to the suburbs, where only a small area could be planted. Still he cultivated tomatoes, lettuce, trees, and flowers, and my Mom shopped for produce at the local farm.

Eating Salmon Sustainably

Alaskan Salmon Habitat

A couple weeks back, I was excited to hear that king salmon fishing was open in California, but when I inquired about buying local salmon at Staff of Life, my favorite natural foods store, they said it would be several weeks before commercial fishing is allowed. Right now the season is only for non-commercial anglers, and we will not be able to buy local salmon until May.

This brings up several questions for me. How sustainable is the salmon industry in California? Are there good alternatives to local salmon that we can eat now? What alternatives are best to avoid, environmentally speaking? And of course, might any of my friends be salmon sports-fishers and provide me with some salmon in the meantime? :-)