BREAKING: Late this evening (8 pm EST, or tomorrow, March 31, at 9 am in Tokyo), something large and unpleasant will hit the fan about climate change. At a press conference in Yokohama, the Nobel Prize-winning Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change will release its Fifth Assessment Report on impacts of human activities on current and [&hellip
If you tend to become bored out of your mind and feel like you’re wasting your time when standing around waiting at your train station/bus stop, well, it looks like there may finally be a good solution to that quandary — a means of doing something perhaps a bit more useful than playing candy crush on your phone or thinking about work.
Enter, the Soradofarm project — a new venture that allows you to rent your own small-garden allotment on the rooftop of your train station (if you’re in Japan anyways). You’re provided with everything that you need — garden space, water, tools, and even seeds. Seems like a perfect fit when you consider the situation that many urban Japanese are in — limited space for gardening, lots of time spent commuting, etc.
The intriguing new project is the result of a collaboration between the East Japan Railway Company and a station entertainment company. As it stands currently, the project is offering garden space at five locations, including Tokyo’s massive JR Ebisu station.
The price isn’t cheap, as some of the plots cost 100,440 JPY per year (~$960 USD), but considering that it may be the best option for many of the people who are interested in it, due to space issues, these urban rooftop garden allotments could be a viable way to get some green in their busy lives.
Aside from the possibility of growing even a tiny amount of fresh food for themselves, these innovative urban gardens may be an effective solution for decreasing stress and increasing the amount of time spent out in the fresh air and sunshine, especially in areas where outdoor space is at a premium, and having a place to call your own is hard to come by.
While the project is currently limited to five locations (as stated previously), there are plans in place to install considerably more of these garden allotments throughout the transportation network in the country within the near future.
America’s farmers are on the front lines of food and fuel production, and this 60 seconds video explains how they work to serve America more sustainably
There are so many concerns tied to GMO foods — health concerns from scientifically documented health risks, environmental concerns by the bushel, and economic returns (GMO companies are generally large and monopolistic and are not good for small farmers and communities). For all of these reasons, and maybe more, there is a strong groundswell of opposition to GMOs around the world, including in Kenya. Last week, the African Biodiversity Network released a statement on how it thinks the Kenyan government should be supporting its farmers and protecting its citizens.
The video on the next page does a great job presenting core food problems we are facing today but goes far beyond the problems and offers some great solutions to them. The filmmaker, Karney Hatch, is look to get $7,500 donated by Saturday, July 16 on Kickstarter to make a documentary on these problems and solutions.
Huge fallacy: undocumented immigrants don’t contribute to society.
Truth: undocumented immigrants do tremendously important work in inhumane conditions and for completely unfair wages so that Americans can eat cheap food.
Test: Georgia Republican lawmakers recently passed legislation geared at pushing undocumented, “illegal” immigrants out of the state of Georgia.
The United Nations Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO) proclaimed today that we need to switch from the intensive farming practices of the past half-century to more sustainable agricultural practices if we want to feed the world in 2050.
The tremendous drought in Texas and the Southwest that I wrote about in early April continues on (almost 50% of Texas is experience “exceptional” drought now, the highest level of drought — “unprecedented” according to experts). Furthermore, it has expanded and is affecting even more important U.S. farming areas.
I’ve covered the horrendous topic of child labor on farms in the U.S. in the past, as well as Stephen Colbert’s testimony to Congress on immigrant farmworkers in which he almost broke into tears. Now, I’m bringing to you the…
