We did come and enjoy the music, food, people and the festival this weekend. It was awesome! The music was great, food was incredible and we left with a fistful of information and a gratifying feeling about being part of something good.
It was after a brief introduction and an evocative performance of “Trouble In The Fields” by Caroline Venters that Carolyn Herriot took to the main stage for her presentation of “The Zero-Mile Diet: A Year Round Guide to Growing Organic Food.” Carolyn spoke to the sun-drenched but otherwise engaged crowd for 30 minutes about individual responsibility, going back to the garden, and how it is we alone who are responsible for what we are putting into our mouths, not only for the sake of ourselves but for those of the next generation who will inherit the world we are living in now.
Posts Tagged ‘Sustainable’
“The Zero-Mile Diet” Book Launch
Home Sweet Home
The Green Building and Development Forum heated up this morning, with Gord Baird, JC Scott, Doug Makaroff, John Gower, and Elke Cole, as panelists. Each of these speakers brought a unique perspective to the green building debate but all of them universally emphasized one thing: make your house a home – not an investment. Make your house beautiful. Love it and it will last for a long time.
Waste is Fuel
Waste equals food is one of Mother Nature’s fundamental principles and one that has been highlighted by McDonough and Braungart. The idea is that all waste products can be regenerated into new life or new energy.
After the Sustainable Transportation Forum, I thought I might look into some of the alternative forms of transportation parked right here at the festival. I set out to investigate Dr.Bjorn’s car, run almost completely on vegetable oil, and the CHFCA’s fuel cell car, parked just outside the entrance. Both, as it turns out, can be fueled by waste.
Engage the Change!
Today is a day to make some changes! One of the first tables you’ll see set up at the festival is The Change Tent, and it is definitely one you want to visit. Annalea and Brad are there from The Change to tell you all about local companies that are “Greener, Fairer and Truer.
At The Change Tent pick up an Organic Islands GREEN PASSPORT. This baby is basically a scavenger hunt through the festival exhibitors. Stop by the 12 tables listed, find out about that company, get your passport stamped and have a fun day in the sun learning about everything Victoria has to offer the green movement!
Start the “Movement”
“Once our personal connection to what is wrong becomes clear, we have to choose. We can go on as before, recognizing our dishonesty and living with it the best we can, or we can begin the effort to change the way we think and live.” – Wendell Berry
With “The Zero-Mile Diet: A Year-Round Guide to Growing Organic Food”, Carolyn Herriot’s greatest hope is to kickstart a movement: the “grow your own food” movement.
Some Golden Rules
While container and lasagna gardening can make the idea of growing your own vegetables a lot more doable, the amount of knowledge that comes along with even beginning can be overwhelming too! In “The Zero-Mile Diet: A Year-Round Guide to Growing Organic Food”, Carolyn Herriot provides us with 10 of her golden rules for growing great produce. Today, I am going to share a few of those with you.
What Does Sustainable Mean?
No really, I’m asking you – what does sustainability really mean?
To some, sustainability means choosing the lesser of two evils. Wikipedia tells me sustainable is “the capacity to endure” (sounds a bit painful, doesn’t it?). It can mean ensuring life for the next seven generations, or indefinitely. To others, it is a word that has a comfortable vagueness allowing for marketability. Conversely, It may be a mathematical calculation of population and greed. The trouble with sustainability today is as much about finding out how it’s done as what it genuinely means.
A Green Victory – Madrona Farm
If you haven’t heard yet, after a two-year campaign with nearly 3000 donors, the Land Conservancy of British Columbia has raised 1.7 million dollars to save Madrona Farm. The Farm comprises 27-acres wedged between Blenkinsop Rd. and Mount Douglas and is a paradigm for sustainable agriculture. The farm was threatened when the owners decided to sell the property, leaving the farmers, David and Nathalie, in a sort of limbo. If the new owners didn’t want to maintain the property as an organic fruits and vegetable farm, then there would have been little holding them back. As of May 14, the area exists in a land trust that will preserve the ecological and agricultural value of the area indefinitely.
After doing a bit of reading, I realized that I was alarmingly ignorant of just how much was at stake. Not only…
