aug 24th, 2009
http://www.nytimes.com/2009/08/24/opinion/24Despommier.html?th&emc=th
wow, vertical farms.
http://www.nytimes.com/2009/08/23/opinion/23kristof.html?em
kriston pontificates on the virtues of the natural farm. i have to agree. i remember my grandfather's lovely farm, and the paddy fields that lie fallow now, and the stable (cow-shed?) that no longer has any cows. (ok, ok, i know san will now accuse me of harboring some agrarian romantic fantasy. yeah, and you have a problem with that, san? :-) chant 'food, not rubber dog-shit' :-) )
2 comments:
Nizhal Yoddha,
I now see why I share your angst at the lost agrarian rhythms. I did not grow up in a village or on a farm. I grew up in a town that could have best been described as “nascent industrialising” just outside Delhi.
My grandfather brought the village ways with him and for as long I can remember; we had a cow and a buffalo. In fact, I had to bathe and scrub the animals – and my older brother had to milch them. I also had to prepare the feed for the cattle
My grandfather would revolt at the idea of buying diary milk – or worse powdered milk. After moving to North America and consuming this ‘poison milk’ – (got from designer cows and shot full of anti-biotics and other injections) - I see the folk wisdom of his ways.
Incidentally – our good fellow-blogger Sandeep pointed us to this observation by Bhyrappa about Amul and the milk co-operative movement. I always thought highly of Amul – but now may have to reconsider that as well!
http://www.sandeepweb.com/2009/08/16/sunday-special-excerpts-from-an-autobiography-2/
The piece about vertical farms would be a revolution if it can come true – sadly every hydroponics company I know is going broke. In BC, it was thought as being the solution to growing food in the cold Canadian winter. Government gave some tax benefits, but even so the industry has more or less folded.
i grew up in a town, ghostwriter, but used to summer in the native village at my grandfather's. he had cows, fields, a serpent grove which was an undisturbed virgin forest, and most of all, a pond full of fish where we also bathed. no electricity, so we dined by hurricane lamp. and the toilets were in an outhouse.
after the harvest, the farmhands would boil the rice in large vats. i can still remember the warm, suffocating smell of the hay in the haystacks.
like kristoff, i would say, those were the days. 'paradise enow'.
but gone for good. no more paddy fields, thanks to the idiot government.
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