Info, news & debate
Community-supported agriculture
Making local food production and land commons more viable with procurement hubs
small, local food producers are having a hard time making ends meet, because small farm incomes are falling, due to supermarkets constantly squeezing farmers/growers, to make food prices cheaper and cheaper. Here’s a potential solution.
Vision for a UK-Wide ‘Market Garden Renaissance’ from the Landworkers Alliance
Landworkers Alliance (LWA) launched its brand new report “Horticulture Across Four Nations” at a panel discussion at the Oxford Real Farming Conference (ORFC).
Beyond Conservation: The Farmland Commons
The Farmers Land Trust is diversifying participation in our food system and helping to create stronger communities that can not only survive the land, climate, and social injustices of the world, but can thrive while helping to heal them. Learn more about the work of The Farmers Land Trust and the Farmland Commons.
Resistance Festival to help save Monkton Wyld Court
A resistance festival of free workshops and music is taking place at Monkton Wyld Court, nr Lyme Regis. This is in support of the community that has run Monkton Wyld Court for the last fifteen years, and is now threatened by incoming charity trustees. Monkton Wyld Court is the site of a microdairy which dates …
Community Orchards – tragedy or victory of the commons?
Community orchards at their best are many things at once: a social space, a coming together of people to work together on a common task; a celebration of the abundant harvest of fruit; a haven for wildlife and a pocket of biodiversity.
Worried about fruit & veg rationing? Let’s grow our own, in our communities
Every so often something happens that punctures our sense of what’s normal. In the UK one of those events was empty shelves that used to display fruit and veg. Then supermarkets began rationing some food items.
George Monbiot and friends are wrong: techno-utopianism won’t save us
George Monbiot has joined a campaign called ‘Reboot Food’, working with techno-utopians who would like to see governments remove support for organic food and deregulate the GM industry, as well as producing bacteria-based food in giant factories (‘precision-fermentation’), and getting rid of smallholdings.
‘Monbiotic man’ – will future food be ‘farm-free’?
Simon Fairlie starts a series of articles about whether technology will save us. He supports small farmers over George Monbiot’s ‘Regenesis’ solution.
Consider gifting land to the Ecological Land Coop to support agroecological farming
At Low impact we love to hear about our companion organizations’ successes, this reblog from the ecological land coop describes why we are celebrating. The ecological land coop have been inspired to try a new approach in their campaign to reawaken our rural economies after they were gifted land by two very noble ecologically minded farmers in Wales…
12 reasons why industrial-scale agriculture is driving environmental destruction
In this article, the LWA’s Horticulture Campaigns Coordinator Rebecca Laughton explains why we have to produce and trade a greater percentage of food locally.
Want to work for a great veg box scheme in the south of England?
Want to work for a great veg box scheme in the south of England? Actually it’s our veg box scheme. And it’s a bag not a a box. Each week we get a bag full of organic fruit and veg from Sutton Community Farm. If you live in south London, I really recommend them. Lovely …
Can organic farming feed the world?
Now there’s a question – posed by Chris Smaje of the Ecoogical Land Co-op. Chris joined the board of the ELC as Dave of Lowimpact left, and since then Chris has produced a book called A Small Farm Future, which we review here. Members of Lowimpact have become involved in the world of mutual credit, …
A beginners’ guide to farmers’ markets: Part 3
Our friends at Ethical.net share what to look for in local food and drink in their guide to farmers’ market shopping, plus how else to access sustainable produce from local producers.
A beginners’ guide to farmers’ markets: Part 2
In the second instalment of A beginners’ guide to farmers’ markets, Elizabeth Waddington of Ethical.net explores how to find and what to expect at your local farmers’ market, as well as how to ensure your shop is as affordable as possible.
A beginners’ guide to farmers’ markets: Part 1
Not sure how to make the most of your local farmers’ market? In the first part of A beginners’ guide to farmers’ markets, Elizabeth Waddington of Ethical.net sets out how and why shopping at your local farmers’ market can make a real and positive difference.
Review of ‘A Small Farm Future’ by Chris Smaje
Industrial agriculture and giant monoculture farms dominate our food sector. But does it have to be that way? Could and should we build a new kind of food system based on small farms? This new book, ‘A Small Farm Future’ published by Chelsea Green, outlines what a post-covid, post-capitalist society might look like, built around …
We need to completely close down industrial animal agriculture
Industrial agriculture is cruel to animals, cruel to people who work in it, it damages the environment and concentrates wealth in very few hands. I guess if you’re reading this, you know that already, and I don’t have to explain it. The problem is, it’s still there, doing its vile stuff every day. What do …
Keeping communities growing: how to get involved
With huge changes demanded by the Covid-19 pandemic, community gardens and growing spaces up and down the country are adapting to new realities. Here’s how you can support and get involved in their work to keep communities growing.
‘The Case for Community Wealth Building’: review
This is the first of three articles in three days about ‘community wealth building’ (CWB) and mutual credit. Today we’re explaining community wealth building, and reviewing a book: The Case for Community Wealth Building. Tomorrow we’ll blog about how mutual credit can help post-Covid communities, and on Monday, Dil Green continues the theme, explaining how …
How to grow the non-corporate food sector: interview with Lynne Davis of the Open Food Network (Part 2)
This is Part 2 of an interview by Dave Darby of Lowimpact.org / NonCorporate.org with Lynne Davis of the Open Food Network as part of a series of interviews with people building the new economy. Here’s Part 1, and below is the transcript of the interview, plus the video.