64

An Inconvenient Truth: The Peasant Food Web Feeds the World

Colin Todhunter

In October 2020, CropLife International said that its new strategic partnership with the United Nations Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO) would contribute to sustainable food systems.

It added that it was a first for the industry and the FAO and demonstrates the determination of the plant science sector to work constructively in a partnership where common goals are shared.

A powerful trade and lobby association, CropLife International counts among its members the world’s largest agricultural biotechnology and pesticide businesses: Bayer, BASF, Syngenta, FMC, Corteva and Sumitoma Chemical.

Under the guise of promoting plant science technology, the association first and foremost looks after the interests (bottom line) of its member corporations.

Not long after the CropLife-FAO partnership was announced, PAN (Pesticide Action Network) Asia Pacific along with 350 organisations wrote a letter to FAO Director-General Qu Dongyu urging him to stop the collaboration and for good reason.

A 2020 joint investigation by Unearthed (Greenpeace) and Public Eye (a human rights NGO) revealed that BASF, Corteva, Bayer, FMC and Syngenta bring in billions of dollars by selling toxic chemicals found by regulatory authorities to pose serious health hazards.

It also found more than a billion dollars of their sales came from chemicals – some now banned in European markets – that are highly toxic to bees. Over two thirds of these sales were made in low- and middle-income countries like Brazil and India.

The Political Declaration of the People’s Autonomous Response to the UN Food Systems Summit in 2021 stated that global corporations are increasingly infiltrating multilateral spaces to co-opt the narrative of sustainability to secure further industrialisation, the extraction of wealth and labour from rural communities and the concentration of corporate power.

With this in mind, a major concern is that CropLife International will now seek to derail the FAO’s commitment to agroecology and push for the further corporate colonisation of food systems.

The July 2019 UN FAO High Level Panel of Experts Report concluded that agroecology provides greatly improved food security and nutritional, gender, environmental and yield benefits compared to industrial agriculture. This report formed part of the FAO’s ongoing commitment to agroecology.

But agroecology represents a direct challenge to the interests of CropLife members. With the emphasis on localisation and on-farm inputs, agroecology does not require dependency on proprietary chemicals, seeds and knowledge nor the long-line global supply chains dominated by transnational agrifood corporations.

There does now appear to be an ideological assault from within the FAO on alternative development and agrifood models that threaten CropLife International’s member interests.

In the report ‘Who Will Feed Us? The Industrial Food Chain vs the Peasant Food Web (ETC Group, 2017), it was shown that a diverse network of small-scale producers (the peasant food web) actually feeds 70% of the world, including the most hungry and marginalised.

The flagship report indicated that only 24% of the food produced by the industrial food chain actually reaches people. Furthermore, it was shown that industrial food costs us more: for every dollar spent on industrial food, it costs another two dollars to clean up the mess.

However, two prominent papers have since claimed that small farms feed only 35% of the global population.

One of the papers is ‘How much of our world’s food do smallholders produce?’ (Ricciardi et al, 2018). The other is an FAO report, ‘Which farms feed the world and has farmland become more concentrated? (Lowder et al, 2021).

Eight key organisations have just written to the FAO sharply criticising the Lowder paper which reverses a number of well-established positions held by the organisation. The letter is signed by the Oakland Institute, Landworkers Alliance, ETC Group, A Growing Culture, Alliance for Food Sovereignty in Africa, GRAIN, Groundswell International and the Institute for Agriculture and Trade Policy.

The open letter calls on the FAO to reaffirm that peasants (including small farmers, artisanal fishers, pastoralists, hunters and gatherers and urban producers) provide more food with fewer resources and are the primary source of nourishment for at least 70% of the world population.

ETC Group has also published the 16-page report ‘Small-scale Farmers and Peasants Still Feed the World‘ in response to the two papers, indicating how the authors indulged in methodological and conceptual gymnastics and certain important omissions to arrive at the 35% figure – not least by changing the definition of ‘family farmer’ and by defining a ‘small farm’ as less than 2 ha. This contradicts the FAO’s own decision in 2018 to reject a universal land area threshold for describing small farms in favour of more sensitive country-specific definitions.

The Lowder et al paper also contradicts recent FAO and other reports that state peasant farms produce more food and more nutritious food per hectare than large farms. It maintains that policy makers are wrongly focused on peasant production and should give greater attention to larger production units.

The signatories of the open letter to the FAO strongly disagree with the Lowder study’s assumption that food production is a proxy for food consumption and that the commercial value of food in the marketplace can be equated with the nutritional value of the food consumed.

The paper feeds into an agribusiness narrative that attempts to undermine the effectiveness of peasant production in order to promote its proprietary technologies and agrifood model.

Smallholder peasant farming is regarded by these conglomerates as an impediment. Their vision is fixated on a narrow yield-output paradigm based on the bulk production of commodities that is unwilling to grasp an integrated social-cultural-economic-agronomic systems approach that accounts for the likes of food sovereignty and diverse nutrition production per acre.

This systems approach also serves to boost rural and regional development based on thriving, self-sustaining local communities rather than eradicating them and subordinating whoever remains to the needs of global supply chains and global markets. Industry lobbyists like to promote the latter as ‘responding to the needs of modern agriculture’ rather than calling it for what it is: corporate imperialism.

The FAO paper concludes that the world small farms only produce 35% of the world’s food using 12% of agricultural land. But ETC Group says that by working with the FAO’s normal or comparable databases, it is apparent that peasants nourish at least 70% of the world’s people with less than one third of the agricultural land and resources.

But even if 35% of food is produced on 12% of land, does that not suggest we should be investing in small, family and peasant farming rather than large-scale chemical-intensive agriculture?

While not all small farms might be practising agroecology or chemical-free agriculture, they are more likely to be integral to local markets and networks, short supply chains, food sovereignty, more diverse cropping systems and healthier diets. And they tend to serve the food requirements of communities rather than those of external business interests, institutional investors and shareholders half a world away.

When the corporate capture a body occurs, too often the first casualty is truth.

Colin Todhunter specialises in development, food and agriculture and is a Research Associate of the Centre for Research on Globalization in Montreal. You can read his “mini e-book”, Food, Dependency and Dispossession: Cultivating Resistance, here.

SUPPORT OFFGUARDIAN

If you enjoy OffG's content, please help us make our monthly fund-raising goal and keep the site alive.

For other ways to donate, including direct-transfer bank details click HERE.

4.9 15 votes
Article Rating
Subscribe
Notify of
guest

64 Comments
newest
oldest most voted
Inline Feedbacks
View all comments
Ernest Judd
Ernest Judd
Feb 10, 2022 7:42 PM

The only reason for GMO IS to OWN and CONTROL the food supply.

The only reason for mass vexxination IS to OWN and CONTROL the human supply.

NickM
NickM
Feb 8, 2022 6:27 AM

From Michael Hudson, economist:

[The U$A is deliberately pressurising its European allies to boycott trade with Russia and China because, by so doing] “its allies hurt their own economies, not those of Russia and China”

“What seems ironic is that such sanctions against Russia and China have ended up helping rather than hurting them. But the primary U$ aim was not to hurt the Russian and Chinese economies: U$ economic pressure is aimed primarily at keeping allied European and Asian countries within a U$ “protected” economic orbit. Germany, Lithuania and other allies are told to impose sanctions directed against their own economic welfare by not trading with countries outside the U$ dollar-area.”

https://thesaker.is/americas-real-adversaries-are-its-european-and-other-allies-the-u-s-aim-is-to-keep-them-from-trading-with-china-and-russia/

[Like with NATZO, the U$ uses Brussels to keep the Russians out and the EU down].

paul
paul
Feb 6, 2022 6:06 PM

Control the food and you control the people.
“If they (Iranians) want their people to eat, they have to do as they’re told.” – Pompeo.

Because when you’re American and you’re special and you’re exceptional and you’re indispensable, and the sun literally shines out of your a***hole, you’re entitled to starve and murder children.

Really nice people, those Americans.

mgeo
mgeo
Feb 6, 2022 5:19 PM

Over two thirds of these sales were made in low- and middle-income countries..
Hence the propaganda effort to promote hatred or at alienation towards Others, and undermine inconvenient foreign news.

agroecology does not require dependency on proprietary chemicals, seeds and knowledge nor the long-line global supply chains
Traditional farming specifically promotes independence from external inputs, say from beyond the village level. Thank heavens for that sanity.

The giant agricultural industry – research, experts, field advice and commercialisation – rests on the dogma that specialists know more than local farmers.

Paul Vonharnish
Paul Vonharnish
Feb 6, 2022 3:54 PM

Erm…

“We have fundamentally altered the very conditions that made the evolution of life on Earth possible.”
– Arthur Firstenberg –

Another well considered article that few will bother to consider. >

Deadly Rainbow: Will 5G Precipitate the Extinction of All Life on Earth?
Robert J. Burrowes, Ph.D.
July 6, 2020
TRANSCEND MEDIA SERVICE » Deadly Rainbow: Will 5G Precipitate the Extinction of All Life on Earth?

Sunface Jack
Sunface Jack
Feb 6, 2022 9:26 AM

It must be understood there are more issues than meets the eye. The Globalist want to control food production for profit, the eco-fundamentalists want to ram organics down peoples throats- for profit, they too use poisons to control pests. The small and medium size farmers are being squeezed out by the big players to force them out of the market aided and abetted by Governments. Organic Trade Association welcomes Sustainable Food Trade Association in 2021- to build sustainable food system and fight climate change– same BS as the UN. peas in a pod. Money and profit.

sabelmouse
sabelmouse
Feb 6, 2022 12:29 PM
Reply to  Sunface Jack

please, they’ve got profit, they want to be all powerful/play god!

dr death
dr death
Feb 6, 2022 4:39 PM
Reply to  sabelmouse

I think it more likely they intend to reduce the population… that seems to be their primary concern in all areas…

they are anti-human..

sabelmouse
sabelmouse
Feb 7, 2022 11:31 AM
Reply to  dr death

yes + perfect enslavement of the rest.

Brian of Nazareth
Brian of Nazareth
Feb 6, 2022 1:06 PM
Reply to  Sunface Jack

An organic farmer would not use chemical poisons to control pests, so that statement is false. As for forcing people to eat organic food, what evidence do you have for this bizarre claim?

Neo-Feudal Lord
Neo-Feudal Lord
Feb 6, 2022 6:20 PM

Beware absolutist statements & highly-reductionist narratives.
“chemical poisons” is a highly generalized and very broad term.

Most all things are chemicals.
Chemicals make up all matter—but they don’t make up everything”A chemical is any substance consisting of matter. This includes any liquid, solid, or gas. A chemical is any pure substance (an element) or any mixture (a solution, compound, or gas). They can either occur naturally or can be created artificially.”

The pesticides approved in organic farming are largely natural ones, though a limited amount of synthetic substances are permitted:Copper: Copper hydroxide, copper oxide, copper oxychloride, includes products exempted from EPA tolerance, provided that copper-based materials must be used in a manner that minimizes accumulation in the soil and shall not be used as herbicides.
Copper sulfate: Application rates are limited to levels which do not increase baseline soil test values for copper over a timeframe agreed upon by the producer and accredited certifying agent.Hydrogen peroxide
Lime sulfer: Including calcium polysulfide
Peracetic acid: For use to control fire blight bacteria. Also permitted in hydrogen peroxide formulations at a concentration of no more than 6% as indicated on the pesticide product label

The National List of Allowed and Prohibited Substances:
§ 205.600 Evaluation criteria for allowed and prohibited substances, methods, and ingredients.
https://www.ecfr.gov/current/title-7/part-205/subpart-g

Plus, Corporate America is gaining ever-increased influence & control over the USDA-NOP program.

So regulations are constantly evolving.

And, “organics” is increasingly becoming merely a clever marketing strategy.
Becoming increasingly devoid of sustainable & regenerative practices.
The largest “organic” producers are now massive corporate giants.

“Organics” has become an extremely high profit margin industry.
And most often when you have high-profits, the biggest shysters come out to reap most of those profits.

Brian of Nazareth
Brian of Nazareth
Feb 7, 2022 9:19 AM

I have worked in organic farming in the UK for over 20 years and I have never encountered corruption or dishonesty among producers. And I don’t drink because alcohol is a poison, right?
The real issue for me is land “ownership” It has been said that humans owning land is equivalent to a bunch of fleas claiming ownership of the dog they live on. Land is capital. Control of land means control of food production, allowing control of populations. The true motive for wars is to gain land and resources, always has been.

Ernest Judd
Ernest Judd
Feb 7, 2022 4:52 PM

That was a poor whitewash of of the issues of industrial agriculture.
You see, the “elephant-in-the-room” issue:

The flagship report indicated that only 24% of the food produced by the industrial food chain actually reaches people. Furthermore, it was shown that industrial food costs us more: for every dollar spent on industrial food, it costs another two dollars to clean up the mess.

Organics are only high profit in Mammon-istan, ie. “Western Democracies”.
The largest “organic” producers are now massive corporate giants.

This is the second article I have read in recent days on disparaging organic food production. The other is in a seemingly innocuous periodical, “Nutrition Action”. Rather than explaining in clear detail WHY it’s better to NOT eat GMO’s and what are important crops becoming “Frankenfood” they say, “Since the labelling says ‘This product contains GMO” they suggest that since the ingredient isn’t listed to go ahead and TRUST the FDA, as they make the claim that GMO’s are “Safe”. The FDA also thinks the vexxes are a good idea!

It’s dis-information of the worst gas lighting kind, just like CoVid1984 and it’s “solutions”.

Guess what? Russia has banned GMO’s.

Edwige
Edwige
Feb 6, 2022 9:20 AM

From Sweden, the heroes of light lockdown:

https://dumptheguardian.com/world/2022/feb/06/sweden-returns-to-cold-war-tactics-to-battle-fake-news

They’ve almost certainly been doing this for ages and are just using the current wave of Putin-phobia to declare it publicly. Hidden in plain sight is always their preferred option.

exiled off mainstreet
exiled off mainstreet
Feb 6, 2022 6:55 AM

BASF was part of the IG Farben chemical consortium which marketed Zyklon B, the Nazi extermination gas.

Hamish
Hamish
Feb 6, 2022 8:53 AM

De-lousing gas, not extermination gas.

sabelmouse
sabelmouse
Feb 6, 2022 12:36 PM
Reply to  Hamish

uhm

Mann Friedman
Mann Friedman
Feb 7, 2022 6:57 PM
Reply to  sabelmouse

Yes! NOT extermination gas.

Penelope
Penelope
Feb 6, 2022 4:55 AM

https://twitter.com/PremierScottMoe/status/1489045180745494529
Outspoken guy running against Turdeau. Brief video. He gets it.

Phantasm
Phantasm
Feb 6, 2022 4:08 PM
Reply to  Penelope

So the solution is./…replace one shill for another!!!!
Penelope how is it you really dont get it..?

Penelope
Penelope
Feb 7, 2022 12:43 AM
Reply to  Phantasm

Phantasm, you obviously didn’t listen to the video– where he calls out the bankers as the bad guys, for example.

Penelope
Penelope
Feb 6, 2022 4:49 AM

Turdeau Calls Truckers “Racist”

Keep digging that hole, idiot. You’ll fall in sooner or later. What a dummy! You’re under seige, so tell the most obvious lie you can think of– that’s bound to increase your credibility.

Humanity can’t possibly be defeated by such as these: Que poca cosa.

Penelope
Penelope
Feb 6, 2022 2:55 AM

I’m hungry for the data that will substantiate that diversified small farms are more productive than the mega-mechanized ones. I think they are, and decentralization of food-production is desirable in any case. However, the source document https://www.etcgroup.org/sites/www.etcgroup.org/files/files/etc-whowillfeedus-english-webshare.pdf
in this article commits errors:

–unquestioned belief in the human-caused global warming hoax & therefore condemnation of all mechanization, tractors, etc.

–criticism of crops raised for meat-production.  

–belief that if Americans ate less there wd be more for others. US obesity is caused mostly by the TYPE of food eaten ala the Dietary Guidelines– i.e., increased carbs, especially refined ones and the noxious vegetable oils. Also adulteration of meat animals by feeding grain, antibiotics, hormones and too much copper. 

 Antibiotics fed to animals fattens them through selectively killing certain gut bacteria so that the remaining type will exaggerate the effect of carbs. Residues in meat have the same effect on people. Grain feed alters the animals’ fat so that it loses much of the characteristics of healthful animal fat and moves towards those of vegetable oils.

Copper: Mexico recently turned back a US shipment of meat cuz it had too much copper. Copper sulfate is sprayed even on organic vegetables. High copper to zinc ratios is a major driver of Alzheimer’s. (copper pipes and low dietary zinc)

paul
paul
Feb 6, 2022 12:07 AM

Access to the site is being blocked by search engines like bing. They produce search results prioritising things like Newsguard smear pieces, helpfully explaining how OG is run by bots and degenerates who cheat at golf, kick their dogs, urinate on war memorials and steal from the homeless while dressed in Nazi regalia and women’s underwear.

Rhys Jaggar
Rhys Jaggar
Feb 6, 2022 9:49 AM
Reply to  paul

Why on earth would you ever use Bing? More Gates trash.

paul
paul
Feb 6, 2022 8:21 PM
Reply to  Rhys Jaggar

I don’t. It’s just one example, Duckduckgo is another.

les online
les online
Feb 5, 2022 11:45 PM

Before capture, the struggle first takes place over the definition of central words and concepts. Surely everybody learned how the re-definition of ‘pandemic’ right through to re-definition of ‘vaccine’ have been central to the invention of the ‘covid’ narrative as cover for the imposition of The New World Order/ The Great Reset ?

In 1966 the Situationist International declared, “People like (…….), being themselves valets of power’s cultural spectacle, which wants to quickly recuperate for its own use the most crucial terms of modern critical thought, will never want to admit that the truest and most important concepts of an era – alienation, communism, dialectics – are precisely marked by the organization of the greatest confusion and the worst misinterpretation. Vital concepts are simultaneously subject to the truest and the most false use, with a multitude of intermediary confusions, because of the struggle between critical reality and the apologetic spectacle leads to a struggle over words, a struggle that is more bitter the more those words are central. The truth of a concept is revealed not by an authoritarian purge, but by the coherence of its use in theory and in practical life……” (p184) SI Anthology. Ken Knabb. 1981. Bureau of Public Secrets…

Entryism is the favoured tactic of the small, marginal Trotskyite sects – infiltration then take-over of large political groups. Have the Trots used it, managed to take over the giant agro-chemical corporations who are using the tactic to subordinate the FAO to their agenda ?

Edwige
Edwige
Feb 6, 2022 9:13 AM
Reply to  les online

Trots don’t need to infiltrate large corporations because those who run these corporations are Trots and always have been.

The division between capitalism and communism was fake, isn’t it obvious by now? This is not to say Trotskyism is the ‘true’ ideology of the mega-rich, they don’t have a true ideology but it’s one of their weapons to be deployed when it’ll be most effective. True ideologies are for little people.

jimbojames
jimbojames
Feb 6, 2022 10:20 AM
Reply to  Edwige

Can you defend your opinion?
Do you have any source material as for the basis of your opinion?
Where do you get off?

Trotskyism is the ideology of the rich?

Please define Trotskyism. Then offer your evidence.

Waldorf
Waldorf
Feb 6, 2022 12:37 PM
Reply to  jimbojames

He or she is prone to make sweeping statements, often buttressed with gematria.

Howard
Howard
Feb 6, 2022 5:24 PM
Reply to  jimbojames

Were I British, I would call “source material” a sticky wicket in that the material is only as good as the source. Plus, many sources are mixed bags. Take the Lancet: highly regarded, it gets some right and some wrong, depending whether it’s leaning toward the mainstream or allowing itself to be more independent.

Opinions have greater leeway than sources. But that doesn’t mean opinions are necessarily wrong just because they’re derived more from observation than from reading this or that text.

Using a poor reference as a source demonstrates the old saw “two wrongs don’t make a right.”

hotrod31
hotrod31
Feb 5, 2022 11:06 PM

For a legal perspective on the status of the scam … a shortish vidpod from Gwarfare & Reinner Fulmich: https://www.australiannationalreview.com/health/reiner-fuellmich-on-the-c0vid-exit-strategy/

wardropper
wardropper
Feb 6, 2022 1:42 AM
Reply to  hotrod31

Fuellmich is beginning to worry me.
He admits at the end of this video that he didn’t realize that the judiciary had also been infiltrated…
I mean… WHAT ???
He’s the lawyer, yet I realized almost two years ago that covid infiltration was global. Why didn’t he realize it?
The same vermin that infiltrate the US Supreme Court, the British Judiciary – and in fact the entire electoral process of the west – were already doing so decades ago.

The only question on any rational person’s lips is, “How do we stop that?”

OF COURSE the judiciary was infiltrated.
You always go for the media, the banks and the judiciary when your name is Macchiavelli, for heaven’s sake…

El Zafio
El Zafio
Feb 6, 2022 8:20 AM
Reply to  wardropper

Here he admits it again.
Also, it evidently took until session #90 to ponder the possibility there may not be a virus. Clear as day, the Committee is not very versed or happy with that viewpoint.
https://odysee.com/@dharmabear:2/Dr-Stefan-Lanka-Dr-Andrew-Kaufman-CIC-Session-90:2

Rhisiart Gwilym
Rhisiart Gwilym
Feb 6, 2022 8:40 AM
Reply to  wardropper

W, remember that Reiner is one of that company of people who were doing very nicely in well-paid middle-class careers until the pseudopandemic was launched. Reiner, along with Mike Yeadon, Robert Malone, and other such conventionally ‘successful’ people, are on record with variations of the same statement, which can be precised like this:

“When the covid thing started, I was doing well in my life’s work, and I tended to accept conventional accounts of things without too much scepticism. Consequently, when the covid scam began, I was inclined to believe the official story. More importantly, when the first suggestions of a huge criminal conspiracy began to appear, I began by saying: ‘Oh for heavens sake! Get rid of your tin-foil hat. Get your head straight!’ Now, though, I’ve been forced by unignorable and very shocking facts to come round to the drastically-altered view of: ‘My god! It’s true!'”

You have to allow some adjustment time for people who’ve spent their whole lives, from school-time on, being goodthinkers who believe what they’re told by the indoctrination and propaganda system, and who, consequently, get rewarded as useful naifs by the gangsters who run it. Remember: “It’s difficult to get a man to see something when his income [power and status in society] depend on him not seeing it.”

The real, properly-clued-up sceptics tend to be people like us, down amongst the detritus of the uncareered plebs. We have nothing much to lose by facing nasty realities. We can afford to see them easily. Allow the former stratospherically-careered goodthinkers a bit of room to peel the scales from their eyes completely. Many still haven’t got there yet.

Paul Vonharnish
Paul Vonharnish
Feb 6, 2022 3:48 PM

Hello Rhisiart Gwilym: Right on target. Those “goodthinkers” you mention are college educated to think above the poorly “informed” and unwashed plebs. They often belong to the BAR ASSOCIATION, which is modeled after the legal associations of Medieval Barristers.

Barristers pled before the Royal bars of oligarchs, and were of course, included in on the game. It’s all royal bull crap, and the miserable peasants own nothing…

wardropper
wardropper
Feb 8, 2022 5:40 AM

Yes indeed.
I’d noticed that company of people too…

mgeo
mgeo
Feb 6, 2022 3:33 PM
Reply to  wardropper

+1

wardropper
wardropper
Feb 8, 2022 5:42 AM
Reply to  wardropper

Oh, and I forgot, you go for the universities too…

Penelope
Penelope
Feb 6, 2022 4:06 AM
Reply to  hotrod31

hotrod, thanks for posting that. A congenial video that tells me where Fuellmich is going next. I will feel better when someone starts a new money system cuz we’re certainly vulnerable on that front.

dom irritant
dom irritant
Feb 6, 2022 6:16 PM
Reply to  Penelope

fk your new money system, we once lived without money at all, and we can do it again…..we are the only animals that pay for anything……all the worlds resources belong to us all and not the pedo elite, money being a huge control shitstem

Phantasm
Phantasm
Feb 6, 2022 4:11 PM
Reply to  hotrod31

Ow look another wasted 2 years of Q / trump style opium hopium = lies.
Mass arrest,s Tribunals, Court cases, sealed indictments.
exacts to bullshit…
donate now scams aimed at the low IQ

S Cooper
S Cooper
Feb 5, 2022 10:00 PM

comment image

“Move along now. Nothing to see here. Just the Scamdemic Gestapo enforcing the Big Cull, Great Ripoff and Enslavement and administering the Eucharist.”
comment image

“Show them your Pfizer/Modena/J&J App. May as well get one because one is going to need it anyway to enter the Kingdom of Heaven.

jubal hershaw
jubal hershaw
Feb 5, 2022 10:25 PM
Reply to  S Cooper

They usually hide their eyes behind shame shades, now they hide their shame behind health-endangering masks. Perfect examples of Obedience Training Schooling (Schooling – the pathway to a rewarding job.)

wardropper
wardropper
Feb 6, 2022 1:56 AM
Reply to  S Cooper

Oh for a priest with enough religious conviction to tell that rat to get out of God’s House…

New Nane
New Nane
Feb 6, 2022 3:19 AM
Reply to  S Cooper

Bergoglio would have no problem with that.

S Cooper
S Cooper
Feb 5, 2022 7:27 PM

comment image
comment image

Penelope
Penelope
Feb 5, 2022 7:03 PM

Off-G what an interesting article! I look forward to studying its sources. BTW here’s some info on saving the bees; hope it’s not snake oil:

Derek saved his bees by using the mineral shungite. His hives have no mites or disease and are docile. He placed about 5 small rocks of shungite at the hive entrance and the bees like to rub against it. When he placed shungite powder at the entrance with the rocks the bees began making new queens and Derek had to add 4 hives. He has also devised a way to add shungite powder to paint and has painted the inside if the hive boxes.
***Learn more about Derek’s success in beekeeping at ShungiteBeehives.com and on Youtube.

Nature
Nature
Feb 5, 2022 9:25 PM
Reply to  Penelope

Save the bees?

I have worked in & have intensively studied organic agriculture for over 10 years.
I run a vermicomposting (worm composting) company.
No snake oil needed.

It turns out that everything loves better tasting foods, not just humans.
And everything benefits from better quality foods, those rich in natural antibiotics, natural vitamins, natural flavonoids, secondary metabolites, etc.

And all of those things are promoted by sustainable, regenerative organic practices.
Microorganisms are a bases of all life.
And whilst it is true that you are what you eat (new cells are made from the molecules & atoms of the cells of the things eaten & digested), it is also true that you are what you eat, ate.
I.e. – The quality of the foods you eat depend on the quality of the foods they eat.
Healthier animals are dependent on healthier feeds (for you carnivores).
Healthier plants are dependent on healthier feeds, aka nutrients (for you herbivores & omnivores).

Healthier plants are dependent on healthier soils, meaning healthier microorganisms & surrounding biota.
Those healthier microorganisms & surrounding biota need continued high-quality organic matter to continue to feed on, releasing higher-quality nutrients.

By cleaning & clearing gardens of dead plant & other organic matter you are simply removing the food stuff that those microorganisms need to remain beneficial, abundant & productive.

The healthier the microorganisms & biota, the healthier the plants, and hence healthier pollen & nectar they produce.
Meaning more nutrients, more vitamins, more natural antibiotics, more secondary metabolites, etc.
Meaning happier & healthier pollinators.

A true GROUNDS UP approach.

I have been experimenting & observing for several years, utilizing vermicompost, and have consistently demonstrated that plants grown in higher-quality organic soils & amendments attract much larger quantities of pollinators.
An abundant quantity of pollinators that absolutely thrive.
I have repeatedly transformed pollinator “dead-zones” to gardens thriving with hoards of happy pollinators.

The formation of polyphenols (like flavonoids, terpenoids, tannins, lignans, and such), which are often called “aromatic compounds”, and often responsible for the taste & smell of foods, are largely dependent on microorganisms as they interact with other constituents (like enzymes).

When pollinators, like bees, eat higher-quality foods, those produced by healthier plants, grown in healthier soils, which contain more vitamins, more natural antibiotics, more natural antivirals, more secondary metabolites, etc., they are afforded better protection from disease, and other pathogenic organisms & issues.

Nature knows what it’s doing.
Nature has a way of protecting & restoring itself.
But humans, mostly those seeking the protections & profits of patents, IP’s, and other measures, continue to interfere with Nature protecting & restoring itself.

les online
les online
Feb 5, 2022 10:37 PM
Reply to  Nature

So what’s your take on hydroponically grown foods ? I suspect that without the involvement of the soil microorganisms such food is suspect. Local supermarkets have redefined “fresh” to be able to apply it to stuff that’s been picked near-ripe, held in cool rooms for ages, forced ‘ripe’… If non-soil grown foods are promoted as “healthy”, has that words’ definition been expanded too ?

NatureSoil Products
NatureSoil Products
Feb 6, 2022 1:51 AM
Reply to  les online

There are different ways of doing things.
Hydroponic doesn’t necessarily have to mean synthetic chemicals or highly-refined & isolated nutrients, but it usually does.
There were big fights waged over whether or not hydroponics should be allowed the “organic” label.

I haven’t done thorough experimentation but am fairly certain hydroponics can support healthy microorganisms/biota.

“Soil” microorganisms really just need the food (organic matter) to support them, and if that organic matter is reduced to nano sizes, it can more easily be absorbed into water, giving those microorganisms access to the multitude of nutrients & other constituents.
Thus I believe hydroponics can be made to work within the framework of soil-type conditions (but it’s still just a theory of mine at this point).

But I’m happy to discuss ideas & theories for anyone willing to try & experiment with this natural hydroponics technique.

A major problem with refined nutrients, whether “organic” or conventional, is that they often largely lack the numerous other essential constituents (like carbon, magnesium, iron, zinc, boron, selenium, and the list quite literally goes on & on & on).
And also largely lack the secondary metabolites that microorganisms need for proper metabolic functioning & health.

Most “fertilizers”, regardless whether “organic” or synthetic/conventional are designed just to feed the plants. Negligent of the necessary & beneficial actions of microorganisms.
As such they bypass the crucial involvement & processes of microorganisms.
Which is a mistake, because those microorganisms are necessary for production/natural synthesis/interaction of/with those other necessary compounds (like natural vitamins, natural antibiotics, secondary metabolites, etc.).

Just like humans and animals and insects have to continually eat to survive, so too do microorganisms.
And eliminating that process is detrimental to the quantities/populations of microorganisms.

And that is one of the biggest failures of modern agriculture today.
It focuses on the plants rather than the microorganisms that create symbiotic relationships with plants, including the breakdown
of organic “waste” matter into available nutrients.

Plant roots are supposed to be miniature mega-societies of largely diverse species of microorganisms.
Both “good” and “bad”, each looking to defeat the others for control of the circulatory system and botanical metabolism of those plants.

Much natural health is largely dependent on chemical signatures produced by microorganisms.
Similar to the necessary beneficial microbiome of humans, plants require the same.

Everything eventually becomes merely a marketing gimmick.
Especially the more popular it becomes.

And the more refining & processing corporations can engage in, the more profit they make.

More people should be doing more of their own things.

Penelope
Penelope
Feb 6, 2022 4:17 AM
Reply to  Nature

Nature, couldn’t agree more. Thanks for posting your experience. Some are saying that bee colonies sickened by nicotinoids can be healed by shungite. Hope it’s true cuz it’s not possible to imprison the bees to healthful areas like yours.

NatureSoil Products
NatureSoil Products
Feb 6, 2022 3:43 PM
Reply to  Penelope

Thanks.
The reason for my post is to encourage more people to do the same.
Because it’s super easy, and highly-beneficial.
And it doesn’t take much room to create a garden that is beneficial for pollinators.

And if we all make changes to our own habits first, that’s what makes true global/universal change.
Read about the philosophy of Universalizailbity, if you’re not already aware of it.

Where you have systems of growing dependence, you increasingly have an absence of independence.
And there are massive power & profit motives behind systems of growing dependence.
And those massive power & profit motives are often widely destructive.

People don’t need to buy stuff to make a difference (mindless consumerism is perhaps one of the biggest problems).
They just need to invest in more personal effort.

Some are saying that bee colonies sickened by nicotinoids…

Beware reductionist thinking & narratives, and now consider this.
I also grow tons of tobacco (nicotiana alata), in my own organic soils & amendments.
The flowers, pollen & nectar of which all contain natural nicotine.

And yet not only do those pollinators love those tobacco flowers (it is often a favorite of those pollinators), which smell absolutely delightful, but numerous studies (including my own research) have shown that natural nicotine is highly beneficial (giving consideration to nicotine concentration), including offering protection from pathogenic pests.

So, the synthetic nicotine, Neonicotinoids, are amongst the most deadly & destructive poisons.
But natural nicotine has shown quite beneficial.

Natural tobacco was used for centuries as an herbal medicine.
And most all research linking tobacco use to cancer has focused on highly-processed tobacco products, which can contain any number of the 500-plus additives Big Tobacco uses to increase taste, smell, effect, etc.

More recent research has actually shown that pure tobacco contains numerous anti-cancer phytochemicals.

And, in a somewhat off-topic but related note, the history of the study of “viruses” began with the study of tobacco disease.
The Tobacco Mosaic Virus (TMV) is often regarded as the first recognized “virus”.
That “virus” & related highly-destructive tobacco plant disease seemingly began showing up only after mass production & less-sustainable growing practices began.

There is growing bodies of evidence showing that a destruction/absence of beneficial microorganisms, and growing antibiotic resistance, may be responsible for viral outbreaks.

I have run several of my own research & studies, and have consistently shown that tobacco plants grown in highly-bioactive organic soils do not succumb to that TMV.
Whereas tobacco plants grown in synthetic chemicals & products do succumb to it.
Which has led me to believe that a well-cared for, healthy & beneficial plant microbiome & surrounding biota are extremely effective in warding off disease.

“You are what you eat” extends across the entire food chain.

Too many people are neglecting the very things that Nature provides & that exist to help & protect us.

Penelope
Penelope
Feb 7, 2022 12:53 AM

nicotine and nicotinoid pesticides not the same.

Rhisiart Gwilym
Rhisiart Gwilym
Feb 6, 2022 8:56 AM
Reply to  Nature

Well said, Nature! Exactly so.

mgeo
mgeo
Feb 6, 2022 3:55 PM
Reply to  Nature

Cloves have the highest level of antioxidants and polyphenols.

NatureSoil Products
NatureSoil Products
Feb 6, 2022 5:10 PM
Reply to  mgeo

That’s interesting.
But just to clarify, as far as I know this is based, at least in part, on the following research:
Manuel Viuda-Martos, Yolanda Ruiz Navajas, Elena Sánchez Zapata, Juana Fernández-López y José A. Pérez-Álvarez. Antioxidant activity of essential oils of five spice plants widely used in a Mediterranean diet. Flavour and Fragrance Journal,

Which studied only a relatively small selection of plants used in the Mediterranean diet.
So it’s far from being comprehensive.

But it is also backed by research like this, which looked at 100 different foods.
But noting that research looked only at total polyphenol content (in mg), rather than quantity of diversity, and/or quality & benefit of particular polyphenols (of the 15,000 mg total polyphenol content per 100 g in cloves, 12592.93 mg come from just one polyphenol, Eugenol).

And what many research studies often don’t take into account are the environments & growing conditions of those studied plants.
There are numerous studies showing that different environments & growing conditions can vastly affect the diversity & levels of polyphenols.

So what may be true in one environment, under certain variables, may not hold true in other environments with other variables.

But it is interesting & good research nonetheless.
Appreciate the add & info.

I just encourage more people to be more thorough in their comprehension of knowledge, including the limitations of that knowledge.
And continue researching & learning.
A little knowledge can be a dangerous thing.
Thus everyone should remain mindful that what they think is true may not be true after-all, or may not be an absolute truth.

There have been over 8,000 polyphenols identified & classified.
Yet many of the best polyphenol databases have only more closely categorized & studied merely like 500 of those.

So, much more work needs to be done.

The point being, more people should engage in more research, and observation, and experimentation, and personal involvement to continue to learn, outside the oft-highly controlled narratives.

Geoff S
Geoff S
Feb 5, 2022 9:43 PM
Reply to  Penelope

the website you gave redirects to mysticalwares, who are proponents of shungite and will tell you all about Derek and his beehives, and, as luck would have it, are happy to sell you shungite in all manner of forms with various new-agey sounding descriptions for the low low price of many times its value. They also will do a video conference with you to show you how the energy colour of your body changes in real time using your own thoughts and feelings.

Colour me sceptical, but I suspect your snake oil suspicions may have been grounded in reality.

les online
les online
Feb 5, 2022 10:47 PM
Reply to  Geoff S

Nexus magazine has been a long-time promoter of shungite products. It’s latest edition (Feb-March) has a two page colour spread (p6-7). I must say “I’m thinking about it,” and it being Sunday here in Sydney, maybe it’s just the Sunday Blues i get from being a born-again non-believer. But if shungite can protect me from the death rays from 5G…
Let me put it this way – i’m more likely to fall for a snake-oil salesman’s spiel about shungite, than i would for claims about the Protective Power of ‘covid’ injections…

Kika
Kika
Feb 5, 2022 11:16 PM
Reply to  les online

Perhaps we should shun shungite. Or is it ‘shun-gate’?

If you want real protection from 5G, I recommend this fabric. It does protect from RF (radio frequencies) as I have tested it with my frequency meter. I have no interest in this company, by the way.

https://aaronia.com/shielding-materials/aaronia-shield/

les online
les online
Feb 5, 2022 11:53 PM
Reply to  Kika

I’m familiar with the product. But being a pensioner my tinfoil hat will have to protect me for now.

wardropper
wardropper
Feb 6, 2022 1:54 AM
Reply to  Kika

At those prices you damn well ought to have an interest in this company…
You’ll be rich…

Penelope
Penelope
Feb 6, 2022 4:36 AM
Reply to  Geoff S

Geoff S, thanks for spurring me to escape laziness long enough to do 5 minutes research on shungite. Search term “pubmed and shungite” yields
–antioxidant and cytotoxic effects
–EMF shielding
–used in water filtration (hi carbon content)
–fatty acid transfer between serum albumin and shungite

Now I really am too lazy to go further. Perhaps it’s just possible that this complex of minerals might be helpful to bee health? Quien sabe?