The Wisdom of Wendell Berry

After reading two books (each by a different author) that were full of quotes from Wendell Berry's writings, I figured it was high time I investigated some of his work. It took some searching of San Jose Public Library's catalog to find the books containing the essays most frequently referenced in Shannon Hayes's Radical Homemakers, but I was able to find and check out Berry's The Gift of Good Land and Home Economics. I've already begun plowing through several essays in the former, but it was the foreword that I found especially thoughtful. In particular, the following paragraph for me summarized and underscored the primary reason our species seems to be increasingly indifferent to the plight of the natural systems that support life on our planet, despite the abundance of evidence that our current behavior is very likely to lead to the demise of more than just a few "inconsequential" species:

Soil conservation, Henry Besuden wrote nearly forty years ago, "involves the heart of the man managing the land. If he loves his soil he will save it." There are fewer hearts involved now than there were then, and more soil is being lost. Wes Jackson, writing in 1981, is forced by consideration of the increased loss to the same perception; the cause of waste is "alienation from the land": "Where there is alienation, stewardship has no chance."

Pollan Pegs It

While reading Michael Pollan's Omnivore's Dilemma, I was particularly struck by one of his keen observations on the connections between soil and food:

In many ways the mysteries of nutrition at the eating end of the food chain closely mirror the mysteries of fertility at the growing end: The two realms are like wildernesses that we keep convincing ourselves our chemistry has mapped, at least until the next level of complexity comes into view. Curiously, Justus von Liebig, the nineteenth-century German chemist with the spectacularly ironic surname, bears responsibility for science's overly reductive understanding of both ends of the food chain. It was Liebig, you'll recall who thought he had found the chemical key to human nutrition when he identified the macronutrients in food. Liebig wasn't wrong on either count, yet in both instances he made the fatal mistake we'll probably keep repeating until we develop a deeper respect for the complexity of food and soil and, perhaps, the links between the two.

The New Face of Farming

Urban agriculture has been gaining more and more attention in the past few years. And it's not surprising to me since I have believed for several years now that an urge has been welling in the hearts of urban and suburban people the world over, an overwhelming desire to reconnect with the earth and with the legacies of their ancestors. I, too, have felt this need and recently began investigating the various ways in which "average" people—those who are not celebrities nor excessively wealthy—could produce their own food while rediscovering the true meaning of community.

I have found that not only are many people exploring their agricultural roots and putting their hands in the soil, but they are doing it within city limits—and not just those out in the sticks. Folks are organizing community gardens in large cities like San Jose and Detroit.

The more research I do, the more I believe in the feasibility of my ideas. I live in Willow Glen, a well-to-do suburb of San Jose that, like many other areas of the city, has a rich agricultural history. Only recently (during the last four decades) did this area metamorphose into a yuppie nesting ground, teeming with affluent, self-centered urbanites. Many large residential properties were sold during the last ten years, and many of them are over 10,000 square feet. Some were subdivided and subsequently developed with townhouse groups or crowded detached homes. Other large properties in Willow Glen remained intact, and several—some recently sold, others in the hands of longtime owners—have large expanses of land. These enormous lots often have only small to medium-sized houses on them; the remaining space of these lots is usually just filled with unmanaged weed forests. Some people have tilled their soil and planted productive gardens, but this does not seem to represent the majority. Many of the backyards I have observed on my afternoon strolls are underutilized.

My proposal is simple. I believe these yards could be intensively farmed under the leadership of one organization. CityFarm would operate as a non-profit organization and would be run by community members from all walks of life. Landowners could choose to "donate" their land by leasing it to CityFarm, in which case they could deduct from their income taxes the amount they would have collected in rent. Alternatively, landowners could opt for crop shares as payment for use of their land.

The idea is fairly straightforward, but several considerations must be made; the general interest level of the public regarding such arrangements, zoning laws, liability and safety issues, funding sources and philosophy are all important factors that must be given serious attention. I really do think the interest is out there, but securing funding and working through liability issues could take several years.

Original Publication Date: 3-27-2005 4:45 PM PST

Lack of Affordable Arable Land Is Often Largest Hurdle for New Farmers

In this article, Julia Scott looks at how the lack of affordable land available to new farmers in California makes it extraordinarily difficult to start with little or no capital and make a living from farming in The Golden State, even for those with some farming experience.

Read the article at http://kalwnews.org/audio/2011/01/24/growing-pains-new-farmers-break-mold_807017.html.