Our highest priority is keeping our bodies healthy, and our environment clean and Life promoting. In caring for this earth by moving through this Life in an environmentally responsible manner, we ensure a future with very little disease, and a planet that can sustain Life without depleting our natural resources. Everything is already in place, as intended by the original creators, and we just need to slow down and really take a look around at how we care for our surroundings on this planet. Each of us have a profound impact on the natural world, and we must remember to walk softly and respectfully. I love this planet, and will do all in my power that I can to protect her and encourage awareness.

I ran across this very interesting article over at Organic Consumers Association, written by Ronnie Cummins and Will Allen. Please take a few moments to read, and follow the link provided at the bottom of this message to read more, and visit Organic Consumers Association to learn about ways to promote a beautiful and healthy planet Earth. We are each of us equally responsible as stewards on this planet. We do not deserve such beauty and wonders if we take no heed of the preventable damage being done to Mother Earth on a large scale.

“Climate Catastrophe: Surviving the 21st Century” written by Ronnie Cummins and Will Allen

Climate Stabilization Requires a Cultural and Political Revolution

The climate, energy, and political catastrophe we are facing is mind-boggling and frightening. Yet there is still time to save ourselves, to move beyond psychological denial, despair, or false optimism. There is still hope if we are willing to confront the hydra-headed monsters that block our path, and move ahead with a decisive plan of action. The inspirational message we need to deliver is that we’re not just talking about drastically reducing fossil fuel use and greenhouse gas (GHG) pollution, but rebuilding society, creating in effect a New Woman and a New Man for the 21st Century. What we are witnessing are the early stages of a mass grassroots consciousness-raising and taking back of power from out-of-control corporations, banks, corporate-controlled media, and politicians. This cultural and political revolution will empower us to to carry out a deep and profound retrofitting of industry, government, education, health care, housing, neighborhoods, transportation, food and farming systems, as well as our diets and lifestyles.

The scale of human and physical resources needed to turn our current suicide economy into a green economy is daunting, but absolutely necessary and achievable. The only viable roadmap for survival-an 80-90% reduction in fossil fuel use and greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions by 2050-means we must force a drastic reduction in military spending (current wars and military spending are costing us almost one trillion dollars a year). We must tax the rich and the greenhouse gas polluters, and bring our out-of-control politicians, banks, Federal Reserve System, and corporations to heel.

The good news, as Van Jones and others have pointed out, is that this 21st Century green economy will not only stabilize the climate, but enable us to retrain and reemploy the U.S. workforce, including low-income youth and 16-25 million unemployed workers, as building retrofitters, solar and wind installers, recyclers, organic gardeners, farmers, nutritionists, holistic health care providers, and other green economy workers.

Please visit –> Organic Consumers Association <-- to read more on this very important subject of our Climate and the Environment, and what we face on a Global level today.

I am always a bit wary when I hear of new moves to create a supposed act of safety in regards to food regulations. Usually this is an action designed to lull people into believing a real solution to a problem is being implemented, when in reality those in power have no true wish to solve the probem in the first place. Controlling powers know exactly what they are doing through the current lack of consumer safety, yet most people simply are not aware of the true agenda therein.

I will, however, pass along an article written by Alexis Baden-Mayer Organic Consumers Association, June 23, 2009 relating to OCA’s position on the New House Food Safety Bill, for those interested in their take on the matter…

Straight to the Source

There’s been a lot of buzz on the web about the new Food Safety Enhancement Act of 2009 (HR 2749). Many of our supporters have called or emailed us to find our stance on the issue.

Although the Organic Consumers Association is fairly satisfied that the bill is intended to protect organic farmers from being negatively impacted by new food safety regulations (Sec. 419A directs the USDA to “take into consideration, consistent with ensuring enforceable public health protection, the impact on small-scale and diversified farms, and on wildlife habitat, conservation practices, watershed-protection efforts, and organic production methods”), unfortunately the bill does not address the underlying causes of America’s persistent and evermore serious food safety crisis: factory farms and chemical-intensive agriculture. When addressing the concerns of E.coli or salmonella, the bill focuses on fresh vegetables and fruits rather than CAFOs or intensive confinement factory farms, in effect treating the symptom and not the disease.

A close look at the nation’s food poisoning epidemics over the past decade reveal that the overwhelming majority of fruit and vegetable contamination incidents are a direct result of water and soil pollution from large factory farms. The OCA believes that HR 2749 should be amended to address factory farming:

1. Animals should never be fed blood, manure or slaughterhouse waste.

2. Cows need to eat grass.

3. Animals need to be spread out on enough land to absorb their waste.

4. CAFOs (Confined Animal Feeding Operations) pose unacceptable risks to human health, such as antibiotic resistance, incubate dangerous viruses and pathogens, such as the Swine Flu and Bird Flu, contaminate the environment, institutionalize animal cruelty, and need to be phased out and shut down.

In addition, we share the concerns of the Farm-to-Consumer Legal Defense Fund and support the amendments suggested by the Maine Organic Farmers And Gardeners Association. We also agree with the Wild Farm Alliance, especially their position paper, Food Safety Requires a Healthy Environment: Policy Recommendations for E. coli O157.

The dangers to food safety of factory farms, also known as Confined Animal Feeding Operations, are well documented by the Pew Commission on Industrial Farm Animal Production, the Union of Concerned Scientists, the National Resources Defense Council and Food & Water Watch.

In addition to factory farm runoff, vegetables can also become contaminated is through the use of untreated animal manure or biosolids (the fertilizer industry’s name for sewage sludge/human waste). Organic regulations ban sewage sludge and have rules for the use of manure that prevent contamination.

Certified organic farmers must maintain a farm plan detailing the methods used to build soil fertility, including the application of manure. Organic rules require raw animal manure to be composted if it is to be applied to land used for a crop intended for human consumption. Well-composted manure reduces the incidence of E. coli. Manure must be applied to the land at least 120 days prior to harvest if the edible part crops come in contact with soil, and at least 90 days prior to harvest of edible parts that do not come into contact with soil. Longer periods can be required by certifiers if soil or other conditions warrant. No other agricultural regulation in the United States imposes such strict control on the use of manure.

For more information on this and other important Organic News you may wish to visit Organic Consumer’s Association.

If you are a farmer, or know a farmer who needs assistance in converting to organic farming, there is a very short window of opportunity to do so now, for 3 weeks during the Month of May 2009. Many people worked very hard to get this farm bill on the table, so be sure to get the word out and take advantage of this while you can!

Washington, D.C. May 5, 2009 – USDA today announced a special three- week sign-up for farmers in the process of converting to organic farming to receive technical and financial assistance through the Environmental Quality Incentives Program (EQIP), a move applauded by the National Sustainable Agriculture Coalition and its grassroots member organizations across the country.

“This was a was a wrong that needed righting, and with today’s announcement USDA is not only setting it right, but doing so in an innovative and farmer-friendly manner,” said Aimee Witteman, NSAC Executive Director. “We thank NRCS and USDA leadership for listening to the concerns of organic farmers and applaud their new initiative.”

For more details on how to sign up between May 11th and May 29th, please visit Organic Consumers Association to get the whole scoop. It is important to pass this information along to your networks as quickly as possible to beat the deadline. This is good news for Organic Farmers!

You may wish to visit ATTRA – National Sustainable Information Service: Agricultural and Organic Farming News to get the latest information as well.