Stuff that matters to me

SHE had so much. A two-bedroom apartment. Two cars. Enough wedding china to serve two dozen people. Yet Tammy Strobel wasn’t happy. Working as a project manager with an investment management firm in Davis, Calif., and making about $40,000 a year, she was, as she put it, caught in the “work-spend treadmill.” So one day she stepped off. Read the full article here

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Interesting and inspiring article with 3 videos interviews of permaculturalist Albert Bates. Read the article here.

I have extremely fond memories of riding in Critical Mass, when on the last Friday of every month hundreds of bicyclists take over the San Francisco streets. It's exhilarating to participate, but it also has a huge impact on motorists and pedestrians. I recall once seeing a group of teenagers, who turned out to be tourists from Nebraska, talking excitedly about the river of bikes streaming past them. I slowed to a stop and explained to them what was happening, and I could see little lights go on in their eyes. They were catching a glimpse of another way to live, and I could tell they were going to take that vision home with them. So how can kids like them organize their own Critical Mass bike rides? While there is no national organization for Critical Mass -- or CM for short -- I found this very handy guide (slightly edited for Shareable.net) to starting your own: Read more here

Today, Environment Minister Jim Prentice announced that Canada would provide $400 million to developing countries to help them cope and adapt to the impacts of climate change. If this money is additional to Canada's existing aid pledges, as prescribed in the Copenhagen Accord, then it is a welcome down payment toward fulfilling Canada's responsibility to poor and vulnerable countries. Although these nations are less responsible for causing global warming than wealthy nations, they are experiencing the brunt of the harmful effects such as severe drought. However, if the government is raiding funds from official development assistance to provide this financing, then developing countries suffering under both poverty and the impacts of global warming are no better off. Read the full article here

BRUSSELS (22 June 2010) – “Governments and international agencies urgently need to boost ecological farming techniques to increase food production and save the climate,” said UN Special Rapporteur on the Right to Food, Olivier De Schutter, while presenting the findings at an international meeting on agroecology held in Brussels on 21 and 22 June. Along with 25 of the world’s most renowned experts on agroecology, the UN expert urged the international community to re-think current agricultural policies and build on the potential of agroecology. Read the article here

'Coalition of the Willing' is an animated film about an online war against global warming in a post-Copenhagen world. Click here to watch

Roofs make up 21% of the area of Toronto, so it is logical that they should be put to good use. Now they will be green; by a stunning 36-2 vote, council approved new rules that require green roofs on residential buildings next year and on industrial buildings in two years. Like most good legislation, people at both ends don't like it; Steven Peck of Green Roofs for Healthy Cities says in the Globe and Mail that "We would have liked it [the Toronto bylaw] to be more aggressive,” while the real estate industry lobby group says Cost is an issue,The market is so price-sensitive now.” Read the full article here

After founding Slow Food USA in 2000, Patrick Martins went on to cofound Heritage Foods USA, a nationwide purveyor of meat from sustainably raised, heritage-breed animals, which he continues to head. And every Sunday, he records a radio show & podcast, The Main Course, from New York City.

Knowing he's a man of strong opinions, Grist recently asked him by email for his take on some current trends in the sustainable food world.

Read the full article here

The Chief Executive Officer of insurance giants Lloyds is warning that the world is facing a “period of deep uncertainty” over the decline of fossil fuels – and may soon be coping with $200-a-barrel oil.

It may be hard to believe now, writes Dr Richard Ward in his introduction to a “stark” report just published by Lloyds and an influential UK think tank, but that’s because “the bad times have not yet hit.” He warns business managers to be ready for “dramatic changes” as oil, gas and coal supplies will soon be “less reliable and more expensive.” The world “has entered a period of deep uncertainty in how we will source energy for power, heat and mobility, and how much we will pay for it,” he states.

And that’s just CEO Ward’s introduction. The rest of the report does not disappoint.

Click here to read the full article

At a time when excessive pressures on the earth’s land and water resources are of growing concern, there is a massive new demand emerging for cropland to produce fuel for cars—one that threatens world food security. Although this situation had been developing for a few decades, it was not until Hurricane Katrina in 2005, when oil prices jumped above $60 a barrel and U.S. gasoline prices climbed to $3 a gallon, that the situation came into focus... Read the full article here

Two pieces on Arctic ice which are worth paying attention to today: 1) Via Climate Progress, Wieslaw Maslowski of the Naval Postgraduate School has presented some new research showing how autumn in the Arctic is likely to be ice-free by the end of this decade and perhaps much sooner--either option is well ahead of the 2007 IPCC report projections... Read full article here

David McKeown is out to change the way you think about food. What you eat, where it comes from, where you buy it and how you consume it. Toronto's Board of Health is unveiling a wide-ranging food strategy whose broad and lofty goals include creating "food-friendly neighbourhoods," connecting city-dwelling consumers to rural producers and eliminating hunger... Read the full article here

As oil continued to pour into the Gulf of Mexico on a recent Saturday, Jennifer Wilkerson spent three hours on the phone talking about life after petroleum... Read the full article here

Dear Umbra, This oil spill has really gotten me down. Countless millions of gallons flowing into the beautiful Gulf of Mexico and no end in sight. The leak just keeps on leaking. I hate to admit this, but I’m feeling helpless and a bit hopeless. I’m not a big oil company or the U.S. government. I’m just one person. What can I do to help? Show me the silver lining in the oil slick. Read Umbra's response here.

The first edible plant to poke its head out of the ground at my farm early this spring wasn't lettuce, arugula, broccoli, or any other hardy plant widely seen at early farmers markets. It was stinging nettles... Read the full article here.

Over on Earth Island Journal, Sena Christian has an excellent, rigorously reported article about the tough economics of urban farming. She focuses on some of the more famous city farms of the Bay Area, where EIJ is based -- City Slicker Farms, People's Grocery -- but she also discusses projects like Milwaukee's Growing Power. And she finishes the piece with a farm I'd never heard of before: Greensgrow, in Philadelphia. Read the full article here.

With the Gulf oil spill continuing unabated, powering a 21st century economy on a 19th century fossil fuel looks less and less smart by the day. Luckily, we've got other options... Read the full article here