Category Archives: Uncategorized

British woman gears up to row across Pacific

British woman gears up to row across Pacific.

Wow!

Briton Sarah Outen is no stranger to adventure, but when she rows out from a small port in Japan this week she will be on her own — all the way until she reaches Canada.

Outen’s solo voyage across the Pacific, in a rowboat packed with the latest gadgetry, is probably the most challenging leg in her ambitious project to circle the globe by boat and bike.

“The distance is really huge,” the 26-year-old adventurer, who became the first woman to row solo across the Indian Ocean in 2009.

Outen left Britain on April 1 last year on a 30-month expedition under the title London2London: Via the World, which saw her kayak to Europe, cycle across Eurasia then get back in her kayak to Japan.

Afghan Women’s Writing Project | The Lovely Province

Afghan Women’s Writing Project | The Lovely Province.

arah is a special place for me—
a small and lovely city with kind, helpful people.
There is no electricity, but there is love.
There is no security, but the people are brave partners.
There is no government faculty, but there are hard-working students.
People make friendships on dusty dirt roads,
Delicious fruits grow in green villages,
With their pleasing smell.
Women stay home
And become good mothers,
Who are rich in kindness with big hearts.
Farah — Farah — Farah
My heart is in Farah.

By Leeda

In Time of Drought, Mexico’s Tarahumara Turn to Tradition – NAM

In Time of Drought, Mexico’s Tarahumara Turn to Tradition – NAM.

“Córima.” 

For the more than sixty thousand Tarahumara Indians living in the high Sierra’s of northern Mexico, the expression connotes sharing, a tradition borne more of necessity than charity. It is also a subtle reminder of the ongoing drought that is proving to be one of Mexico’s worst dry seasons in recent memory.

In Tarahumara society, those who have must share with those who do not. Far from humiliating, roaming the streets of the Chabochis — non-Indian mestizos living in the towns and cities below — asking for a few coins to ease their hunger is a natural tendency that has ensured centuries of survival in this unforgiving terrain.

But times are harder now.

As years have passed without substantial rain, even those who once smiled at Tarahumara children requesting córima outside convenience stores across Chihuahua are now clinching on to their coins more tightly, less willing to share.

“We fear the worst is yet to come,” says Antonio Rodriguez Quinones, chief of staff for Carichi’s municipal administration. “If we don’t get enough water this rainy season, next winter is going to be an uphill battle in terms of feeding these people.”

The city is working with the non-profit Angeles del Desierto – which normally focuses on locating would-be migrants to the U.S. who become lost in the California-Arizona desert – to deliver some 12 tons of winter clothing, food and water to the Tarahumara.

Indonesian Farmers Burned in Biofuel Drive – IPS ipsnews.net

Indonesian Farmers Burned in Biofuel Drive – IPS ipsnews.net.

“None of these promises were fulfilled, with investors offering to pay between 11-17 cents only for a kilogramme of jatropha beans,” said Muslikin. 

Depending on the type of seedling and soil, one hectare of jatropha can produce up to 3000 kilogrammes of jatropha beans annually so that, with a price of 67 cents per kilogramme, Muslikin would have earned 4,000 dollars annually, compared to the 2,778 dollars he earns per year cultivating rice. 

To repay his outstanding loan of 1,889 dollars, Muslikin sells rice harvested from his plot, putting a strain on his household income. “I used to buy new clothes and shoes for my children twice a year and eat meat almost everyday. Now, I buy them new clothes and shoes once a year only and eat meat just on Saturdays and Sundays,” he said. 

Failed national plan 

Muslikin was one of tens of thousands, or perhaps hundreds of thousands, of farmers who heeded government appeals to plant jatropha curcas as Indonesia – an oil-producing country that has now become a net oil importer – sought to reduce dependence on fossil fuel, whose price has been rising steadily since 2005. 

Watertown Daily Times | Farmers, legislators decry bill preventing teens from working on farms

Watertown Daily Times | Farmers, legislators decry bill preventing teens from working on farms.

I support laws that protect children from abuse while  working but parents, grand-parents, aunt and uncles ought to be able to teach their children farming. There are already laws to protect the children from abuse and not taking care of their well being. “Ronald F. Porter, co-owner of Porterdale Farms in Adams Center, plans to hire his 12-year-old son, Andrew W., to work on the family’s 5,000-acre dairy farm when he’s 14, teaching him basic skills in farming and machinery.”

National Fish and Wildlife Foundation | Native Plant Conservation Initiative

National Fish and Wildlife Foundation | Native Plant Conservation Initiative.

The National Fish and Wildlife Foundation (NFWF) is soliciting proposals for the 2011 Native Plant Conservation Initiative (NPCI) grants cycle. The NPCI grant program is conducted in cooperation with the Plant Conservation Alliance (PCA), a partnership between the Foundation, ten federal agencies, and more than 270 non-governmental organizations. PCA provides a framework and strategy for linking resources and expertise in developing a coordinated national approach to the conservation of native plants.  Since 1995, the NPCI grant program has funded multi-stakeholder projects that focus on the conservation of native plants and pollinators under any of the following 6 focal areas: conservation, education, restoration, research, sustainability, and data linkages.

Pre-Proposal Deadline: May 25th, 2012

Project selection criteria
Proposals must meet the minimum eligibility requirements, as described in the request for proposals. There is a strong preference for “on-the-ground” projects that provide plant conservation benefit according to the priorities established by one or more of the funding federal agencies and to the Plant Conservation Alliance strategies for plant conservation.

Urban farming trend growing in Metro Atlanta | Public Broadcasting Atlanta

Urban farming trend growing in Metro Atlanta | Public Broadcasting Atlanta.

The Burundi Women’s Farm initiative creates agricultural and economic opportunities for refugees who were forced to flee their homes due to war, genocide and persecution.

In Burundi, these women traditionally grew the food for their households.  And now they’re able to do so here.

With what they produce they can feed their families and sell the excess fruits of their labor in neighborhood farmers markets.

“The Burundi Women’s Farm gives the women an opportunity to truly become self-sufficient in a lot of different ways. In part they can grow and sell food for supplemental income,” Pavli continues “but it also provides opportunity to practice English, they work alongside American volunteers and they’re out at the market with Americans, so they’re learning the basics of American business skills.”

Bad Bug Book 2nd Edition

Bad Bug Book 2nd EditionThe second edition of the Bad Bug Book, published by the Center for Food Safety and Applied Nutrition, of the Food and Drug Administration (FDA), U.S. Department of Health and Human Services, provides current information about the major known agents that cause foodborne illness. The information provided in this handbook is abbreviated and general in nature, and is intended for practical use. It is not intended to be a comprehensive scientific or clinical reference. Each chapter in this book is about a pathogen – a bacterium, virus, or parasite – or a natural toxin that can contaminate food and cause illness. The book contains scientific and technical information about the major pathogens that cause these kinds of illnesses. A separate “consumer box” in each chapter provides non-technical information, in everyday language. The boxes describe plainly what can make you sick and, more important, how to prevent it.

IRIN Africa | MALI: Beyond the drought – “Families will disappear” | Mali | Food Security | Governance | Migration | Natural Disasters | Sahel Crisis | Security | Water & Sanitation

IRIN Africa | MALI: Beyond the drought – “Families will disappear” | Mali | Food Security | Governance | Migration | Natural Disasters | Sahel Crisis | Security | Water & Sanitation.

“It was the drought that made people move away from here,” Ousmane Touré said in Kayes, 450km northwest of Bamako, the capital of Mali, and a 10-hour bus ride across the scorched scrubland of the western Sahel. “There had been a tradition of emigration, but it was when the harvests failed in the 1970s that we saw a real surge in emigration. There was simply not enough to eat, so people took off for France, Germany and the United States. They knew it was only the way of feeding their families back home in Kayes. The same thing is happening this year.”