opening the food chain

Nokia Bonds Are Junk

Nokia’s declining fortunes lead to it’s bonds being rated as junk, after falling to No 2 mobile phone maker, behind Samsung:

S.&P. Downgrades Nokia’s Bonds to Junk - Brian X Chen via NYTimes.com

S.& P.’s announcement came as Samsung dethroned Nokia as the world’s No. 1 maker of mobile phones, which includes traditional cellphones and smartphones. Samsung sold 92 million phones over the last quarter, and Nokia sold 83 million, according to estimates by IHS iSuppli, the research firm. It is the first time since 1998 that Nokia is not the No. 1 phone maker in the world.

In the smartphone category, Nokia slips to third place behind Apple, the leader with 35 million phones shipped, and Samsung, with 32 million devices, according to iSuppli. In that category, Nokia is slipping faster than Research in Motion, the maker of the BlackBerry. The smartphone segment is the only part of the handset market that is showing any growth.

Nokia’s long-term rating was dropped to a noninvestment rating, BB+, from the investment-grade rating BBB–, with a negative outlook, S.& P. said. Its short-term rating dropped to B from A-3, S.& P. said.

Nokia has been struggling to reverse its declining fortunes with its Lumia smartphones, which include Microsoft’s newer operating system, Windows Phone 7. In the United States, AT&T and Nokia have been aggressively promoting the Lumia 900, a $100 smartphone that has been a strong seller on Amazon.com.

Trying to be the world’s leading maker of Windows mobile phones is like being the world’s tallest midget.

(via stoweboyd)

Effects of Climate Change Seen for Corn Prices - Stephanie Strom via NYTimes.com

stoweboyd:

Stephanie Strom via NYTimes.com

Researchers have found that climate change is likely to have far greater influence on the volatility of corn prices over the next three decades than factors that recently have been blamed for price swings — like oil prices, trade policies and government biofuel mandates.

The new study, published on Sunday in the journal Nature Climate Change, suggests that unless farmers develop more heat-tolerant corn varieties or gradually move corn production from the United States into Canada, frequent heat waves will cause sharp price spikes.

More critical than short-term spikes is relatively high growth rates for food stuffs across the board, and especially for building blocks like corn and soy in the industrial food chain.

How Can Paiche Be ‘New’ And ‘Prehistoric’ At The Same Time?

A ‘new’ freshwater fish is getting a buzz in South Florida, the Paiche, or arapaima, is popping up in hip restaurants and being toured as a sustainable alternative to sea bass and other fish.

Paiche is an air breathing fish, which makes it susceptible to harpooning, because they tend to remain near the water’s surface, where they hunt and emerge often to breathe with a distinctive coughing noise. I am hoping that the claims of sustainable farming are true:

Ina Paive Cordle, Seafood Sensation

A new freshwater fish has landed at select South Florida restaurants, offering diners a rewarding taste sensation and chefs a delectable and sustainable alternative to rival the popular Chilean sea bass.

The Amazone paiche (pronounced pie-ché) gives the health and environmentally conscious a farm-raised option for an endangered wild, prehistoric Peruvian fish, considered one of the largest river fish in the world.

[…]

Artisanfish is the exclusive importer for the Americas of the Amazone brand of paiche. Amazone, which is part of a privately held Peruvian business group, is the only company aqua farming the fish, free of chemicals, hormones or contaminants, and with an aim to restore the species, Burstein said.

[…]

While paiche is just making its debut on plates locally, it is already a hit in France, the biggest market so far for Amazon paiche, he said.

Restoring the species because people have been hunting it to extinction, and it has been protected by International law for 20 years. I worry that the fish becoming the new hot thing will lead to a new wave of overhunting.

de Guia: Should Every Restaurant Have A Farm? No. But, It's Not A Bad Idea.

A sensible trend: farm-to-restaurant-table, where the farm is owned by the restaurant:

Liza de Guia via HuffPo

At Egg, the word “comfort” isn’t taken lightly, and diners who want a taste of the South done authentically and simply know to come, and keep coming back here. They’ve got homemade buttermilk biscuits & gravy, heaping servings of the tastiest grits, juicy fried chicken, Carolina kale, pulled pork, hot ham, pimento cheese and, of course, eggs, lots of eggs. Up until three years ago, the restaurant worked closely with local farmers to provide the fresh produce featured on their seasonal menus. Now, they are able to provide almost all the vegetables they need for their dishes from their own 6-acre farm, Goatfell Farm, located 2.5 hours from the restaurant in upstate New York - a personal, passion project that George [Weld, owner/chef] had been thinking about for many years.

I bet we will see hundreds of farm-to-table restaurants in NYC alone, in the next few years.

More Fallout From Irene

via Facebook

No CSA distribution this Wednesday - Hurricane destroys New Paltz area farms by Bed-Stuy Farm Share on Tuesday, August 30, 2011 at 6:41pm

I am writing with some very unfortunate news from Hector Tejada, the farmer at Conuco Farm. While Hurricane Irene made its pass through NYC with little harm, it has and continues to wreak havok on the Hudson Valley. Conuco Farm, your vegetable producer for Bed-Stuy Farm Share’s Wednesday shares, is completely underwater due to flooding of the Wallkill River. It is unclear when the water will recede. We do not know the status of the produce that is underwater, but we hope that once the water goes down there will be some produce that is salvagable. That said, there will definitely be no Farm Share distribution this Wednesday, August 31st, and it is possible that there will not be farm share distribution for several weeks.

[…]

We will have a discussion with our fruit and egg farmers shortly to see if there is another way to bring their products into the city. Up to this point, Conuco Farm has graciously transported your eggs and fruit to the city each week. Considering their current situation, it is not possible to have them spend the gas money and time to transport a small delivery of fruit and eggs to us.

Thank you for your membership to this community supported agriculture (CSA) project. As you know when you signed your membership agreement, CSAs support farms for the full year. We always hope that our investment in these farms will help them have a great, bountiful year; but unfortunately sometimes Mother Nature or global warming or whatever you want to call it has a bigger impact that can be devastating. Thank you for your patience and understanding as CSA members to Conuco Farm. If you have any questions, please email bedstuycsa@gmail.com or call (646) 389-1783. We will get back to you as soon as possible.

Thanks,

Lauren Melodia, Core Member

Bed-Stuy Farm Share

People are putting the picture together of the coming Water Wars, but generally stop short of saying the obvious: world climate change has destabilized large parts of the world, principally due to drought and rising heat, and the consequent lack of water. This is the most dangerous trend on Earth, and a large minority of US politicians can’t even admit that climate change is happening. Damian Carrington, Food is the ultimate security need, new map showsA new map of food security risk around the world is, in some ways, depressingly familiar. Sub-saharan Africa leaps out as the place where the most people fear for their next meal, while the rich world has more to fear from obesity. But there’s plenty of salutary reminders and fascinating detail, like India’s food problems and the vulnerability of Spain.And it demonstrates the sickening, symbiotic relationship between lack of food and conflict: where one leads, the other follows.We must start with the worst, in the horn of Africa. In Somalia, Ethiopia and Eritrea, human failings mean a severe drought has tipped millions into famine. It’s a textbook case of why things go wrong. War begets poverty, leaving food unaffordable. Devastated infrastructure destroys both food production and the ability to truck in emergency food. The collapse of society means the effects of extreme weather such as drought cannot be dealt with. And the fear of violence turns people into refugees, leaving their livelihoods and social networks behind. If you move away from the Horn of Africa — where we can expect millions to die in the next year from famine — the really scary area is Pakistan/India/China. All three countries have serious food supply problems — in the map above red is most dangerous and green is least — and Pakistan and India are arch-enemies with decades of open conflict.India and China have fought several border wars, as well. It is almost impossible to imagine a good outcome there, where the rivers from the Himalayas cross Chinese territories, then India, then Pakistan. Three nuclear powers, with histories of conflict, requiring more water as their populations and water needs grow, and no obvious means to get more water locally. (Note: China is buying up arable land in other continents, and importing the food grown there back to China, which is one way to increase water: use water located elsewhere). The Water Wars are already here, we just haven’t started using the term, yet. Also note that very few regions are free of this danger. Notably, North America is positioned to become the breadbasket of the world, again. Although we can’t just look at that transactionally, because there is the huge externality of shipping away our water — in the form of foods — to other, drought-ridden countries. We will have to consider the full costs of shipping an apple, or a ton of wheat, to Spain or Turkey.

People are putting the picture together of the coming Water Wars, but generally stop short of saying the obvious: world climate change has destabilized large parts of the world, principally due to drought and rising heat, and the consequent lack of water. This is the most dangerous trend on Earth, and a large minority of US politicians can’t even admit that climate change is happening.

Damian Carrington, Food is the ultimate security need, new map shows

A new map of food security risk around the world is, in some ways, depressingly familiar. Sub-saharan Africa leaps out as the place where the most people fear for their next meal, while the rich world has more to fear from obesity. But there’s plenty of salutary reminders and fascinating detail, like India’s food problems and the vulnerability of Spain.

And it demonstrates the sickening, symbiotic relationship between lack of food and conflict: where one leads, the other follows.

We must start with the worst, in the horn of Africa. In Somalia, Ethiopia and Eritrea, human failings mean a severe drought has tipped millions into famine. It’s a textbook case of why things go wrong. War begets poverty, leaving food unaffordable. Devastated infrastructure destroys both food production and the ability to truck in emergency food. The collapse of society means the effects of extreme weather such as drought cannot be dealt with. And the fear of violence turns people into refugees, leaving their livelihoods and social networks behind.

If you move away from the Horn of Africa — where we can expect millions to die in the next year from famine — the really scary area is Pakistan/India/China. All three countries have serious food supply problems — in the map above red is most dangerous and green is least — and Pakistan and India are arch-enemies with decades of open conflict.India and China have fought several border wars, as well.

It is almost impossible to imagine a good outcome there, where the rivers from the Himalayas cross Chinese territories, then India, then Pakistan. Three nuclear powers, with histories of conflict, requiring more water as their populations and water needs grow, and no obvious means to get more water locally. (Note: China is buying up arable land in other continents, and importing the food grown there back to China, which is one way to increase water: use water located elsewhere).

The Water Wars are already here, we just haven’t started using the term, yet.

Also note that very few regions are free of this danger. Notably, North America is positioned to become the breadbasket of the world, again. Although we can’t just look at that transactionally, because there is the huge externality of shipping away our water — in the form of foods — to other, drought-ridden countries. We will have to consider the full costs of shipping an apple, or a ton of wheat, to Spain or Turkey.

After Irene, Upstate New York Farmers Suffer in Flood Plain - NYTimes.com

The Hudson River valley’s farmers have been hard hit by hurricane Irene, and while the level of damage is not yet fully known the impacts are going to be long-term:

Lisa Foderaro via NY Times

From the Hudson Valley to areas farther north, along the Mohawk River and Schoharie Creek, New York growers, many of whose farms have been in the family for generations, were dealt a devastating blow by the storm, which dumped heavy rain on the region. Some farmers, who were without power and hobbled by disabled equipment, were not even able to assess the full extent of the damage.

State and local officials said the storm destroyed dozens of farms and crippled many others by killing livestock, submerging crops, washing away barns and buckling nearby roads. The onslaught came at the worst possible time, with farmers in the midst of harvesting a year’s worth of labor. In some spots, orange orbs were eerily visible underwater during flyovers by state officials — a vestige of the season’s pumpkin crop.

“Clearly, it’s not good,” said Darrel J. Aubertine, the commissioner of the state’s Department of Agriculture and Markets. “I’ve been involved in agriculture my entire life, and there have been times when the weather has wreaked havoc on livestock and farms, but I don’t think I have ever seen anything on this scale here in New York.”

Representatives of farmers’ markets in New York City said that shoppers would feel the effects throughout the fall. “There will be farmers they’ve known for years who might not be bringing product,” said Michael Hurwitz, director of the greenmarket program at GrowNYC, a nonprofit group.

I can tell you that my CSA, here in Beacon NY, which is not on a floodplain, was severely battered by the heavy rains.

“

Dozens of United States diplomatic cables released in the latest WikiLeaks dump on Wednesday reveal new details of the US effort to push foreign governments to approve genetically engineered (GE) crops and promote the worldwide interests of agribusiness giants like Monsanto and DuPont.

The cables further confirm previous Truthout reports on the diplomatic pressure the US has put on Spain and France, two countries with powerful anti-GE crop movements, to speed up their biotech approval process and quell anti-GE sentiment within the European Union (EU).

Several cables describe “biotechnology outreach programs” in countries across the globe, including African, Asian and South American countries where Western biotech agriculture had yet to gain a foothold. In some cables (such as this 2010 cable from Morocco) US diplomats ask the State Department for funds to send US biotech experts and trade industry representatives to target countries for discussions with high-profile politicians and agricultural officials.

Truthout recently reported on front groups supported by the US government, philanthropic foundations and companies like Monsanto that are working to introduce pro-biotechnology policy initiatives and GE crops in developing African countries, and several cables released this week confirm that American diplomats have promoted biotech agriculture to countries like Tunisia, South Africa and Mozambique.

- Mike Ludwig, New WikiLeaks Cables Show US Diplomats Promote Genetically Engineered Crops Worldwide

The policies of the US government is one of the many reasons that changing the food system is incredibly hard.  Here, newly leaked cables show that US officials have been working on behalf of US-based agribusiness to promote genetically engineered foods.

I am not afraid of frankenfoods becuase they are genetically engineered, per se. What I oppose is the creation of foods that are tailored to work in combination with other chemicals, like Monsanto’s RoundUp, or where tailored strains are introduced under patent, so farmers cannot grow and retain seeds. An behind all the monoculturism is the loss of landraces: strains of plants that have adapted to local conditions over millenia, but do not offer the profits that genetically engineered ones do.

An Open Letter To Ken Kleinpeter, Mid-Hudson Regional Economic Development Council

I received an email from Judith LaBelle, president of Glynwood Farms:

Dear Stowe, 
 
HOW COULD NEW YORK STATE SUPPORT THE AGRICULTURAL ECONOMY OF THE MID-HUDSON REGION?

If you have specific suggestions or recommendations, now is the time to put them forward!
 
Governor Cuomo recently created ten Regional Economic Development Councils to develop plans for the use of nearly $1 billion in state funding, to be allocated in the coming years.  The first task of the councils is to develop regional plans by November 14, so time is short.

The councils will also work with the state to eliminate unnecessary barriers to economic growth and prosperity, which may include some regulations and taxes.  Priority will be given to proposals that can create jobs in each region.
 
Glynwood’s Director of Farm and Facilities, Ken Kleinpeter, has been appointed to the Mid-Hudson regional council, which includes these counties:  Dutchess, Orange, Putnam, Rockland, Sullivan, Ulster, and Westchester.  He is working with the entire Glynwood staff to develop proposals that reflect and support  the vital role that agriculture plays in the region’s economy.  
 
PLEASE SEND YOUR THOUGHTS AND SUGGESTONS BY REPLYING TO THIS EMAIL (MidHudsonAg@glynwood.org).
 
For more information on the Regional Economic Councils, go to http://nyworks.ny.gov.
 
Judith M. LaBelle
President

So I respond, here, with an open letter to Mr. Ken Kleinpeter:

Mr Kleinpeter -

The Hudson River Valley is a food shed of enormous possibility, once the breadbasket of the America colonies, and now a center for the food renaissance in the US. There are several trends that warrant research and development.

The world — and the US — is rapidly becoming more urban: 82% of Americans live in cities and suburbs as of 2008, when the worldwide rate in only 51%. But this number is likely to increase, for a wide range of reasons, most notably the efficiency and lower costs of living in urban areas. New York City, for example, consumes the least electricity per capita in the US, and has the lowest percentage of car ownership.

But urbanization poses a variety of challenges for food production and distribution. We know about the problems of food deserts — regions where no fresh foods are retailed because of economic disincentives for conventional grocery chains — and some recent initiatives (like Michelle Obama’s Healthy Food Financing Initiative) are pointing the direction that we may need to head to counter those problems.

But a greater problem remains: if our current system of food production and distribution is unsustainable, and has contributed to the dietary and nutritional problems that the US faces, what will we be facing with even higher levels of urbanization?

The Hudson River Valley presents a unique opportunity to investigate the juxtaposition of a major metropolitan hub — New York City and the surrounding urban region — with a major food shed. For the country to learn how to feed its population safely, sustainably, and locally, this combination of town and country is arguably the best place to start.

However, the small, disorganized, and largely unsupported local food community of New York State has structural impediments to rising to this challenge: economic, logistic, and regulatory barriers slow the innovation and development needed.

New York’s Regional Economic Councils could be a source of needed innovation and leadership in this movement. As just one example, consider farmer’s markets. There are more farmers’ markets than ever (over 1,000 new markets opened in the last year, nationally), but participating farmers are complaining of increasing costs from transportation, distribution and staffing at multiple markets are cutting into margins. However, communities are benefitted by more markets, shorter travel to closer markets, and longer hours. Likewise, the provisioning of local healthy food to schools, nursing homes, food pantries, and other civic organizations is a social imperative, and con’t be accomplished just by programs like the Healthy Food Financing Initiative.

A regional solution to some of these core issues — like decreasing transportation and distribution costs though farmers’ and market cooperatives, for example — is exactly the guidance and support that the State could provide. I propose that some research into these issues is essential, as more diverse sorts of foods — local meats and fish, beer, wine and other alcoholic beverages — start to produced locally, and for longer seasons, farmer’s markets will have even more challenges. But instead of a patchwork of one-off solutions, worked out market by market, a statewide sets of best practices and government supports could be developed, and ultimately set the stage for activities elsewhere across the US.

For more information on the New York State Regional Economic Development Councils, visit here. And send ideas and suggestions along to MidHudsonAg@glynwood.org, as well.