Danielle Nierenberg
The Institute for Food and Development Policy, a nonprofit known as Food First, released a new book entitled Fertile Ground: Scaling Agroecology from the Ground Up, edited by Groundswell International Executive Director and co-founder Steve Brescia.Fertile Ground presents nine innovative case studies authored by agroecologists from Africa, Latin America, the Caribbean, North America, and Europe to make a case for promoting the use of agroecology worldwide.
“There are about 2.5 billion people in the world, on 500 million farms, involved with smallholder family agriculture and food production. Their creative capacity to farm productively and sustainably with nature, instead of against it, is perhaps the most powerful force that can be unleashed to overcome the interlinking challenges of hunger, poverty, climate change, and environmental degradation,” says Brescia. “This is the essence of agroecology.”
Many see agroecology, or the study of ecological processes applied to agricultural production systems, as a viable option for long-term sustainability of the food system. The practice is able to conserve water and soil while promoting biodiversity. According to Brescia, the use of agroecology by millions of family farmers has begun to carry influence on agricultural policy, rural program development, and climate adaption strategies.
Currently, this technique is most frequently passed on through farmer-to-farmer promotion. Fertile Ground addresses how to strengthen and spread agroecology to make it the norm for agriculture worldwide.
Food First is offering a 20-percent discount on Fertile Ground for the Food Tank network—use discount code: foodtankfg.
(Danielle Nierenberg, President, Food Tank <danielle@foodtank.com>)
