iEat Green – Denise O’Brien – 06.09.16

Denise O’Brien is a farmer and community organizer from Atlantic, Iowa. She has farmed with her husband, Larry Harris, for 40 years. She maintains sixteen acres of organic fruit and vegetable production incorporating high tunnel production. O’Brien also raises turkeys and chickens for meat and egg production. Denise mentors many women who are the next generation of farmers.

Through farming, Denise has had numerous opportunities to work within the agricultural community working on policy development on the state, national and international level and becoming involved in the community of women in agriculture, organic production, local food systems and conservation issues.

Denise has been involved in her community as well as in the agricultural sector. She is the founder of Women Food and Agriculture Network. O’Brien was a Food and Society Fellow, a W.K. Kellogg funded program from 2001 to 2003. She currently serves on the board of the Pest Action Network and the Sustainable Iowa Land Trust. In 2012 O’Brien completed a year assignment with the United States Department of Agriculture as an Agriculture Adviser in Afghanistan.

Baba Ghannouj 3 lg Eggplants, roasted, 1 cup Tahini 2/3 cup lemon juice 2 Tbs. chopped garlic 1 Tbs. cumin 1 ½ t. salt ¼ t. pepper ¼ cup chopped Parsley In a food processor, pulse eggplant until blended. Add remaining ingredients and process until smooth. Add water, and puree until desired consistency.Adjust seasonings for taste. *Garnish with Olive Oil, pine nuts and parsley or pomegranate

iEat Green – Michael Phillips – 06.02.16

Michael Phillips is a farmer, writer, carpenter, orchard consultant, and speaker who lives with his wife, Nancy, and daughter, Grace, on Heartsong Farm in northern New Hampshire, where they grow apples and a variety of medicinal herbs. Michael authored The Apple Grower and teamed up with Nancy to write The Herbalist’s Way. His Lost Nation Orchard is part of a diversified mountain farm in northern New Hampshire, and he also leads the community orchard movement at www.GrowOrganicApples.com. – See more at: Chelsea Green Publishing

Leah Penniman – After a Century In Decline, Black Farmers Are Back And On the Rise

A few years ago, while clearing dried broccoli stalks from the tired soil of our land at Soul Fire Farm in upstate New York, I received a cold call from Boston. On the other end was a Black woman, unknown to me, who wanted to share her story of trying to make it as a farmer. Through tears, she explained …

Jill Richardson – Don’t Let Them Blind You with Their Science

When I first began researching agriculture, I had no idea how organic farming worked. I saw it as a somewhat backward yet non-toxic and desirable way to grow food. Organic farmers didn’t use fertilizer, I figured, so maybe the plants would be smaller. And they didn’t use pesticides, so I’d have to settle for some damage to my food — …

Interview with Lucy Marston, Field Vegetable and CSA Manager at Hawthorne Valley Farm – 10.22.15

Lucy Marston is the Field Vegetable and CSA Manager at Hawthorne Valley Farm – a 400-acre certified biodynamic farm in the Hudson Valley. She grows for a 300 member CSA, on site farm store and 5 weekly farmers markets in NYC. Lucy came to Hawthorne Valley Farm as an apprentice looking to learn how to farm and then moved up to manage their production vegetable operation, which she has been doing for the past 3 seasons. Before coming to production farming she worked in farm-based education in Connecticut and California.

Interview with Elizabeth Henderson – Author, Sharing the Harvest: A Citizen’s Guide to Community Supported Agriculture – 08.20.15

Elizabeth Henderson farmed at Peacework Farm in Wayne County, New York, producing organically grown vegetables for the fresh market for over 30 years. She is a member of the Board of Directors of the Northeast Organic Farming Association of New York (NOFA-NY), co-chairs the Policy Committee, and represents the NOFA Interstate Council on the Board of the Agricultural Justice Project. For 20 years, from 1993 – 2013, she chaired the Agricultural Development Board in Wayne County and took an active role in creating the Farming and Farmland Protection Plan for the county. In 2001, the organic industry honored her with one of the first “Spirit of Organic awards, in 2007, Abundance Co-op honored her with the “Cooperating for Communities” award and in 2009 NOFA-NY honored her with a Lifetime Achievement Award and then a Golden Carrot in 2013. In 2014 Eco-Farm presented her with their “Advocate of Social Justice Award, the Justie.” Her writings on organic agriculture appear in The Natural Farmer and other publications, and she is the lead author of Sharing the Harvest: A Citizen’s Guide to Community Supported Agriculture (Chelsea Green, 2007). She also wrote A Food Book for a Sustainable Harvest for the members of Peacework Organic Community Supported Agriculture (aka GVOCSA) in its twenty seventh year in 2015.

Organic industry in shock as Whole Foods pushes new rating system that promotes chemical agriculture as better than organic by J. D. Heyes

For some time, food chain Whole Foods Market and organic farmers have had a cooperative, mutual relationship. The retail grocer has enabled organic farmers to gain a sizable foothold in the food market at a time when Americans’ passion for healthier alternatives to the GMO-laden, processed foods market is rising. As The New York Times reported, Whole Foods’ stores were more like …

Organic farming thrives in India as growers revert back to traditional methods by Julie Wilson

Thousands of farmers throughout India are reverting back to traditional farming methods as the consequences of Western agriculture have begun to negatively impact the region’s food and water supply, and the health of its people. More than 40 years after the “Green Revolution,” a period in which India’s agricultural yields skyrocketed following the introduction of commercial farming techniques, growers are …

Food Stamps Are Worth Double at These Michigan Farmers Markets—Helping Families and Local Businesses – Araz Hachadourian

Vicki Zilke is a farmer in Ypsilanti, Mich., population 20,000, where more than a quarter of residents live below the poverty line. Every week, she sells her vegetables at Downtown Ypsilanti Farmers Market, one of two in the city. Nearly 40 percent of the shoppers at both hubs are on some form of food assistance funding from the government. The …

Choosing Life – Chris Hedges

The affable, soft-spoken dairy farmer stood outside his 70-stall milking barn on his 230-acre family farm. When his father started farming there in 1950 were about 800 dairy farms in New York state’s Orange County. Only 39 survive. Small, traditional farms have been driven out of business by rising real estate prices, genetic manipulation of cows, industrial-scale hormone use that …