Right around the time a barrel of oil was around $150 USD I stumbled upon an article from an "expert" saying that the solution to resolve hunger was to give more money to poor countries in order to buy more tractors and more agrochemicals! So wrong! Then a thought popped into mind: " Do something! No matter what! Anything is better than nothing! ". Mission: increasing awareness of hydroponics and aquaponics as key tools in fighting hunger around the world.
Roger Pilon, Editor
Hello everyone! How I got into hydroponics is a long story...let's just say that it involves a lot of tedious farm work as a child, unsuccessful 'dirt' gardens of my own and a near electrocution from a semi-submersible hydroponic pump. I've learned that hydroponic gardening is the only way to garden for me and I've been working at it for several years now. I've built ebb/flow, nft, Mittleider, wick and passive systems and I'm always on the lookout for the easiest and most efficient means of hydroponic gardening...If you have questions, I would be more than happy to answer them...
Small and medium agriculture builds community. Consider: community gardens and farmers markets.
Urban agriculture requires permanent and temporary space where we live. Consider: Temporary may be 'raised bed' and 'hoop house'.
In many cities world-wide we urban agriculture practitioners and advocates should be working to assure that public lands/properties are assigned to agriculture to serve community needs; social, environmental and economic.
Consider:
Parks, schools, playgrounds libraries, hospitals, fire and police stations, street and roadsides, power/electric and other utility rights-of-way, idle/vacant land and roof-wall-fence [RWF] .
In the urban 21st century we need local government policies, plans, strategies and programs to convert these spaces-places-land into a productive edible urban landscape and green infrastructure. The action is up to communities, with professional support.
We advocates need to put the tools into community activists hands/portfolios. We need to pull up historic and modern best practice and be able to recite and quantify the benefits in terms of building community.
We have such an organization here in the United States Capitol, with 40 NGO & corporate endorsers, to serve as a starting step. There must be a hundred more.
Empower DC', an NGO, launched "The Peoples Property Campaign" in 2005. It is advocating that public properties be kept public and used to serve communities.
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