Jeff Vail is starting his long-awaited series on the next step for our post-meltdown political economies (see ToC for full project description):

An excerpt on how this change may come about in the core country of the present system.

Jeff Vail:

“The diagonal economy might rise amidst the decline of our current system—the “Legacy System.” Using America as an example (but certainly translatable to other regions and cultures), more and more people will gradually realize that there the “plausible promise” once offered by the American nation-state is no longer plausible. A decent education and the willingness to work 40 hours a week will no longer provide the “Leave it to Beaver” quid pro quo of a comfortable suburban existence and a secure future for one’s children. As a result, our collective willingness to agree to the conditions set by this Legacy System (willing participation in the system in exchange for this once “plausible promise”) will wane. Pioneers—and this is certainly already happening—will reject these conditions in favor of a form of networked civilizational entrepreneurship. While this is initially composed of professionals, independent sales people, internet-businesses, and a few market gardeners, it will gradually transition to take on a decidedly “third world” flavor of local self-sufficiency and import-replacement (leveraging developments in distributed, open-source, and peer-to-peer manufacturing) in the face of growing ecological and resource pressures. People will, to varying degrees, recognize that they cannot rely on the cradle-to-cradle promise of lifetime employment by their nation state. Instead, they will realize that they are all entrepreneurs in at least three—and possibly many more—separate enterprises: one’s personal brand in interaction with the Legacy System (e.g. your conventional job), one’s localized self-sufficiency business (ranging from a back yard tomato plant to suburban homesteads and garage workshops), and one’s community entrepreneurship and network development.

As the constitutional basis of our already illusory Nation-State system erodes further, the focus on

#2 (localized self-sufficiency) and

#3 (community/networking) will gradually spread and increase in importance, though it may take much more than my lifetime to see them rise to general prominence in replacement of the Nation-State system. Ultimately, the conceptual “map” of the American Nation-State will re-open, and those pockets that best develop a Diagonal Economy to fill that gap will enjoy the most success in what will otherwise be a time of substantial—though I think largely subconscious—transition.”

We’re all familiar with the vast solar thermal power stations in the desert that use mirrors to make steam to drive turbines. Giant solar thermal arrays are already making electricity in the desert in Spain and California. But what if we could have just one of these units in the backyard, just for our own use?

That’s what motivated a team of MIT students to find the way to make the cheapest solar power station out there. Mass produce it for the home user and market it under their own new start up RawSolar.

Sure, it melts steel. But even more practically for the home owner, it makes steam in a flash:

Read more of this story »

“Latinamerica is particularly well equipped for these changes (peer production) by their cultural affinity with the values of P2P”, said Michel Bauwens on an interview for Pagina/12 the Argentinian journal. This statement seems to prove itself when one reads Elyssa Pachico;s article “Rural revolution in Colombia goes digital” (first published by CounterPunch, you can find it also at her site).

In poor rural Colombia, where phone lines, drinkable water and decent roads can be hard to find and where the violence that the country has faced for the last decades is tangible, a free and basic infrastructure of “Telecentros” that allows connection to the Internet has been built by the State and embraced by the communities. The Communications Ministry has been building this infrastructure for web connectivity over the past few years and by doing so, the State is embracing a new role in giving communities new means of autonomous production and participation (using Bauwens’ words in the same interview). Indeed, the latest incidents in some indigenous communities with armed actors (guerrilla, army and paramilitaries) mentioned in Pachico´s article provide evidence of the communities’ awareness of the power of the web as a tool for political organizations and citizen participation.

It is interesting to find out that the landscape her article presents is not the hightly interactive Internet we might be used to; it is the basic communication and dissemination tools (email, facebook and discussion lists) that can have a huge impact on their political situation giving social networks another dimension where citizen journalism is an important approach. According to Vilma Almendra, a web producer for indigenous organizations in Cauca interviewed by Pachico, for this communities “It’s not a question of Internet coming in and transforming us, It’s a question of us taking these technologies designed for a globalized, consumerist world and turning them into a tool that’s useful for our needs.”

Additionally, considering that connectivity is low for individuals in these communities, the traditional communication tools like radio and sound systems in public transportation are also having their own share of success. “Activists also record radio shows discussing local and international news compiled from the Internet, burn the radio programs to CDs, then distribute the disks to local bus drivers… On eight-hour chiva rides previously dominated by static-filled salsa music, passengers now listen to CD recordings recounting the recent bloody protests in Peru, water privatization battles in Mexico, illegal mining contracts in Guatemala, Evo Morales’ hunger strike – information collected online in the telecentres then disseminated throughout the region…”

I would like to end by posing the question that comes to me after reading and reflecting on Pachico’s piece: how can we read this landscape change and it’s potential improvement if we consider the increasing access to cellular phones in Colombia? This is particularly important since we know that this situation is also providing lower, more competitive fees for Internet access through mobile devices.

My feeling is that cellular phones are currently playing an important role on connecting rural people and their interests with the outside, that this importance is yet to be determined (according to a rescent report by Telefonica and Navarra university about 80% of teens have access to a mobile phone in the region) and that probably once web connection via mobile becomes widelly accesible tools that allow people to follow, spread and feed discussion lists and social networks will improve the potential communication that Pachico is currrently talking about providing real time, non jerarquical source data. Definetely this is something worth thinking of.

Spanish version here

Increasing the number of bikes on the road is becoming a serious goal for forward-thinking leaders. As Elisabeth Rosenthal recently wrote in the New York Times, there will soon be only two kinds of city leaders: those who are implementing bike amenities and bike-sharing programs, and those who plan to do so soon. But it’s about more than just announcing a mission, or even making bikes available for free. A lack of bike infrastructure plagues many cities, causing would-be cyclists to shy away from congested, potentially dangerous roads. City leaders are finding that adding bike amenities, such as sharrows, separate lanes and on-street bike parking to the streetscape works well to encourage residents to use their pedal power.

Read on to find out what some of these infrastructure improvements are, how they work, and what they mean for cyclists and drivers alike.

Separate Bike Amenities
It’s about time we recognized bicycling as a legitimate mode of transportation with dedicated bike lanes and parking. Bicyclists are hit by car drivers far too often in our cities, and local governments are starting to do something about it. In Copenhagen, for example, grade-separated bike paths make cycling safer, and in Portland, Ore., painted paths and other road coloring treatments keep cyclists visible. Scroll down to check out a variety of some of the best innovations cities are implementing to help people share the road:

On-Street Bike Parking

Street parking for bicyclists is surprisingly controversial, even though parking is a basic and essential part of personal transportation infrastructure. By giving over parking spaces traditionally reserved for one car or motorcycle, cities can provide places to park up to eight bikes. Transforming these 9′ by 18′ rectangules of urban real estate into bike parking does more than just make it easier to ride, it sends a visual message about the type of change we want to see.

Sharrows

Sometimes letting motorists know to expect cyclists on the road can be a big step toward encouraging safer driving. A 2004 study done in San Francisco revealed that the sharrow – a painted symbol indicating a shared roadway – is an effective way to shift motorists’ (as well as cyclists’) positing in the streets as to help create a safer, friendlier way to roll. Have you seen these pop up in your neighborhood?

Bike Boxes & Green Lanes

Otherwise known as “advanced stop lines,” bike boxes work under a simple concept: provide a colored “box” at the front of intersections where cyclists can wait at a red light. Cars sit behind this line, and are often times required by law to not make a right hand turn on red. These brightly colored boxes succeed in raising awareness of cyclists, and also help to eliminate potential conflicts that may arise at intersections. Read more about the bike boxes in Portland.

On a similar note, bike lanes themselves are going green — literally. Whether an entire lane is painted, or sections leading into intersections, a brightly colored patch of “green-crete” serves as a reminder to automobile drivers that a cyclist may be right alongside them.

Create Your Own Bike Lane

When your route has no sharrows, bike boxes or green lanes, LightLane can help you keep your personal space at night. With two lines of lasers projected onto the pavement just behind your bike, LightLane both makes cyclists more visible to cars, but also gives drivers a guide showing how close is too close. Finally in production, LightLane may be a lifesaver for those late nights at work and long rides home on unmarked roads. (We’re still waiting for someone to invent the DIY chalk route!)

…Or Just Ride Separately

In Copenhagen, bicycle “superhighways” run right alongside major auto-packed roads, giving commuters a healthier, safer alternative way to access the city. Worldwide, places such as Montreal, Bogota and London have long embraced and provided these lanes. As you can see from the video above, separate lanes not only increase cyclist safety, but also encourage more “reluctant cyclists” to hit the streets.

Bike Sharing

A community oriented and civilized system, bike sharing actually originated within a Dutch anarchist movement, the Provos, who painted 50 bikes white and left them for free use around Amsterdam (all 50 were stolen, and their plan to close downtown to all traffic and encourage the government to buy 200,000 white bikes fell flat). Bike sharing has taken a turn for the better since then, and bike sharing programs are wildly successful across Europe and the Americas — Paris’ Velib system has become the most iconic worldwide, but other cities have added their own: SmartBike in Washington, D.C., BIXI in Montreal, Samba in Rio de Janiero and b’easy in Santiago. Bike storage stations are placed in transit areas around cities, and for deposits, fees, or even for free, cycles can be checked out and returned for short jaunts or long treks. From the popular zip-car-esque membership community bike system to “bike libraries” where you can check out a bike for long periods of time for free, people are realizing that it is more convenient to share their wheels.

Bike Storage
Ever ride your bike up to a public bike rack that can only be easily locked to your quick-release front wheel or easy-to-remove back wheel? Seems cyclists could use a few more options. Here are a few public bike storage innovations that we think U-lock and chain lock users alike may find a little more user friendly:

Giken’s ECO-Cycle is an underground, automated parking kiosk, currently in use in Tokyo. The kiosk can lock and retrieve bikes in seconds and some installations can hold up to 9,400 bikes. See the short video to see how it works. Also see a more detailed article about the ECO-Cycle here.

Penny Farthings’ Green Pod is a great solution for building owners who want to help bikers commute to work. A single parking space can be converted into solar powered showers, lockers, changing rooms and up to 10 bike storage spots. One thought: since garage owners might hesitate to encourage non-car forms of commuting, this might be a good opportunity for a local government incentive aimed at garage operators, developers or employers.

Multi-modal Transportation

By incorporating bicycle-friendly designs within public transportation systems, cities can encourage more people to decide to beat the traffic by jumping on the light rail with their bike in tow.

By combining the best of our transit options we can be multi-modal and super-connected. Just imagine every bit of your trip to work or school being bike friendly: you bike to the light rail or bus stop nearest your house, zip downtown on public transportation, hop off and pedal the rest of the way. And maybe we even go so far as to ensure that every taxi cab has a bike rack, too!

This piece was written by Sean Conroe, Sarah Kuck and Kamal Patel

Image credits: Traffic Sign: Bfick, CC License; BCycle; Bike Rack/Light Rail: IrishFireside, CC License

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(Posted by WorldChanging Team in Features at 5:20 PM)

See larger image here.

by Clive van Heerden, August 6, 2009

Looking into the economics and politics of rising food prices and theories about impending food shortages led us to create the “food farm” to test peoples sensitivity to the issue. We wanted to develop something initially that would supplement the nutritional needs of a family living in high rise accommodation, without drawing electricity or gas.

The ‘’diagnostic kitchen’’ concept is a response to the global diet business and obsession with calories and fat free food. We responded to the “weak signal” that in the 30 years of fat-free food marketing in the US, the obesity level had soared. Creating tools that enable people to manage a healthy lifestyle based on the specific metabolic profile of individuals rather than generic standards seems essential. We also wanted to ask the question whether the kitchen, as an assembly of labour-saving devices which emerged in the 1920’s, will will be transformed into a collection of diagnostic and diet management tools in keeping with our lifestyle needs. Knowing what a food ingredient contains, where it came from and what it has been exposed to is more important than how likely it is to stick to the pan.

More from Far-future research dialogue by Philips Design here.

Go to minute 6:46 – Food For Thought part 3 – where the Home Farm is described.

And follow this link to see a video showing the day to day use of the home farming unit.

For centuries, farmers have placed trees among their crops to enhance soil health, raise marketable fruits or nuts, and protect row crops from damaging winds. Yet agroforestry, as the practice is known, is generally considered a rarity among mainstream farmers.

New data suggests that more farmers practice agroforestry than previously appreciated. Nearly half of the world’s farmlands have at least 10 percent tree cover, more than 10 million square kilometers in total, the Nairobi-based World Agroforestry Centre announced this week.

“This study offers convincing evidence that farms and forests are in no way mutually exclusive. Trees are in fact critical to agricultural production everywhere,” said Nobel Peace Prize laureate Wangari Maathai, founder of Kenya’s Green Belt Movement, in a statement [PDF]. Maathai was not involved in the study.

Agroforestry has long been promoted by sustainable agriculture advocates. The practice is now gaining increased attention for its potential to sequester large amounts of carbon dioxide.

Agroforestry systems are used for five main purposes: increase farm value by putting crops between trees; provide shelter for forest crops such as mushrooms and ginseng; form a buffer along streams and lakes to filter pollution and prevent erosion; provide shade for livestock on pasture lands; and protect sensitive plants and animals from wind. 

“If planted systematically on farms, trees could improve the resiliency of farmers by providing them with food and income,” said Tony Simons, deputy director general of the Centre. “When crops and livestock fail, trees often withstand drought conditions and allow people to hold over until the next season.”

Previous efforts to quantify the extent of agroforestry have struggled to differentiate mixed stands of trees and crops on a global scale. This study was unique, its authors said, due to the use of advanced satellite imagery that identified populated regions with arable land. In these agricultural areas, the authors assumed that existing tree cover represented a viable agroforestry system.

While more encompassing than previous agroforestry estimates, the study has its limitations. Mainly, a satellite image does not explain what farmers are actually doing on-the-ground. “We cannot expect results for an individual pixel (1 kilometer x 1 kilometer) to be close to reality,” the report said.

Due to its uncertainties, the study provided a wide estimate. Between 17 and 46 percent of all agricultural land involves agroforestry, the report said.

The study found large areas of agroforestry in South America (3.2 million squared kilometers), sub-Saharan Africa (1.9 million squared kilometers), and Southeast Asia (1.3 million squared kilometers).

The report, released at the start of this week’s World Agroforestry Congress in Kenya, comes as many agroforestry researchers and farmers are lobbying for international climate negotiators to include agroforestry in the successor agreement to the Kyoto Protocol.

Polluters in developed countries may offset their emissions by planting new trees on deforested land or in areas where trees have not naturally grown (known as reforestation and afforestation, respectively). Negotiators will decide at the climate summit in Copenhagen this December whether farmers should be compensated for practices that sequester carbon on their land, such as the use of biochar, no-till farming, and agroforestry.

“Indeed, agroforestry’s relevance to sustainable development in the 21^st century has in many ways come of age in part through the lens of climate change,” said UN Environment Programme (UNEP) Executive Director Achim Steiner, in the opening speech of the World Agroforestry Congress on Monday.

UNEP estimates that 6 gigatons of carbon dioxide equivalent could be sequestered on farmland by 2030 if agricultural practices such as agroforestry were more widely adopted. In addition to absorbing carbon dioxide from the atmosphere, some trees can also capture nitrogen and therefore reduce the need for energy-intensive nitrogen fertilizer.

Some climate experts remain dubious that land use changes should be relied upon for near-term reductions in greenhouse gases. The projects sequester carbon when plants are growing, so sudden changes, such as a fire or deforestation, would cause the project to release the carbon stored within the plants and soil. Meanwhile, the polluter who financed the offset project continues to release emissions.

Agroforestry may also not be the most cost-effective use of carbon funds. Reforestation, improved logging, and fire prevention projects may sequester more greenhouse gases at a cheaper cost, said Jack Putz, a University of Florida forest ecologist.

“It’s hard to say it’s a bad option for sequestering carbon because of the ancillary benefits. That said, an agroforest is not a forest in the sense of biological diversity,” Putz said. “Keeping forests as intact as possible is a very cost-effective way of sequestering carbon.”

In preparation for incoming carbon funds for agroforestry, the World Agroforestry Centre and UNEP are developing a standard method for measuring carbon sequestration across all landscape types.

“I suspect [agroforestry] is where a lot of the funding is going to go,” Putz said.

Read more about this in the Worldchanging archives:
Trees: The Anti-Desert
Agricultural Sustainability = Agricultural Productivity

Ben Block is a staff writer with the Worldwatch Institute. He can be reached at bblock@worldwatch.org. This article is a product of Eye on Earth, Worldwatch Institute’s online news service.

Photo credit: Flickr/treesftf, Creative Commons License.

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(Posted by Ben Block in Food and Farming at 12:34 PM)

By Peter Melchett

There really are nutritional benefits, as research to be published next year will show

Ben Goldacre says the Soil Association’s criticism of the recent Food Standards Agency research on nutrients is “not about organic food” and that “the emotive commentary in favour of organic farming bundles together diverse and legitimate concerns about unchecked capitalism in our food supply” (Bad Science: Argument is about capitalism, not food, 1 August). In fact, our argument with the FSA research is about whether it gives a fair and accurate picture of organic food.

Goldacre claims that the Soil Association put forward three “bad arguments”. If he had talked to us, he would not have misunderstood our views. First, he said we were trying to change the argument by saying that “the important issue with organic food is not personal health benefits, but rather benefit to the environment”. More farmland wildlife, high animal welfare and lower pollution were not mentioned in our own initial response, but were put forward strongly by the government when the FSA launched its report, and we repeated it as the government’s view, with which we agree.

Second, we argued that absence of pesticides, no routine use of antibiotics on farm animals and far fewer additives allowed in organic food all deliver health benefits. Goldacre says that as these “cannot be measured” by the FSA research, mentioning them “is gamesmanship”. These are real benefits, confirmed by other research. But we also answered the FSA head-on, making clear that more recent science than the FSA’s has found more beneficial nutrients in organic food.

Third, Goldacre says we wrongly said the FSA “deliberately excluded evidence”. When the FSA announced its review two years ago, we asked it to wait so it could include the results of the largest-ever research programme into organic food, funded by the EU. It refused. Goldacre claimed of the EU papers published so far, “almost all are irrelevant”. The full results of the five years of EU research, presented at a conference in April, and including a positive review of nutritional differences, will be peer-reviewed and published next spring. Goldacre would have learnt this if he had talked to the scientists involved.

There are real questions about how the FSA framed its review, and a rational explanation for it reaching different conclusions from more recent reviews. For example, the FSA study was organised in ways which introduced significant variability into the data. It included “shopping basket” studies, known to give particularly variable results for nutritional content, because they do not control for differences in growing and harvesting conditions. So although it mostly found positive differences in the nutrients it looked at in organic food, it rejected most of them as too variable to be statistically significant.

That left a small number of positive differences in nutrients which the FSA could not dismiss as statistically insignificant. The researchers simply decided, in their opinion, that the significant results were not “important”, and “no important differences” was the result they announced. That really is bad science.

Peter Melchett is policy director of the Soil Association pmelchett@soilassociation.org

This piece originally appeared in The Guardian.

Photo credit: Flickr/ILoveButter, Creative Commons License.

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(Posted by WorldChanging Team in Food and Farming at 11:55 AM)

Springwise reports on the LaidOffCamp initiative:

“Unconferences have become increasingly common over the past decade or so, notable in particular for their low-key structure and participant-driven format. LaidOffCamp is one such example, and now—inspired, in fact, by that initiative—the concept has been applied to education with the launch of (un)classes.

Aiming to provide a more casual and ad hoc way for people to learn something new during their limited free time, the (un)classes website serves as a sort of marketplace through which people interested in learning about a topic can find someone in their area with the passion to teach it. Anyone can create a new class listing on (un)classes, and anyone can sign up to be a student or a teacher. Topics tend to be lightweight and fun, offering a way to learn about things not traditionally taught elsewhere. Examples so far have included How to Create The Greatest Rock Song of All Time and How to Be a Digital Nomad—the only guidelines are that they shouldn’t be offensive or illegal.”

The official unveiling of the exquisitely designed Stroud Pound will take place on Threadneedle Street, outside the offices of the Stroud Valleys Project and opposite Stroud’s very own Old Lady (Teashop) on Saturday 12th September at 10 am. Four denominations of Stroud Pound vouchers will then be available to exchange for sterling on a 1-to-1 basis.

The notes, designed by local artist Ronan Schoemaker and produced by local currency collector Steve Charlwood, are like miniature histories of the economic and cultural life of the Five Valleys. The most prominent local celebrity to feature is Laurie Lee, author of Cider with Rosie, who was born in Stroud and is buried in the Slad Valley. Local wildlife is represented by the rare Adonis Blue butterfly found on Minchinhampton Common. Stroud’s economic heritage is commemorated by the teazle itself, while the lawnmower, invented in Stroud, the green felt cloth that is still made in the town and Thomas the Tank Engine also feature.

Events will kick off at 10am, with a short presentation by Dr Peter North of Liverpool University, an international expert on local currencies. He will describe developments from Argentina to Japan, and link them to the history of radical economics in the UK. Then Molly Scott Cato of Stroud Pound Co-operative will introduce the currency and at around 10.15 the notes will be unveiled. Stroud pounds will be available for sale from 10.30 and 100 of them will be given away to random shoppers.

The Stroud Pound is an initiative of Stroud Pound Co-op Ltd, which grew out of Transition Stroud. It aims to:

• Retain more locally created economic values within the locality and prevent
leakage into the global economy, as happens with sterling exchanges;
• Increase and sustain local economic activity and help insulate Stroud’s
economy from the worst effects of Recession;
• Increase trade and support the creation of more jobs
• Help consumers identify which businesses support the local economy.
• (Reduce the length of supply chains for local consumers;)
• Stimulate greater local production

Commentary from Sam Rose:

“Not only is urban agriculture an emerging movement for individuals, it is also being pursued as part of a sustainable urban renewal strategy throughout the midwest.

Some examples include:

• http://www.milwaukeerenaissance.com/SweetWaterFishFarming/HomePage Sweetwater organics Aquaponics fishfarming in Milwaukee WI
• self sustaining urban food production in Cleveland, Pittsburgh and Detroit  http://localfoodsystems.org/lfs-storytellers
  
• Efforts in Chicago and elsewhere http://www.organicnation.tv/videos/

The reality here is that green energy, localized specialty food production, and cradle to cradle systems for managing waste back into appropriate systems is already creating new ways to address basic survival needs for people in these regions. Open source technology and p2p money systems are coming next.

These efforts are following what myself and Paul B. Hartzog call “Transition Economics”.  If you want to really *transform* a system, you have to start out with transitions toward transformation. Complex systems theory confirms that this is true. Change starts on local levels and permeates out through networks.  A system of people and technology stuck in earlier paradigms of problem solving have too much inertia in past systems to change very fast.  However, transitional changes in problem solving helps transformation happen fast enough to accomplish change, plus creates a new inertia based around new ways of solving problems. The idea of rapid revolutions is an unrealistic projection, a product of mass culture 20th century thinking.   Transitional changes change existing systems, in place, starting with individuals and small groups who are interested in trying new things, such as new methods of energy production, etc. Food systems are a first logical system to seek interested stakeholders and work together towards transitional change.

It is important to note that actual local food systems usually encompass urban to rural areas, and that new approaches are happening in urban, suburban and rural locales.  It is also important to note that “local” in the context of humans, is dependent on what people define as “local”. Compare the state of North Dakota to the City of Chicago, for instance.

All of that being said, urban agriculture is a tremendous opportunity for decaying urban infrastructure that was originally designed and configured to support mass industrial activity. ”

A video on the vibrant locavore movement:

Details on the video:

“Path to Freedom presents ‘A Homegrown Revolution’ A collaboration of selective media clips which feature their urban homestead and farm which focus on the need of radical action — growing food in the city.

This self produced, short music video was shown at Peter Seller’s Cultural Art’s class at UCLA followed by a short presentation by urban farmer, Jules Dervaes founder of Path to Freedom. The class focus was on the art of slow food and among other guests invited were Michael Pollan, Alice Waters and Eric Schlosser.”

More Information:

Like Victory Gardens of yesteryear, start your own homegrown revolution, grow your own food in your back or front yard — for more information visit the urban homesteaders at http://www.PathtoFreedom.com

Or on their online journal at: http://www.urbanhomestead.org/journal