On Urban Agricultre

[JTB]

With growing food insecurity in the U.S. and the numerous concerns (http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2010/11/101130171952.htm) over Monsanto's product (http://www.disinfo.com/2011/04/scientist-warns-that-roundup-ready-gm-seeds-could-cause-crop-collapse/) and practices (not to mention the obvious concerns to be had over corporate control of the food supply (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2P1CJ7IEt0c)), it seems increasingly obvious that the people need to take the matter of food production into their own hands. As fuel costs skyrocket and the possibility that this any number of other forces could halt or severely limit the importation of food into populated areas, the concerns over pesticides and the as yet unknown long-term effects of GMOs, the clearest solution is for individuals and communities to grow hearty regional food plants in their own backyards and vacant lots.

This, of course, is not a new idea. Around the time of the Second World War 'Liberty Gardens' were considered a patriotic move towards self-reliance and even even autonomy. People were, in the time before the rise of the modern corporatocracy under which we live today, encouraged ensure they were not dependent on inter-state (let alone international) commerce, large corporations, or other outside sources for their survival. This, of course, all changed with consumerism and continued efforts among politicians and the wealthy to centralize power and control of the population at all possible levels.

But what, aside, from more diverse and dependable sources of food, are we to get from investing in urban agricultural programs in our communities? I dare say we have community itself to gain. In the modern world, the average Western worker is perhaps more alienated from himself, his labour, and his neighbors than he has been since the dawn of the industrial revolution and the rise of the bourgeoisie as the factory became part and parcel of modern life. Whether he is in retail, computer programming, or what little manufacturing remains, many are those who cannot look upon the fruits of their day's labour and feel any sense of pride any more. With the decline of private-sector unions, he finds himself alienated even from the comrades alongside whom he works. Modern pop culture encourages mindless, shallow entertainment and materialist pursuits. He is no longer a man, a worker, or even a customer, but a consumer. he is expected to swallow what the media feeds him and love it and if the pursuit of material goods (often by the use of 'credit' that can leave him and his family in debt they might never be able to pay off) does not leave him contented, he is to be given any of a number of pharmaceutical sedatives, mood stabilizers, or anti-depressants. Add to this the economic turmoil of recent years and the proletariat finds itself restless, adrift in a sea of uncertainty without meaning or purpose.

When a man labours beside another man and looks at the end of the day at a field which will come to provide the very food that will feed both of their families, they become something more than fellow-workers. Their labour is tied to their own life, to the life of their comrades, to the life of their families, and to the direct prosperity of their community. Indeed, this is not the only collective effort through which real communities are built, but it perhaps the one most necessary in light of other socio-political and economic uncertainties on the horizon. Collective urban agriculture offers us the chance to regain a sense of community, as well as to help shield ourselves from the sorts of food shocks that have recently struck other regions of the world. It is one of the first steps we can take together towards autonomy, community, and a better world for ourselves, our neighbors, and our children.

For those of you who are already involved in such projects, I ask you to share your stories- your troubles, your successes, and your advice for others. For those of us who are not yet involved or who are not as involved as we would wish, I issue a call for us to unite, to find eachother, and to reach out to others in order to begin organizing, planning, and executing this and other measures to build the new world of which we have been dreaming. Such a world will never be built from the top-down; the only systems those in power would build in such a manner are those we are all working to resist. No, a better world for the common man and the common woman can only be built from the bottom up by the very same every day folk who stand to benefit from the fruits of their collective efforts. Others in Detroit and elsewhere have shown the blueprint to be sound. Let us now come together to begin to construct the world that we desire.

[Robespierre Richard]

So is it fun or is it just hard work and relatively small yields that don't really last any reasonable amount of time?

[masty]

The solution to capitalist domination of an industry isn't to replicate that industry with unwaged labor in your backyard. I'm going to grow a garden and try to fix my car when I can but marginal urban gardening is not and can never be in any way shape or form any kind of substantial challenge to monsanto et al. At best we'll grow so much food that agribusiness will shove some kind of absurd bullshit through the state legislature like the laws in florida which flat-out ban privately owned citrus trees on individual lawns. At worst we get some nice tomatoes (which is a pleasure, definitely, but not revolutionary) and waste our time.

As for your actual post it's amazingly conservative and hippie-ish. One of the most revolting lies of localvorism or whatever it's called is that digging your hands into the soil and bringing up your own potato is somehow a more worthy form of work than whatever else people do during the day. It's so agonizingly spiritual and pointless and untrue. The fact that we in the first world can look on something as backbreaking and degrading as manual agricultural labor with anything approaching sentiment is a profound indictment of our absurd privilege. You mentioned 'alienation' but what is more 'alien' than the actual human cost and meaning of agriculture, to someone doing it in their spare time as a quaint hobby?

[Sadena Meti]

The areas that have the most food shortage problems in crisis are cities, and there is little to no greenspace there for growing crops.

[Viet Minh]

The areas that have the most food shortage problems in crisis are cities, and there is little to no greenspace there for growing crops.

There are a surprising number of rooftop gardens in New York, not only in private residences but also business properties.

[JTB]

One of the most revolting lies of localvorism or whatever it's called is that digging your hands into the soil and bringing up your own potato is somehow a more worthy form of work than whatever else people do during the day. It's so agonizingly spiritual and pointless and untrue. The fact that we in the first world can look on something as backbreaking and degrading as manual agricultural labor with anything approaching sentiment is a profound indictment of our absurd privilege. You mentioned 'alienation' but what is more 'alien' than the actual human cost and meaning of agriculture

How ironic, coming from someone whose user title declares them to be a maoist...


The areas that have the most food shortage problems in crisis are cities, and there is little to no greenspace there for growing crops.

There are yards, rooftops, parks, empty lots, large buildings not in use...

[ComradeMan]

As for your actual post it's amazingly conservative and hippie-ish. One of the most revolting lies of localvorism or whatever it's called is that digging your hands into the soil and bringing up your own potato is somehow a more worthy form of work than whatever else people do during the day. It's so agonizingly spiritual and pointless and untrue. The fact that we in the first world can look on something as backbreaking and degrading as manual agricultural labor with anything approaching sentiment is a profound indictment of our absurd privilege. You mentioned 'alienation' but what is more 'alien' than the actual human cost and meaning of agriculture, to someone doing it in their spare time as a quaint hobby?

Yeah because the Western World is just full of peasant farmers breaking their backs in the sun. The difference is that producing food is a primordial task and it strikes a chord with a lot of people.

I don't know anyone who has this contempt you are talking about to be honest....

You're talking shit.

[Sadena Meti]

There are yards, rooftops, parks, empty lots, large buildings not in use...

I have a vegetable garden about... oh... 10-15 yards on each side (square). That's a pretty large garden. It produces a lot of vegetables, plus an amazing amount of kiwis (the three vine/trees are on the outside of the garden fence (which is 8' high because of the damn deer and surrounded with rocks because of the damn rabbits)). Odd that the deer don't eat the kiwi vines... they completely destroyed the thorned raspberry bushes.

Anyway, it produces a lot of vegetables and fruit and we love them. But a few points. 1. There is no way we could survive off them, even if we do have green beans year round and more kiwis that we can do anything with (we can, jam, and eat them like mad, but we still leave plenty on the vines to freeze). 2. If you calculate the time it takes to till, plant, seed, water, weed, and fertilize, and bill that out at minimum wage, it is probably cheaper to buy them at the supermarket. You can't beat the efficiency of large scale agriculture. Hence their profit.

So that's a pretty large garden for a family of three and it's still not enough.

[TheCultofAbeLincoln]

There is more to going local than planting a garden. Buying food at farmers markets, grown locally, is a way of eating food that is not a genetically modified, corporate product.


2. If you calculate the time it takes to till, plant, seed, water, weed, and fertilize, and bill that out at minimum wage, it is probably cheaper to buy them at the supermarket. You can't beat the efficiency of large scale agriculture. Hence their profit.

When you say the efficiency of large scale agriculture, one of the things you have to take into account is that things like "minimum wage" often don't apply, even in the US where undocumented workers are given employment on a seasonal basis and paid less than a documented worker could make legally. I've read, but cannot now find, that prices of carnation flowers, for example, would balloon to a large price if it weren't for undocumented workers.


When a man labours beside another man and looks at the end of the day at a field which will come to provide the very food that will feed both of their families, they become something more than fellow-workers. Their labour is tied to their own life, to the life of their comrades, to the life of their families, and to the direct prosperity of their community.


If Tyler Durden wrote a column for adbusters, this is what it would be like lol

BTW speaking of high food prices, gacky had a vid awhile ago about how goldman sachs wqas playing the game by putting crops in the futures market and then fucking with it to raise prices. Intersting shit.

[Sadena Meti]

There is more to going local than planting a garden. Buying food at farmers markets, grown locally, is a way of eating food that is not a genetically modified, corporate product.

Genetically Modified Crops are not to be feared. We've been doing it for thousands of years through selective breeding. You'd be amazed what corn originally looked like. Maybe a dozen deformed kernels.

[ComradeMan]

Genetically Modified Crops are not to be feared. We've been doing it for thousands of years through selective breeding. You'd be amazed what corn originally looked like. Maybe a dozen deformed kernels.

Yeah, that's not quite what the deal is now though.

Leaving aside health and environmental concerns- open to debate, there's also the shitty politics behind the whole GM thing, for example the way the EU was bullied by the US about GM crops despite the fact that no one in Europe really wants them and the WikiLeaks stuff about US "retaliation". Furthermore, there is the whole issue of the intellectual property/patenting of organisms.

Transgenic crops are not the same as the human selection of crops to bring out the best features- which as you correctly state has been done for thousands of years- there is a bit more to all of this.

I for one do my best to avoid that stuff on a number of principles and I support Chavez in banning that shit from Venezuela.

Take a look here too:-
http://www.nongmoproject.org/

[Sadena Meti]

Furthermore, there is the whole issue of the intellectual property/patenting of organisms.

The history of this is quite interesting. Some biotech company whose name escapes me wanted to see if they could patent an organism. So they took a bacterium, one of the strains of E.Coli I think, and modified its genetics. The modification was pointless, it did nothing, just made it genetically different. Then they applied for a patent. They didn't get it right away, because it was the first time such a thing had been tried, but after some legal work, possibly some lawsuits, they were granted a patent on this bacterium.


Transgenic crops are not the same as the human selection of crops to bring out the best features- which as you correctly state has been done for thousands of years- there is a bit more to all of this.One could say yes, they aren't the same, they are better, because we can do it deliberately and accomplish in a year what would have taken centuries. The question is motivation, and for the most part the motivation (of the power holders) is profit. But through GM superior crops can be produced. And so long as they are not also GM'ed to be sterile (many/most are) and thus require you to purchase new seed stock every year, they can be a good thing. GM needs to go non-profit.

And the final product is physically, chemically, biologically indistinguishable from something you buy at an organic farmer's market. Except perhaps that the GM crops are bigger and plumper, if that is what they were modified for. By the way, did you know in a study in the mid 2000's, half of "organic" produce tested positive for industrial chemical pesticides?

Give me GM food. Give me irradiated food. Once you understand the science, you've got nothing to fear. Science has the answers.

[JTB]

You can't beat the efficiency of large scale agriculture.

Urban agriculture's proper role is to augment, not replace, dedicated (yet decentralized) farming and production. Nobody is denying that.

[JTB]

Genetically Modified Crops are not to be feared. We've been doing it for thousands of years through selective breeding. You'd be amazed what corn originally looked like. Maybe a dozen deformed kernels.
There's a big difference between selective breeding and genetic chimeras.

[Sadena Meti]

Chimeras. Like Mules? Should we stop breeding them? And, like most GM crops, they are sterile! What a coincidence.

[Sadena Meti]

Those against GM in general, not just crops but genetic modification in general should take a deep breath and consider this:

Insulin

Without genetic modification, there would be no insulin for diabetics. Insulin is not mined, it is not grown, it is made through genetically modified bacteria.

[TheCultofAbeLincoln]

Genetically Modified Crops are not to be feared. We've been doing it for thousands of years through selective breeding. You'd be amazed what corn originally looked like. Maybe a dozen deformed kernels.

Of course, it's amazing how small the horns of a Texas longhorn are now compared to the size of the animal.

Corporations creating crops that are invasive and the sole property of the corporation is more of what I was referencing.

I have absolutely no problem with research into GM crops, like I have no problem with research into cloning animals or perhaps even growing organs. I agree completely that anyone who opposes this should give a very good reason about why this type of study and research shouldn't go forward.

However, before the system is set up to feed people, not make money, I'm going to feel queasy about it. Especially with less than satisfactory oversight coupled with a legal system that is a joke when the battle is between the mammoth agribusiness corporations and individuals/small businesses.

[ComradeMan]

Of course, it's amazing how small the horns of a Texas longhorn are now compared to the size.

Corporations creating crops that are invasive and the sole property of the corporation is more of what I was referencing.

I have absolutely no problem with research into GM crops, like I have no problem with research into cloning animals or perhaps even growing organs. I agree completely that anyone who opposes this should give a very good reason about why this type of study and research shouldn't go forward.

However, before the system is set up to feed people, not make money, I'm going to feel queasy about it. Especially with less than satisfactory oversight coupled with a legal system that is a joke when the battle is between the mammoth agribusiness corporations and individuals/small businesses.

Exactly- see my point on GM Poll and video.

[RGacky3]

Was anyone involved in the LA urban farm story? (Its tore down now obviously, got sold by the city to a warehouse company).

[masty]

Yeah because the Western World is just full of peasant farmers breaking their backs in the sun. The difference is that producing food is a primordial task and it strikes a chord with a lot of people.

I don't know anyone who has this contempt you are talking about to be honest....

You're talking shit.
this is so garbled lmao. my entire point was that there are no peasants in the western world. thats why we can idealize agriculture. you managed to not get this somehow.

calling some tasks 'primordial' and others by implication not is purely a religious distinction, nothing to do with historical materialism or any other kind of science at all.

I have no idea what you're talking about with contempt but my post was clearly directed at the guy who made the first post.