At some point last month, Ford announced that the Fusion Hybrid would cost slightly more than Toyota’s Camry. Ford hopes that its hybrid version of the Fusion (which is projected to get better gas mileage than the Prius) will be able to start taking away some of the Camry’s annual sales.
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We’ve Junked Up Parts of Earth – Space, Here We Come!
The folks over at FOXNews.com posted an interesting article the other day talking about space junk – the stuff that orbits our planet that has no use or is literally garbage. If you click on the link above to that article you’ll see an artist’s rendition of how much stuff is floating around in the atmosphere.
This article coincides with a special report that I just finished reading from The Economist talking about garbage and how to cleanup the garbage on the planet. The main lesson to learn from all of this is that everyone needs to be more aware of what they are throwing out and, to a greater degree, where their garbage is going. In other words, if you choose to throw a can, plastic bag, or piece of cardboard in the garbage as opposed to recycling it, that singular act alone is not enough to put us in a bad situation. One person, one can – we have enough room for that in our landfills. But what happens when all 25,000 people in your town do the same thing…or all 5 million people in your state? What if all 300 million people in America toss out one can per week? What about two cans? How many sodas or beers or other canned/bottled beverages do you have in a week?
The picture becomes a little bit clearer, I hope.
However, it is amazing that we are creating such a vast amount of “space junk” in the higher and lower atmospheres. And this isn’t stuff just floating around out there; this is stuff that is going at a few thousand miles per hour! Imagine being on a spaceship and all of the bravery that shooting up into the atmosphere takes, but then getting up there and having a stray nut or bolt (or an entire dead satellite) smash into your spaceship at two thousand miles per hour. Unreal.
This is an issue that someone really needs to get on top of – space needs to be cleaned up.
California Congressman Speaks on Organic Foods
While browsing around the New York Times website I came across an interview posted on one of their internal blogs. The interview was with Representative Sam Farr from California’s 17th district. Representative Farr is one of the leaders of a bipartisan caucus in the Congress that focuses on organic agriculture. I thought I’d share some pieces of that interview here for your reading enjoyment.
Question: What needs to be done to ensure our food is safe?
Answer: Food safety has to go back to the field. [Read the full interview for more on this answer]
Question: How significant is it that there is now a vegetable garden on the White House lawn, the first since World War II?
Answer: I think it’s incredible. If there was a statement about values and priorities, it’s that vegetable garden at the White House. In politics, we learn that you ought to practice what you speak. I think for the Obamas, it shows their sincerity to the issues around food. And what a great demonstration, particularly for children, to eat fresh fruits and vegetables out of their own gardens.
Again, nothing major or groundbreaking coming out of this interview, but it’s nice to see that one of the newspapers with the widest readership in the United States has, at least on their website, an area dedicated to talking about one of the most overlooked pieces of creating a new, healthy agricultural system in America. There are so many health problems that can be traced back, in part, to the unhealthy diets of Americans or at least to the core difference in the types of “food products” that we are consuming today versus what our ancestors (even as recent as a few decades ago) consumed.
I hope that more organic agriculture discussions pop up in the mainstream media because, as Representative Farr suggests, food safety (and growing “real foods”) has to go back to the field.
President Obama To Make Food Safety A Priority
President Obama has taken up the mantle on food safety. In his latest radio address to the nation, Obama said, “In the end, food safety is something I take seriously, not just as your president, but as a parent.” Let’s hope so. In yesterday’s post I included a link to one of my previous book reviews on “In Defense of Food” by Michael Pollan. In the book, Pollan talks about how the nature of “food” in America has changed to the point where you can go to the store and buy a block of cheese that is actually imitation cheese. In other words – cheese that is not really cheese!
Thirty-five years ago, the F.D.A. did annual inspections of about half of the nation’s food-processing facilities. Last year, the agency inspected just 7,000 of the nearly 150,000 domestic food facilities, and its oversight of foreign plants, which provide a growing share of the nation’s food supply, is even more spotty.
Experts have long debated whether the F.D.A. should increase inspections or rely instead on private auditors and more detailed safety rules. By calling the limited number of government inspections an “unacceptable” public health hazard, Mr. Obama came down squarely on the side of increased government inspections.
These pieces of information – garnered from a recent New York Times article – show just how low America’s food safety standards have become. We’ve gone from inspecting 50% of the nation’s food processing facilities to inspecting just 4.6%. Come on. That’s clearly not acceptable by any stretch of the imagination.
And what do you get from this type of lackadaisical approach to food safety? Well, for one, you get the gigantic peanut recall that the country is now experiencing. The New York Times article also commented that some, “76 million people in the United States are sickened by contaminated food, hundreds of thousands are hospitalized and about 5,000 die.” That’s no joke. Hey – I was one of the people who got food poisoning over the last year, too.
I hope that President Obama radically alters our current food safety system. If you’re interested in getting better quality food as a government mandate, think about sending your own message to President Obama</a> on this topic.
Joining a CSA Farm for the Coming Season
Last October I reviewed a book called “In Defense of Food” by Michael Pollan. This book had a lot of great information and I highly recommend it to everyone reading. One of the pieces of information that I pulled out of the book and included in my review was the community supported agriculture concept. This is what I wrote back in October:
Another thing that I picked up from reading this book was the existence of community supported agriculture (CSA). With CSA, a consumer pays a set dollar amount to buy a “share” in the farm’s produce; their share comes in the form of a weekly or monthly box of produce that are grown at the farm. This is a good idea for a variety of reasons including the freshness of the items, supporting the local economy, and creating a sustainable method of getting food on your plate.
Pretty interesting, huh? Well, I’ve kept this idea in my head for the last few months and this past weekend I joined the Merrick Farm CSA program in Farmingdale, NJ by purchasing a half share for the coming season. The half share costs $375 (which I’ll split 50/50 with one of my roommates) and entitles me to a weekly box of vegetables, herbs, some fruits, and other 100% certified organic offerings grown at the farm, which is about fifteen minutes from my house. The length of time that the share is active runs from the first week of June through the last week of October – 22 weeks in total. The weekly cost of the share is about $17 ($8.50 per week once I split it with my roommate). There’s no way I’d be able to get a box of organic vegetables each week and spend only $8.50! Plus, the farmer suggested that we might be able to begin getting some produce earlier than the first week of June, but it’s a long shot.
I’m hoping that this turns out to be a good deal. I did some preliminary research on the farm everyone has good things to say about it. During my visit this past Saturday I liked what I saw and I was very happy with the information that I received. More on my involvement in the CSA program as it comes…
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