Skip Navigation | Sheffield IMC | UK IMC | Editorial Guidelines | Mission Statement | About Us | Contact | Help | Support Us

UK Indymedia UK Indymedia Sheffield Indymedia Sheffield Indymedia

UG#633 - Putting The 'Mental' Back in Environmental (Food Waste & FMNR In Niger)

Robin Upton | 05.05.2013 02:11 | Analysis | Ecology | Social Struggles | Sheffield | World

Is planet earth facing a food crisis? Are there too many people here? Can humanity afford to tackle desertification in the Sahel? Filmmaker Mike Freedman, food activist Tristram Stuart, author Ronald Wright and finally permaculturist and aid worker Tony Rinaudo all contribute their voices to this week's challenge to simplistic and reductionist thinking on such matters.

ug633-hour1mix.mp3 - mp3 27M

ug633-hour2mix.mp3 - mp3 27M


We start the show with a Radio Ecoshock interview of film maker Mike Freedman who made a film on the question of population, the narrative structure of which was provided by the influential experiments of John Calhoun on how the behavior of rats changes as their population density increases. Freedman notes that while he believes that Calhoun only ever intended his studies to serve as a metaphor, they have been used as an animal model of societal collapse.

"The environmental movement has traditionally emphasized kind of the accounting tools of sustainability, how much water use, how much pollution, how much food do we need. But... we need to put the 'mental' back in environmental. Humans have deeper needs and a more meaningful purpose in life than merely finding enough rice to eat for the day and having enough water. And so we shouldn't simply think about the bare bones of supply and survival. We need to think about what it will mean to ensure that every person born on this beautiful planet of our has a full meaningful life. That's the real challenge - whether population is going up, whether it's stabilizing or whether its declining - is being willing to reassess and reorganize all of our assumptions, all of our algorithms and spreadsheets, all of our models for planning and molding society, based purely on the quality of life experience for every person alive." — Mike Freedman, 2012

Next we hear from Tristram Stuart about how he got interested in the topic of food waste, and his efforts to raise awareness of the problem, and to tackle hunger and waste directly by matching up surplus food with hungry people using a time honoured gift economy model (the 'Feeding the 5000' events).

Then it's the turn of Ronald Wright, interviewed from the Extra Environmentalist podcast, on the topic of societal collapse. He draws parallels with former societies which collapsed and warns us away from an excess of technology.

We conclude with the remarkable testimony of Tony Rinaudo about how a simple technique with a $2 pocket knife has allowed millions of trees to regrow and the desert to be rolled back in the inhospitable terrain of Niger. As he explains, some of the stiffest opposition he faced as aid agencies and others keen on 'development' who were looking for a more complex solution than the one he came up with.

"All life and sustenance come from the soil. If we treat the soil with respect, we go a long way towards creating food security." — Tony Rinaudo

Robin Upton
- e-mail: unwelcome [At] unwelcome Guests [d0t] net
- Homepage: www.unwelcomeguests.net/633

Kollektives

Birmingham
Cambridge
Liverpool
London
Oxford
Sheffield
South Coast
Wales
World

Other UK IMCs
Bristol/South West
London
Northern Indymedia
Scotland

Sheffield Topics

Afghanistan
Analysis
Animal Liberation
Anti-Nuclear
Anti-militarism
Anti-racism
Bio-technology
Climate Chaos
Culture
Ecology
Education
Energy Crisis
Fracking
Free Spaces
Gender
Globalisation
Health
History
Indymedia
Iraq
Migration
Ocean Defence
Other Press
Palestine
Policing
Public sector cuts
Repression
Social Struggles
Technology
Terror War
Workers' Movements
Zapatista

Sheffield [navigation.actions2016]

Sheffield [navigation.actions2015]

Sheffield [navigation.actions2014]

NATO 2014

Sheffield Actions 2013

G8 2013

Sheffield Actions 2012

Workfare

Sheffield Actions 2011

2011 Census Resistance
August Riots
Dale Farm
J30 Strike
Occupy Everywhere

Sheffield Actions 2010

Flotilla to Gaza
Mayday 2010
Tar Sands

Sheffield Actions 2009

COP15 Climate Summit 2009
G20 London Summit
Guantánamo
Indymedia Server Seizure
University Occupations for Gaza

Sheffield Actions 2008

2008 Days Of Action For Autonomous Spaces
Campaign against Carmel-Agrexco
Climate Camp 2008
G8 Japan 2008
SHAC
Smash EDO
Stop Sequani Animal Testing
Stop the BNP's Red White and Blue festival

Sheffield Actions 2007

Climate Camp 2007
DSEi 2007
G8 Germany 2007
Mayday 2007
No Border Camp 2007

Sheffield Actions 2006

April 2006 No Borders Days of Action
Art and Activism Caravan 2006
Climate Camp 2006
Faslane
French CPE uprising 2006
G8 Russia 2006
Lebanon War 2006
March 18 Anti War Protest
Mayday 2006
Oaxaca Uprising
Refugee Week 2006
Rossport Solidarity
SOCPA
Transnational Day of Action Against Migration Controls
WSF 2006

Sheffield Actions 2005

DSEi 2005
G8 2005
WTO Hong Kong 2005

Sheffield Actions 2004

European Social Forum
FBI Server Seizure
May Day 2004
Venezuela

Sheffield Actions 2003

Bush 2003
DSEi 2003
Evian G8
May Day 2003
No War F15
Saloniki Prisoner Support
Thessaloniki EU
WSIS 2003

Server Appeal Radio Page Video Page Indymedia Cinema Offline Newsheet

secure Encrypted Page

You are viewing this page using an encrypted connection. If you bookmark this page or send its address in an email you might want to use the un-encrypted address of this page.

If you recieved a warning about an untrusted root certificate please install the CAcert root certificate, for more information see the security page.

IMCs


www.indymedia.org

Projects
print
radio
satellite tv
video

Africa

Europe
antwerpen
armenia
athens
austria
barcelona
belarus
belgium
belgrade
brussels
bulgaria
calabria
croatia
cyprus
emilia-romagna
estrecho / madiaq
galiza
germany
grenoble
hungary
ireland
istanbul
italy
la plana
liege
liguria
lille
linksunten
lombardia
madrid
malta
marseille
nantes
napoli
netherlands
northern england
nottingham imc
paris/île-de-france
patras
piemonte
poland
portugal
roma
romania
russia
sardegna
scotland
sverige
switzerland
torun
toscana
ukraine
united kingdom
valencia

Latin America
argentina
bolivia
chiapas
chile
chile sur
cmi brasil
cmi sucre
colombia
ecuador
mexico
peru
puerto rico
qollasuyu
rosario
santiago
tijuana
uruguay
valparaiso
venezuela

Oceania
aotearoa
brisbane
burma
darwin
jakarta
manila
melbourne
perth
qc
sydney

South Asia
india


United States
arizona
arkansas
asheville
atlanta
Austin
binghamton
boston
buffalo
chicago
cleveland
colorado
columbus
dc
hawaii
houston
hudson mohawk
kansas city
la
madison
maine
miami
michigan
milwaukee
minneapolis/st. paul
new hampshire
new jersey
new mexico
new orleans
north carolina
north texas
nyc
oklahoma
philadelphia
pittsburgh
portland
richmond
rochester
rogue valley
saint louis
san diego
san francisco
san francisco bay area
santa barbara
santa cruz, ca
sarasota
seattle
tampa bay
united states
urbana-champaign
vermont
western mass
worcester

West Asia
Armenia
Beirut
Israel
Palestine

Topics
biotech

Process
fbi/legal updates
mailing lists
process & imc docs
tech