How Simple and Effective Ways Can Reduce Carbon Footprint.

Whenever we think of carbon footprint reduction, most of us tend to think of Green hi-tech innovation and products. Some examples of hi-tech Green technologies innovation are wind-powered farm, solar-powered farms, heliostat (alternately known as solar thermal technology and solar hybrid power plant), geothermal power station and other next generation green alternative energy source. Perhaps, there is many media coverage on such alternative green fuel energy source.

For most people on the main street, we may think that this don’t concern us. After all, most of these alternative green fuel energy sources are still in infancy technologies development stages. Also, these hi-tech clean energy technologies can be quite costly for many average households. Some retail consumers may think of alternative-powered automobile like those autos powered by electric car and hybrid technology.

‘Thus, we create win – win situation in greenhouse gas emission reduction and reduce global warming.’

James Ang, The omniGens Blog  - Make Life Simple.

In this current global subprime mortgage crisis, many people are either looking for jobs on full time basic or find their jobs very shaky . In this global recession, many people is looking ways to reduce their expenditure  in  this rising cost of living situation. Some may ask how can we reduce our carbon footprint without burning a hole in our pocket.

Well, there is some simple and cost effective way to reduce our carbon emission and daily living expenditure. Thus, we create win – win situation in greenhouse gas emission reduction and reduce global warming. In fact, we can find some simple green initiative that is easily on our wallets and reduce utilities bill.

Some of these simple, cost effective and low-tech green environmental ideas are:

1. Plant trees to provide shade from afternoon evening sun.

This helps to reduce building homes and apartments interior temperature.

2. Have rooftop herbs, fruit andvegetable farm.

This rooftop urban farming concept can provide fresh food and fruit for households and reduce energy consumption. This urban farming option can reduce rooftop temperature.Through this urban farming projects, we can improve neighbourhood community bonding and self sufficient among residents.

If this urban farming food produce yield is good, you can sell to other people to generate some income. This is provided within what is legally acceptable in your area of residence. For example, some places require certain license permit to sell vegetables.

3. Have some sort of simple urban vertical farming (if possible).

Beside the benefits mentioned in point number 2, this option can reduce room temperature for top floor apartment units or rooms.

If this urban vertical farming is successful, we can create more green employment.Thus, we create green jobs and green-collar jobs for the communities.In the long run, we can create green urban (vertical) farming social enterprise and start-up business model.

4. Recycle and recycle.

Beside cost saving for families, this environmentally green movement can bring other benefits. When there is enough investment funding and various resources, we can create successful green business ideas and models.

For example, we can create green social enterprise start-up companies.

These green social enterprise start-up businesses concepts can benefit us at:

4.1 Micro economic level.

4.2 Macro economic level.

4.3 Social economic level.

5. Explore the possibility of barter trading.

Please note not all things is economically suitable for barter trading. Barter trading has its own shortfall and limitation.

Please note: The above mentioned points are just some suggestions. The Gen Y blogger, James Ang, acknowledges that there are other workable ideas that he may not know at the moment. Please share with us.

These suggestions is dependable on your budget and resources. There can be unintended effects and results when implementing these suggestions.

[Additional information]

Vertical farm comes with various terms.

Some of this alternate terms or names are sky farm, sky farming, vertical farming, farmscraper,  skyscraper farm, hi-tech city farm, advanced city farming technologies,  hi-tech urban farming and others. For the purpose of this article, I will use urban vertical farm or farming for your convenience.

Urban farming comes with various names.

Some of this alternate terms or names are city farm, city farming, urban agriculture, urban farm, urban farming, urban agriculture, backyard farm, backyard farming, backyard garden, backyard gardening, rooftop farm, rooftop farming, courtyard farm, commercial farming, community farming, urban community farms, urban communities farming, large scale farming, traditional factory farm, rural farm, rural farming and others.

[Disclaimer]

Neither James Ang nor the Gen Y Pro blogger (stands for professional blogger) nor The omniGens Blog is affiliated to any business groups, conglomerate, consortium, and, risk management and consultancy companies, investment fund managers, companies, groups and venture capital (VCs) and their subsidiaries. This includes green social enterprise and green companies. Also, James Ang and The omniGens Blog is not affiliated to any urban vertical farm interest related groups, such as design architectural, design schools and research institutions. This includes green social enterprise, environmental green interest groups, recycle advocate groups and green companies.

All urban farms, urban vertical farms and green companies related articles in this blog is never mean or act as an investment advisory or replacement of any professional risk management consultancy services. Any form of business set-up, business start-up and investment will have its own risk category and rating that require detailed risk assessment by independent and experienced finance professionals. Neither James Ang nor The omniGens Blog will be held liable in any manner for the use, damages, loss, accuracy, and profit resulting from any urban farms, urban vertical farms, green companies and green social enterprise related articles in this blog.

All form of investment and businesses will have its own risk, potential, return, investment time horizon, investment related overheads and other issues. This includes the possibility of incurring huge irrecoverable investment loses.

Any project management may likely encounter some form of unexpected issues along the way.

About James  Ang

[James Ang is a Gen Y Blogger (or Gen Y Pro blogger - stands for Professional Blogger) who blogs mainly on innovation, peer learning,  personal development and well beings.]

About The omniGenerations Blog’s Concept

The omniGenerations Blog (or The omniGens blog in short) is a peer learning community blog or a peer learning micro wiki blog that focus on the holistic development of our lives. The omniGens Blog leverages on the collective wisdom of our proactive community in helping us to achieve simple work – life balance and happiness. Make Life Simple.

PLEASE TAKE NOTE: All comments need to be approved before appearing in the contribution box / comment. Time and space constraints may prevent all comments from appearing. We will only approve comments directly related to this blog article and this blog. Please use appropriate language, exercise restrain,  responsible, sensitivity, tolerance, care and courtesy in your contribution. For more details, please refer to The omniGens Blog’s purpose and objective.

Copyright 2009 James Ang. All rights reserved.

Remember the global food crisis? There was a big jump in commodity prices in 2007 which caught everybody’s attention. The boom was part of the excitement over the commodity super-cycle but went bust with Wall Street in 2008.

Central market of Léo, Burkina Faso

Well, food prices are on the rise again — and it’s caught the attention of The Economist. Food prices have already risen 10% this year.

The main issue is staple foods — the foods that form the basis of diets, such as rice and wheat. The initial commodity price boom had major negative poverty effects in countries such as Mozambique (Arndt, et al. 2008), Pakistan (ul Huq, et al. 2008)  and Mexico (Valero-Gil and Valero 2008). The effects are usually worse in urban areas, possibly because subsistence farmers can feed themselves, but poverty effects vary greatly by commodity and by country (Ivanic and Martin 2008).

The cause of higher food prices, and how prices are transferred from farmers to consumers, is debatable. Commonly fingered culprits include higher oil prices and biofuels subsidies, which were intended to reduce oil dependence. However, the explanations are many and varied (Alexandratos 2008, Dewbre, et al. 2008, Hamilton 2009, Headey and Fan 2008)

The Agricultural Economics journal had a special edition on the world food crisis that includes some descriptive analysis of interest to economists and generalists alike (Masters and Shively 2008).

Students and teachers seeking a broad and less technical economic explanation could refer to Alexandratos (2008), or Katz (2008), who includes links to other web sources.

References

Anonymous, (2009) If words were food, nobody would go hungry. The Economist, 19 November.

Alexandratos, Nikos (2008). ‘Food Price Surges: Possible Causes, Past Experience, and Longer Term Relevance.’ Population and Development Review 34(4): 663-97.

Arndt, Channing, Rui Benfica, Nelson Maximiano, Antonio M. D. Nucifora, and James T. Thurlow (2008). ‘Higher Fuel and Food Prices: Impacts and Responses for Mozambique.’ Agricultural Economics 39(s1): 497-511.

Dewbre, Joe, Céline Giner, Wyatt Thompson, and Martin  Von Lampe (2008). ‘High Food Commodity Prices: Will They Stay? Who Will Pay?’ Agricultural Economics 39(s1): 393-403.

Hamilton, James D. (2009). ‘The Causes and Consequences of Rising Food Prices: Discussion.’ American Journal of Agricultural Economics 91(5): 1257-58.

Headey, Derek, and Shenggen Fan (2008). ‘Anatomy of a Crisis: The Causes and Consequences of Surging Food Prices.’ Agricultural Economics 39(s1): 375-91.

Ivanic, Maros, and Will Martin (2008). ‘Implications of Higher Global Food Prices for Poverty in Low-Income Countries.’ Agricultural Economics 39(s1): 405-16.

Katz, Solomon H. (2008). ‘The World Food Crisis: An Overview of the Causes and Consequences.’ Anthropology News 49(7): 4-5.

Masters, William A., and Gerald E. Shively (2008). ‘Introduction to the Special Issue on the World Food Crisis.’ Agricultural Economics 39(s1): 373-74.

ul Haq, Zahoor , Hina Nazli, and Karl Meilke (2008). ‘Implications of High Food Prices for Poverty in Pakistan.’ Agricultural Economics 39(s1): 477-84.

Valero-Gil, Jorge N., and Magali Valero (2008). ‘The Effects of Rising Food Prices on Poverty in Mexico.’ Agricultural Economics 39(s1): 485-96.

Breakthrough Ideas and Gadgets Range From Simple Designs to Hi-tech Product Designs.

For the past few months, I have been writing mostly on urban vertical farming start-up , urban underground farming business concept and Japan  social enterprise start-up model. Well, let’s take a break this time.

This time round we will just focus on winning innovative product design concepts, ideas, solutions in a wide ranging field of modern innovations and technologies. For some of us, it’s surprising to know that sometimes a simple idea and concept can make a lot of difference to our modern day lives.

Source: PicApp - An Earth Hour event held in Sydney Harbour, Australia.

Sometimes simple Green ideas and Green inventions is useful in  reducing global warming, carbon footprint,  household energy consumption reduction,  household clutter organization and implementing global food security crisis solutions. Yes, this is just some simple everyday living examples.

Lots of today’s modern day convenience is brought by simple idea and great innovation product breakthrough. TIME’s 50 Best Inventions of 2009 online innovation contest features a wide ranging innovation product concept, designs and inventions.

Peer learning request

James Ang, the Gen Y blogger of The omniGens Blog, acknowledges that there is other online innovation poll and innovation product design competition like International Design Excellence Award Winners 2009, IDEA 2009, that he may not know of. Please share with us if you know any of these innovation online polls and product design award contest. Thanks.

[James Ang is a Gen Y Blogger (or Gen Y Pro blogger - stands for Professional Blogger) who blogs mainly on innovation, peer learning,  personal development and well beings.]

About The omniGenerations Blog’s Concept

The omniGenerations Blog (or The omniGens blog in short) is a peer learning community blog or a peer learning micro wiki blog that focus on the holistic development of our lives. The omniGens Blog leverages on the collective wisdom of our proactive community in helping us to achieve simple work – life balance and happiness. Make Life Simple.

PLEASE TAKE NOTE: All comments need to be approved before appearing in the contribution box / comment. Time and space constraints may prevent all comments from appearing. We will only approve comments directly related to this blog article and this blog. Please use appropriate language, exercise restrain,  responsible, sensitivity, tolerance, care and courtesy in your contribution. For more details, please refer to The omniGens Blog’s purpose and objective.

Copyright 2009 James Ang. All rights reserved.

]]> http://desertification.wordpress.com/2009/11/19/food-aid-that-gets-you-two-for-the-price-of-one-irin/ Thu, 19 Nov 2009 08:35:26 +0000 willem van cotthem http://desertification.wordpress.com/2009/11/19/food-aid-that-gets-you-two-for-the-price-of-one-irin/ http://tradetimes.wordpress.com/2009/11/18/un-urges-online-haves-to-chip-in-to-the-world-food-basket/ Thu, 19 Nov 2009 06:48:05 +0000 tradetimes http://tradetimes.wordpress.com/2009/11/18/un-urges-online-haves-to-chip-in-to-the-world-food-basket/ http://roofingbird.wordpress.com/2009/11/18/2009-world-food-day/ Wed, 18 Nov 2009 17:41:27 +0000 roofingbird http://roofingbird.wordpress.com/2009/11/18/2009-world-food-day/

Oct 16^th was World Food Day. On this day “The World Summit on Food Security” convened in Rome and will conclude today, November 18th.  Part of a three pronged series of events, these meetings are being held to address the additional burden that the global economic crisis has placed on world hunger.

The Food and Agriculture of the United Nations (FAO) estimates that the number of hungry people worldwide, will pass the one billion mark this year. This means that one sixth of the world is suffering from persistent hunger.

The agenda of these meetings is to provide an action plan on how to boost agricultural productivity. The FAO states:

[The gravity of the current food crisis is the result of 20 years of under-investment in agriculture and neglect of the sector. Directly or indirectly, agriculture provides the livelihood for 70 percent of the world's poor.]

As you can see, global warming is not mentioned. Rather the world’s, and thus our failure, to provide policies, leadership, and economic development is seen as the reason for this current surge of hunger.

(If you want to learn more: at the FAO’s webpage discussing the summit, there is a link to sign a petition to end world hunger, HERE. Ban Ki-moon, the Secretary-General of the United Nations issued a message stressing the need for multilateral commitment, creativity and leadership. On his page HERE, are other links, on how to get involved. There is also a Twitter link.)

As it should be, the emphasis of the events is directed toward poor and developing nations. However, you ever had any doubts, the food crisis is a perfect example of how the United States is part of the global community. Take look at the Washington Post Article, HERE.

We continue to think it is acceptable to starve the brains and stunt the growth of a percentage of our children. It is okay to enfeeble and kill off some of our elderly early and we don’t want to deal with the racial inequities that are still inherent in our domestic economic policies. We still think it is ok to tell women they should get married for money rather than addressing the community practices that allow others avoid responsibility for children.  We still think we should blame women when their children can’t perform in school.

In the USDA’s, 66 page .pdf report, HERE, the US has categories that define levels of food insecurity. The categories of nourishment are defined as: 1) food secure, meaning enough food at all times for a healthy active lifestyle, 2) food insecure, meaning at least some time during the year there was inadequate food in the house, and 3) very low food security, meaning that the food intake of one or more household members was reduced and their eating patterns were disrupted at times during the year because the household lacked money and other resources for food.

We have been running along at a general population of around 12% food insecure people for years. For children with families it’s been 15%. With the economic “recession”, our percentage of food insecure people is now around 14.4% and 21% respectively. This figure does not include indigent or homeless people, so the figure is likely to be higher[1]. By category of selected household statistics, an astonishing 37.2% of “female head of household” with children are food insecure. However, the “male head of household” category is doing pretty badly as well at 27.6%. The third category of other “household with child”, (grandparents, other relative, etc.) is at 29.2%. As might be expected, low-income families are suffering the worst.

As to race, because Black, and Hispanic groups still have proportionally lower incomes and higher poverty levels, as expected, the food insecurity is higher at 25.7% and 26.9%, as opposed to whites at 10.7%. Native Americans are apparently counted in the “other” category at 13.7%. Due to the lack of categorization, this is bound to be a highly deceptive figure.

I think, Pacific John’s recent post over at Alegre’s, elucidates the gap in understanding and potential for turmoil in our current condition.

Although President Obama has stated that “the solution begins with job creation” and is planning increases in food stamps and other feeding programs, these efforts cannot be the end of hunger in this country. Evidence suggests first of all, that many people in this predicament have jobs, but wages do not provide enough income. Secondly, corporate  “big business” agriculture as is suggested by people like Michael Pollan[2], have streamlined, and influenced the USDA as a way to get rid of excess product, rather than toward nutrition. This results in too much corn, wheat and soybean production, at the expense of a national program employing good standards.

Finally, I want to say that during World War II, the US government mobilized the country to feed it’s self, feed the troops, and set standards for good nutrition as part of the effort to win the war. Our country has been at war for eight years now. There has been no such effort. This is much like all the other ways we have tried to pretend that this is war image clean and light of economic impact. As Ban Ki-moon says, we need a coordinated approach to fight this crisis, not the latest political maneuver.

[2] Michael Pollan is the author of “ In Defense of Food”, and “The Omnivores Dilemma”.

There have been a couple of disheartening developments this week.
The World Food Summit in Rome represents an opportunity for world leaders to address the growing food security crisis. However it looks likely that leaders will be signing a vague declaration which lacks targets or deadlines for actions to reduce global hunger.

This strikes a familiar tune. Time has apparently run out for securing a legally binding climate deal at Copenhagen. On Sunday Barak Obama backed plans to delay a formal pact on climate change until next year. This will have a serious effect on food security. As UN Secretary General Ban-Ki Moon said in his opening speech at the World Food Summit “there can be no food security without climate security.”

1 in 6 people on the planet are already facing life-threatening hunger. Lack of targets and delayed deadlines could spell disaster for many more people living in developing countries. These aren’t just statistics – these are people’s lives.

Help challenge this situation! Here are a few things you can do. They may not seem significant but they are all a part of a vital wave for change.
• Make sure that the voices of some of the world’s poorest people are heard: Embed/ post/ e-mail a link our video ‘Climate change: Listening to the voices of rural women’
• Participate in The Wave on December 5th.
• Find out where The Age of Stupid is showing near you and go along with all your friends.

by Gramma Willi

Relatives – like so many of us, I find myself more and more pleased that being an activist has become an easier road to walk. Victories for human rights and for the Earth increase in number and significance and we hear about them sooner than we used to. Everyone’s talking about green jobs. Our hopes are up, we may actually have an activist leading the free world – Yes We Can! It’s quite a time to be a part of it all, isn’t it?

One of my favorite stories about the changes in public attitude towards environment and health concerns feeding our children. So much has changed in my lifetime. As a young mother, it was almost impossible to find, let alone afford, organic baby food; it was tricky to find a place to breast-feed a baby in peace. These days, parents can find a wide variety of organic baby foods and formula in almost any supermarket; my grand-babies were all breast-fed (even the twins!) and fed organic baby foods. Now that the monopolies have more “natural” offerings available to consumers, are we happy with the production? Is there a next step that we need to take?

IICPH (International Institute of Concern for Public Health), whom I have worked with for many years, has a stellar reputation for providing independent, thoughtful analysis and corroborating community environmental health concerns. Most of our works for communities report on contamination of the air, land and water. It has always given me sadness when we report arsenic, tritium, mercury, lead or other highly damaging pollution where people have food gardens or farms. Food discussions at our youth and elder gatherings took on sad notes when realizing how very careful we must be where we grow our food, where it comes from and how it is prepared. We can make sensible choices when we consider our health.

The good news is, learning to choose, grow and cook good food provides not only sound environmental education, but when applied, benefits everyone’s health and saves people money! The truth is out there, people want clean food and groups like IICPH are uniquely positioned to help them to learn about it. Never has environmental health education been more timely and important… and good food is a delicious place to focus.

Perhaps the silver lining of the economic collapse is that the cards are on the table. Finally, the voices of old hippies and tireless activists are welcome and needed. The public continues to become informed and grows in wisdom as the next generation begins making its mark in history books and business reports. Let’s fill their bellies and minds with good things.

Remember that I love you

All My Relations,

Gramma Willi

~~~~

Gramma Willi has been working with IICPH since 1997. Expressions of her dedication to the clean food revolution can be found at http://roughtimes.ca and http://YouTube.com/roughtimescooking.

~~~~

Here are a few more resources to get you started if you want to do more about clean food:

http://www.foodsecurity.org/
The Community Food Security Coalition (CFSC) is a non-profit 501(c)(3), North American organization dedicated to building strong, sustainable, local and regional food systems that ensure access to affordable, nutritious, and culturally appropriate food for all people at all times.

http://www.toronto.ca/health/tfpc_index.htm
Toronto Food Policy Council, 277 Victoria Street, Suite 203, Toronto, Ontario M5B 1W1l: Wayne ““Taking control of our food” Roberts, Project Co-ordinator: 416-338-7937. Friends of Toronto Food Policy Council is on Facebook.
Their aim “is a food system that fosters equitable food access, nutrition, community development and environmental health.

http://www.foodsecuritynews.com/Resources.htm
The Food Security Network of Newfoundland and Labrador have a great page full of links to action going on all over!

Please email to Gramma Willi if you know of any more independent and reliable resources to help our Rough Times mission:

Good Clean Food For Everyone!

Today, food crisis has raised an alarm throughout the world, where almost two-thirds of the population – 60% – in 26 countries say that higher food and energy prices this year have affected them “a great deal”, according to a BBC report in 2008.

While all nations have felt the burden of the higher costs, the problem is most acute in poorer countries.

Looking back over the previous couple of years, there are many unintended consequences arising from the housing boom and its collapse into the credit crunch. One of the worst and most lethal will be this year’s global food crisis. The drying up of credit available to farmers is hampering the ability of the farmers to respond to the global drought crisis hitting many countries, including China, India, Australia and the US. This is placing the food security of hundreds of millions of people in jeopardy.

Governments will be pushed into fighting hard to retain their currency valuations as they try to maintain their purchase over food on the global markets. When a country’s currency drops, it forces farmers to export food for profit, and makes importing food very expensive. The incentive for governments is to keep currencies strong to keep food local and imports cheap.

In addition, since long the consumption of petroleum and genetically modified foods has crusaded against carbon. There is rising diversion of agricultural land from food to fuels. This has added to the food shortage. To this fatal broth, Bush added the notion of energy independence for the US, backed by enormous subsidies and mandatory targets for converting corn to alcohol. This policy aimed at doubling use of corn-based alcohol in gasoline by 2008, and quintupling it by 2022. Europe has mandated 10% use of bio fuels in transport by 2020, says India’s Agriculture scientist, Swaminathan Aiyar.

The global food insecurity situation has worsened and continues to represent a serious threat for humanity. With food prices remaining stubbornly high in developing countries, the number of people suffering from hunger has been growing relentlessly in recent years.

The number of hungry humans may top 1bn this year and international efforts are underway to ease the crisis. This has seen the need for a World Food Summit, to be held in Rome from November 16 to18.

FAO, Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations, Director-General Jacques Diouf has proposed this World Summit on Food Security to agree key actions to tackle this crisis. He commented:

“The silent hunger crisis — affecting one sixth of all of humanity — poses a serious risk for world peace and security. We urgently need to forge a broad consensus on the total and rapid eradication of hunger in the world.”

There are tens of millions of children who suffer from chronic malnutrition which may not be immediately visible. They are deprived of many of the nutrients they need to lead healthy productive lives.

In countries like Sudan – in the Darfur region –, Nigeria, Somalia, and in several West African countries, have still the most pressing humanitarian food crisis problem. Now it takes a third of a month’s salary just to buy a few days worth of rice. Families and especially vulnerable persons will suffer from lack of access to food, eat fewer meals and have a poorer diet, increasing their vulnerability to diseases and illness. The global economic crisis is aggravating the situation by affecting jobs and deepening poverty. FAO estimates that the number of hungry people could increase by a further 100 million in 2009 and pass the one billion mark.

Poor countries need the development, economic and policy tools required to boost their agricultural production and productivity. Investment in agriculture must be increased because for the majority of poor countries a healthy agricultural sector is essential to overcome hunger and poverty, besides being a pre-requisite for overall economic growth. The gravity of the current food crisis is the result of 20 years of under-investment in agriculture and neglect of the sector. Directly or indirectly, agriculture provides the livelihood for 70 percent of the world’s poor.

The world food crisis is surely looming and the elucidation to the steps to embark upon this major crisis will only be explicitly known after November 18.

There’s no shortage of food at this market in Pakistan. Yet costs have risen so much about half the population can’t afford to eat properly. The same problems are making life increasingly difficult for smallholders trying to live off the land.

The Vision Foods

“It’s affecting us.  Inflation is going up, so for example the price of lentils is very high.  We’re poor people. We can’t afford it.  Lentils have become as expensive as meat now. The government has given us these seeds which we will grow and try to reduce food costs.”

The United Nations Food and Agriculture Organisation is about to host a major food summit in Rome. Its director general says there is no time to lose. [Jacques Diouf, Director-General, U.N. Food and Agriculture Organization]:
“We have been saying and repeating that the fundamentals that led to the crisis in 2008 are almost all there.”

The U.N. wants wealthy nations to more than triple their share of aid earmarked for agriculture, currently five per cent. The aid is intended to help farmers in poorer nations with fertilisers, disease-resistant seeds, crop storage, and irrigation. This water system in the Kenyan village of Ahero is an example of why they need help. Aid donations have helped the villagers bring it back to life.

But the expense of electricity for the pump is forcing them to cut production costs of their rice to compete on the market.

[Nelly Odago, Rice Farmer]:
“If we had more support and avoided expenses like paying for electricity used by the pump, and we used the gravity of water instead, then we would save more and plant other crops like maize and since this is one Kenya, we would feed those who don’t have food.”

Despite the good intentions of the impending food summit there is little appetite for it among world leaders.

Major figures including Barack Obama and Nicolas Sarkozy aren’t going to be there.

Meanwhile a final draft seen by Reuters of a declaration due to be made at the summit will not mention a target to eradicate hunger by 2025.

A commitment to increase aid also fails to specify target or timeframe.

How Hi-tech Urban Farming R&D and Social Enterprise Become A Winning Approach. 

Whenever we think of Research and Development (R&D), we tend to think only post-graduate scientists and researchers working together. Rarely do we thinks of any non-university school leavers involvement. Well, the Japan first hi-tech urban underground farming project is an exception example. There can be other examples that I may not know of.

Let’s make life simple. For this article, we just focus on the  Japan urban underground farming concept example. In this Japanese business cum social enterprise case study, the  Pasona Group which is a Japanese temporary staffing recruitment agency creates an agricultural sector employment awareness. Why there is a need for such awareness? In Japan alone, the country is facing an ageing working population. Japanese agricultural workforce population is mostly make up of an ageing population.

 Source: Japundit, Tomatoes growing in Pasona O2, Hi-tech urban underground.  

In addition, there is a need to create employment for unemployed youth and non-degree school leavers. Before the current global subprime mortgage crisis , it used to be a general global trend that not many youths want to work in plantation fields. At the same time, we are facing a global food security crisis. Beside improving traditional soil-based farming output, we need to research for better alternative urban farming solutions.

‘By working proactively and collectively, we can find win -win solutions to many issues.’  

     James Ang, The omniGens Blog  - Make Life Simple   

While researching for better hi-tech urban underground farming techniques, Pasona O₂ (pronounced as “oh-tsoo”) creates jobs for unemployed youths. (I not sure exactly how people are directly hired in Pasona O₂ urban underground farm project.)  Some refer this business model as social enterprise model. It is a win-win situation for parties involve in this advanced urban underground farming research.

Based on News report, the crops production is not significant at the moment. Pasona O₂ urban underground farm project best annual rice production is around 60 kg. This is normal for any major innovation and technology breakthrough. After all, both advanced urban vertical farming and urban underground farming  concept model is still in its infancy development stage . 

Let’s look at automobile development history. There is a huge technology development improvement from the first steam-powered vehicle built around 1672 to first petrol-powered car in 1894 to other alternative powered autos. Automobile technology development takes a long history to reach current advanced level. Even now, automobile technologies still constantly revolve. This creates jobs for many people in the process.

By working proactively and collectively, we can find win -win solutions to many issues. For example, we can achieve reduction in global warming, carbon footprint while maintaining global economic growth. Yes, it’s definitely not an easy task. Perhaps, we can find some win – win solutions to these global issues. Let’s start one step at a time. Just like what we have known about our automobile development history.   

About The omniGenerations Blog’s Concept

The omniGenerations Blog (or The omniGens blog in short) is a peer learning community blog or a peer learning micro wiki blog  that focus on the holistic development of our lives. The omniGens Blog leverages on the collective wisdom of our proactive community in helping us to achieve simple work – life balance and happiness. Make Life Simple.

PLEASE TAKE NOTE: All comments need to be approved before appearing in the contribution box / comment. Time and space constraints may prevent all comments from appearing. We will only approve comments directly related to this blog article and this blog. Please use appropriate language, exercise restrain,  responsible, sensitivity, tolerance, care and courtesy in your contribution. For more details, please refer to The omniGens Blog’s purpose and objective.

Capitalism in Crisis

TOWARDS A MARXIST ANALYSIS OF THE GLOBAL CRISIS

The International Institute for Research and Education: http://www.iire.org

Seminar: Towards A Marxist Analysis of the Global Crisis

On 2-4 October, the IIRE held its first international Economy Seminar on the Global Crisis. Thirty-six participants, economists and non-specialists, from Europe, Africa, Asia and Latin America attended the three-day event which was open to activists from different tendencies of the radical left.

The objectives of the seminar were to analyse the nature, characteristics and consequences of the current global economic crisis, from perspectives relevant to social activists, and to fortify the global network of Marxist economists. All talks will be available at the IIRE podcast, which we expect to launch with the next newsletter. For now it is possible to download all the talks in one file (original languages, more than 500MB).

Three main questions guided the various sessions of the weekend. First, what is the nature or cause of the crisis? Second, what are the social, economic and political consequences? Finally, what are the links between the current economic crisis and the global ecological and food crises? A solid look at Keynesianism, Ernest Mandel’s contribution on long waves and economic cycles and a (self-) critical take on discourse and propaganda were activities that peppered the debates.

The seminar kicked off with a well-attended public meeting on the crisis with guest speakers Chris Harman of the SWP in Britain and IIRE fellows Michel Husson of the French National Institute for Statistics and Economic Studies and Claudio Katz of the University of Buenos Aires.

François Chesnais (France) opened the seminar itself with an introduction on the role that the so-called financialisation of the economy had in the global crisis. He stated that the crisis cannot be labelled either financial or financialised. Rather, the current crisis has its roots deep in the process of capital accumulation, which, revealing its contradictions, should lead us to look at the dynamics of productivity, the rate of profit and its distribution. The discussion that followed generated a debate between over-accumulation versus under-consumption as explanations for understanding the crisis.

Ozlem Onaran (Turkey), Claudio Katz (Argentina) and Bruno Jetin (France) presented reports on the conditions of the European, Latin American and Asian economies. The debates paved the way for a deeper understanding on how the crisis is perceived and dealt with in the different regions. Participants concluded that an essential characteristic of the crisis is the lack of de-linking tendencies among countries and continents; on the contrary, the efforts to save capitalism have been concerted and almost unanimous.

Michel Husson (France) and Klaus Engert (Germany) analysed the crisis in the framework of the theory of long waves. According to this theory, elaborated by IIRE founder Ernest Mandel, it is possible to use important endogenous factors, i.e. related to the logic of capital and its internal contradictions, to explain the general fall in accumulation that began during the 1970s and has not yet concluded. This discussion left open the possibility of a new ascending wave of economic growth and capitalist accumulation dependent on such exogenous factors as a radical change of the relationship of forces between the classes. One of the conclusions, therefore, was that another wave of attacks on the working class is most likely on its way.

Eric Toussaint (Belgium) emphasised that there is no automatic link between the fact that the crisis is being paid for by workers and the popular masses, and an increase of social struggles. Political, ideological and organisational factors will also play a role in the development of the struggles.

Esther Vivas (Spain) and Daniel Tanuro (Belgium) brought in a fundamental analytical dimension with their introductions: the economic crisis cannot be observed in isolation from the global ecological and food crises. Vivas presented the causes and structure of the food crisis: the current model of agricultural and livestock production is in a large measure responsible for climate change. Tanuro demonstrated how the official, ruling class responses to climate change are insufficient, unreal, irrational and even put us in more danger. He argued that eco-socialists should push for and end to unnecessary production, the retraining of workers in affected sectors and the development of a new agricultural model instigated by radical anti-capitalist measures.

Overall, the analyses revealed that the crisis is systemic, that those who are paying for it are the popular and working classes, and that now, more then ever, it is necessary to build an emancipatory, global anti-capitalist and eco-socialist project.

Posted here by Glenn Rikowski

The Flow of Ideas: http://www.flowideas.co.uk

This week we start off with a United Nations report that urges caution on biofuels. Green Inc, a New York Times blog writes,

“The study concluded that whether a biofuel is climate-friendly or not depends largely on whether it is based on crops or production residues. Biofuels of the latter category were generally considered beneficial for the environment, and generating electricity locally from waste materials was found — in most cases — to be more energy efficient than converting biomass to liquid fuels.”

This paper was also written about in the blog, Futurism Now, the post called, Biofuels Will Increase Global Warming According to Study

They explain,

“That is because the land required to plant fast-growing poplar trees and tropical grasses would displace food crops, and so drive deforestation to create more farmland, a powerful source of carbon emissions.”

Not so fast, check out the Sustainable Production of Biofuels.

And biofuels continues to be the topic of the week. The biofuel review writes this week about a report from the Imperial College of London. The report has an upbeat tone about the future of biofuels and The biofuel review ends their post with a quote from Clare Wenner, Head of Renewable Transport at the Renewable Energy Association that says,

“Imperial College London has verified the results which show that these fuels can be produced in a sustainable way. With the right legislative framework, including the implementation of environmental rules under the Directive, it will be possible to limit indirect land use effects. Land will always be used for food and fuel, and the overall balance of these impacts could be positive as far as food is concerned. In fact, it seems likely that wheat-based biofuels production will not affect the amount of wheat exported by the EU as a whole.”

Then it’s more biofuels from Creamer Media’s Engineering News

According to Engineering News,

“Pretreatment and gasification technologies are on the verge of making second-generation biofuels a commercial reality, according to new analysis from Frost & Sullivan, entitled ‘Worldwide Market Analysis of Second Generation Biofeedstock.”

Engineering news interviewed Frost & Sullivan senior research analyst Phani Raj Kumar Chinthapalli,

“The use of second-generation biofuels is expected to reduce 
the emission of greenhouse gases (GHG), particularly carbon 
dioxide (CO2), from combustion engines by 80% to 85% in comparison with conventional fossil fuels. The lifecycle emissions for second-generation biofuels are in the negative range, which implies consumption of CO2 rather than emission.”

That’s it for this week, see you next week.

25 years after a major food crisis in Ethiopia, an Oxfam International report finds that many in the country still lack regular access to food and that international food aid, while saving lives, does not provide Ethiopia with the tools to prevent future food shortages, Report: Band Aids and Beyond.  The UN’s World Food Program has called for emergency food aid to prevent mass starvation in Ethiopia. The country has suffered from four years of drought and experts fear that global climate change will only make the situation worse, BBC News.  Scientists are working to increase food production as populations increase, New York Times.

The pay czar for the Obama administration, Kenneth Feinberg, is expected to call for 175 top executives at U.S. banks that received bailout funds earlier this year to receive pay cuts of about 90%, CNN.  The Obama administration announced yesterday that it will undertake measures to increase small business stability, including allowing small local banks to qualify for loans at lower interest rates, New York Times.

Human Rights Watch reports that dozens of Uighurs are still missing after months of ethnic conflict in western China, Al Jazeera.  Report: We Are Afraid to Even Look for Them.

Social media service Twitter has announced that tweets will appear in both Google and Microsoft search results, Associated Press.