Rhona

Preferring as I do the simplicity of cooking with ingredients that are easy and relatively inexpensive to lay my hands on, I am suspicious of molecular gastronomy. It strikes me as an unsustainable novelty, requiring specialized equipment and highly processed ingredients. So I am with the feeling behind the Italian government’s ban on chemical ingredients used in molecular gastronomy, in the interests of public safety. Though I think if you really want to eat the stuff, you should be willing to bear the consequences – I doubt most people would be eating Gibbs, Vauquelin or Baumé on a daily basis anyway.

It is hard sometimes not to feel that big biobusiness is winning, through sheer massive persistence and economic might. The approval of genetically modified potatoes and feeds by the European Union is disappointing news, to say the least, coming as it does

“over the resistance of half or more of the EU’s 27 countries”

and

“opposition to such foods by European consumers, who worry about risks such as human resistance to antibiotics and the development of “superweeds” that are impervious to herbicides.”

The problem with letting GMO/GE (pick your acronym of choice) feeds into Europe is that this contaminates European animal products, and it also allows the strong possibility (inevitability?) of rogue crops springing up where the seed falls. EU legislators have apparently learned nothing from the experiences of Mexican corn farmers and Canada’s own Percy Schmeiser.

Meanwhile, Canada has more GE headaches, around the flax contamination issue. Here’s how the GE-Free BC folk are tackling it, by asking for support for Alex Atamanenko‘s private members Bill C474, An Act respecting the Seeds Regulations (analysis of potential harm) with a call to action before the bill is debated on March 17:

In the wake of the discovery of Genetically Engineered flax in shipments to Europe 10 years after that flax was removed from the market, and subsequent bans on Canadian exports of flax to Europe, Bill C-474 will help put pressure on the Canadian government to test adequately GE crops.

Please contact your MP through the CBAN website.

If you would like to start a petition to present to your MP, contact GE Free BC at gefreebc07@yahoo.ca to get a blank petition form. Your MP must present the petition in the House of Commons if you get 200 signatures.

I’ve been to a few meetings of Transition Town Victoria now, including its first birthday party at the end of January

and some momentum seems to be building.

The group, descended from its grandparent in Totnes, addresses the community concerns of those of us who want to start planning now for a life without cheap fossil fuel, which eventuality will change every aspect of our lives, but which politicians and vested corporate interests are apparently trying their best to pretend ain’t going to happen. Which, when it does, could leave us as a species unprepared to face the many inherent challenges of life in a time of energy descent. So small groups of people in many countries are starting to build communities of interest to teach themselves what they will need to know, without waiting for the great lumbering beast of politics to change direction and actually make plans on our behalf.

I’ve been interested in many of the group’s committees, including – no-brainer – the Food group. Most recently I attended a gathering on Reskilling – which aims to identify the skills needed to live in a post-carbon world. Last night we met in the Solstice Cafe

to talk about where to go next.

The possibilities are endless, which makes beginnings elusive; so at our next meeting we’ll define a project we can work on together, which will teach us necessary skills while doing something tangible and useful.

Friday night’s PEP reading featured Vancouverian Christopher Levenson

and Victorian Grace Cockburn.

Saturday was the first work party of 2010 at Haliburton Community Organic Farm. There was work to be done

and workers to do it

Apple trees to be planted

A hoop house to move and then reassemble

Coffee break

Work started on the nursery greenhouse

Indoor work to be done

Lovely lunch

Workers large and small

Make hay while the rain holds off

My first Seedy Saturday last weekend! The convention centre in Victoria was mobbed by earlybirds who arrived to browse the stands for seeds and information about all aspects of growing food and flowers.

Food was big, of course, and some interesting things on offer. A couple of places (Carolyn Herriot’s Garden Path, and Sooke Harbour House) offered a small and special tuber, Oca (Oxalis Tuberosa) which hails from the Andes is gaining some popularity in these parts for its ease of growth and its sharp flavour.

The mushroom growers were there, offering inoculated logs for sale; there was a talk about mushroom growing by local expert Justin Napier of Oystercatcher Mushrooms, which offered some revelations about the nutritional value of mushrooms (one point was that they offer vitamin D, and the content of that is related to how much sunlight they absorb).

Mason (blue orchard) bees were topical – a couple of places to buy the houses, and a talk by Steve Mitchell of Bee Haven Farm.

Yum! Jerusalem Artichokes (sunchokes) were on sale for eating and growing.

The dynamic duo of Brock McLeod and Heather Walker (Makaria Farm) were selling beans and grain and gave a talk called Growing your own pancakes (organic grains on a small scale). They’re running a grain CSA this year which sounds like a wonderful thing.

And the tireless farmers of Haliburton Farm were selling seeds, seedlings and the benefits of getting involved in a community farm.

I attended a crowded workshop on fruit tree pruning, by Philip Young who keeps the trees of Glendale Gardens in shape. Time was as always too short to cover everything we wanted to know but we got some good advice about winter and summer prunings, tools, tree renovation, and the difference between pruning for growth and pruning to encourage fruit. Recommended manual: The American Horticultural Society Pruning & Training by Brickell & Joyce.

Carolyn Herriot did a brisk trade in seeds and tubers, while promoting her latest book and eponymous talk (The Zero-Mile Diet)

Out at Haliburton Farm, the seedlings are growing, some of them destined for the Seedy Saturdays that have begun on Vancouver Island.

The farm ducks are hard at work keeping the edible pests down…

and the last of Farmer Ray’s giant beets are going to feed happy animals somewhere in the area.

And once again Margaret Atwood‘s prescient novel Oryx & Crake comes to life. We won’t be eating pigoons just yet, but Enviropigs are on the Canadian horizon. It seems that genetic engineers are attempting to address the complaints of people living near factory farms by reducing the pesky smells of too many pigs being reared inhumanely. The obvious solution (reduce pig numbers) is no fun, so the industrialists prefer to splice mice genes into the pigs. Kind of misses the point… it won’t give the pigs better diets or living conditions, and it certainly won’t make those sewage lagoons disappear. All we end up with is the thin end of a wedge that will give us food animals created by lab rats: same issues as GE foods… do we have the faintest idea what other changes might have been triggered by this genetic manipulation, and what might that do to the bodies who consume them, today, tomorrow or next generation?

Busy times. Let’s try to catch up.

A week ago last Sunday, a talk by Jon Steinman,

out at Muse Winery, was an attempt to draw together the gist of several years’ worth of radio (Deconstructing Dinner). He illustrated some of his concerns by deconstructing one of the agricultural multinationals who control the full spectrum of our food supply in Canada: Cargill. (The Deconstructing Dinner program upon which this is based: part 1 is here and part 2 is here.)

Cargill was established in 1865, in Minnesota. In Canada its headquarters are in Winnipeg. Here are the pies in which you’ll find its fingers:

Beef: Cargill owns 40% of the slaughter capacity in Canada (one of two companies that control 80% of capacity). It operates only two facilities: High River Alberta and Guelph, Ontario, which between them slaughter 5,400 cattle each day. Narrowing the field of operation in this way is undoubtedly cost-efficient for the company, but it shows very clearly the risks to consumers: any problem in one of those plants has grievous repercussions for consumers and meat producers alike, a point proven by the Maple Leaf experience, where we saw how large was the reach from a single production plant. And how great could be the financial repercussions for the company.

Animal feed: Cargill owns Nutrena, the largest feed company in the world, which makes pet food as well as feed for horses and pigs, chickens and cattle; and in 2000 they bought out their competitors, Agribrands Purina (not the pet food Purina, which is owned by Nestle).

Plant breeding: Cargill owns Renessen, partnered with Monsanto, producing such delights as genetically engineered corn. ‘Nuf said.

Fertilizers: Cargil is the largest phosphate producer in the world, operating with agricultural firm IMC Global as Mosaic, and is the second largest potassium producer.

Natural gas: Cargill is one of the world’s major traders and transporters of natural gas (an essential element in fertilizer production).

Salt: Cargill is the world’s largest salt producer and sells such products as water softener as well as manufacturing, agricultural and the Diamond Crystal retail salt brand.

Grain: Cargill commands 17% of the world’s grain trading.

Canola: Cargill operates the largest canola oilseed crushing plant in the world, in Clavet, Saskatchewan (selling under the trade name Canola Harvest).

Eggs: Cargill supplies most of the food service (Sunny Fresh) egg and breakfast products in Eastern Canada through its Kitchen Solutions brand.

Sugar: Cargill is partnering with Imperial Sugar Company to build the world’s largest sugar refinery, in Louisiana.

Malting: Cargill is a partner in Prairie Malt and is one of the two companies that control 75% of malting in Canada.

Chocolate: Cargill owns the production and processing of chocolate, and brands like Peter’s, Gerkens Cocoa, Veliche and Wilbur.

That’s some of what they own. They have many other interests including cotton, grain (through AgHorizons), High-Fructose Corn Syrup and other corn derivatives, frozen desserts, and ethanol.

And that’s only one company. Which is one extremely large reason why it feels safer to buy from small producers whenever possible.