I have been practising sustainable gardening methods for decades. I have always refused to resort to the use of herbicides, pesticides, and fungicides; but I fell short whenever it came to explaining why this is so important. I was grateful then, when I watched the recent documentary, Kiss the Ground, because it not only makes sustainable agriculture easy to understand; it also gives me hope. The film makes it clear that if the entire world would adopt organic methods, we could reverse global warming in a short time. By never allowing soil to lie bare and exposed, and by planting trees, carbon is sequestered in the soil, instead of being released into the atmosphere.
I have written in previous blogs about how much I dislike this town that I have been living in for over two years now. The hurricane force winds, coupled with low humidity and dust, are exacerbated by the extremely cold winters and the brutally hot summers. I have been puzzled as to why nearly every time rain is heading towards the town, it suddenly changes direction, and misses the area entirely. After watching the documentary, I realized that this is a prime example of “desertification”. This part of the country is literally being transformed into a desert. This is happening all over the world. It is scary, but it can be reversed. Unfortunately, most of the people who live here adhere to their old ways – especially the farmers and ranchers. They continue to till their fields and douse them with chemicals, depleting the soil and adding to our already polluted air and water. They are manipulated by politics and the greed of unbridled capitalism.
People need to open their eyes and look around at the disasters that are occurring all over our planet. They need to stop sticking their heads in the sand and pretending that climate change isn’t happening. It is happening at our very doorstep, but we can stop it. We should be boycotting the use of these dangerous chemicals. We should be demanding that farmers stop tilling their fields and cease spraying them with deadly poisons. Moving away from our dependence on fossil fuels is important. Adopting solar and wind power and creating electric cars will help; but those things alone cannot do enough to affect the changes we so desperately need. We must change the way agriculture is growing our food. Whether we are omnivore, vegetarian, or vegan, we must treat animals as kindly as we can. (For some reason, I do not like the word humanely, because humans, frankly, can be quite cruel.)
We are all in this together. It will take all of us together, to make life livable for all. Please, watch this film. It will leave you feeling hopeful, instead of hopelessly despairing about the direction our world has taken.
