Yesterday I presented at the International Seminar on Fires hosted by the Agro-Environmental Court of Bolivia held in Santa Cruz, Bolivia. My presentation was entitled ‘The Ecological Economy, Biomímesis, and the Prevention of Fires’.
Global Crisis and Radical Alternatives: Challenging the Dominant System for a Just and Sustainable Future
The world is going through a crisis of unprecedented global scale engendered by a dominant system that has resulted in deepening inequalities, increasing deprivation in old and new forms, the destruction of ecosystems, catastrophic climate change, ruptures in socio-cultural fabrics, and the violent dispossession of living beings.
However, there is an increasing emergence and visibility of an immense variety of radical alternatives to this dominant regime, contesting its roots in capitalist, patriarchal, racist, statist, and anthropocentric forces.
These range from initiatives with a specific focus like sustainable and holistic agriculture, community led water/energy/food sovereignty, solidarity and sharing economies, worker control of production facilities, resource/knowledge commons, and inter-ethnic peace and harmony, to more holistic or rounded transformations such as those being attempted by the Zapatista in Chiapas and the Kurds in Rojava. Alternatives also include the revival of ancient traditions and the emergence of new worldviews that re-establish humanity’s place within nature, as a basis for human dignity and equality.
– excerpt from the Global Tapestry of Alternatives
Industrial food for profit = highly vulnerable food production system
Industrial food for profit has resulted in a highly vulnerable food production system. Now with climate chaos upon us, we must diversify our food crops. No more monocultures!
Militarism versus Global Health
I just learned about the “One World, One Health” initiative that would address zoonotic diseases. You should too. Visit http://oneworldonehealth.org/
Imagine a trillion dollar commitment to modernize the nuclear arsenal. That plus another all-time high for the US military budget of $768 billion.
Comparatively, nothing is being spent on addressing pandemic-creating phenomenon and US exceptionalism thwarting international cooperation prevails.
The US government has failed us miserably. This initiative should have been fast tracked. The minions who currently occupy our government posts need to be replaced with with true servants of, by and for the people, providing real leadership for ensuring ecological health.
COP26 “Greenwashing Festival” Ended – Now What?
Our world has become too politicized and economized. Everyone’s an expert. Thankfully there are scientists who remain undaunted by our pathetic state of affairs and are doing the hard work of providing sound guidance as to what must be done at this time. The time has come where the people must force their governments to do what’s necessary to save earth systems that support life. That translates into disaster declarations globally and instituting emergency actions across the board as cited in this report.
Localization is the Appropriate Response to Climate Chaos
Touring Bolivia giving lectures about localization expressed as ‘ecopueblos’ as a response to climate chaos in an effort to cease migration to the cities. Working with UNDP, the private sector, government, academia and civil society groups. We all need to be on the same page in this effort! #climatechange #environment #climate #climateemergency #globalwarming #climatechaosmitigation #climatechaosadaptation #climatechaosresilience
Crisis Gardening: Fresh Food Fast
Food security should be job number one for everyone right about now. As our food supply is under increasing threat, taking matters into your own hands (by working with the soil and nature’s forces) can provide both food and sanity. You’d be amazed how much food you can grow in a small amount of space and how good you’ll feel working with living things. What are you waiting for?
Farmers Build Fire Resilience
Having a background in both agriculture and disasters led me to develop course materials for an on-line course for farmers and ranchers on how to prepare for, mitigate against, respond to, and recover from, projected increased incidents of wildfire. While the course was inspired by the record-setting conflagrations in northern California of 2017-2018 which impacted small farmers and ranchers, attendees are from a number of states and Canada.