Photo illustration by Bráulio Amado. Source photograph by Kerem Yucel/Agence France-Presse, via Getty Images

Defeating Line 3 is important. This matters for all humanity, and all other inhabitants of the earth. But the ones most directly and immediately affected are those whose ancestral lands are being intruded upon. However much better the current president of the USA may be compared to his predecessor is a red herring; the bar was below low on environmental grounds. What matters now is what this president does on the most important issues facing our planet. Strong words follow:

Winona LaDuke Feels That President Biden Has Betrayed Native Americans

Winona LaDuke (center) and other protesters at a construction site for the Line 3 oil pipeline near Palisade, Minn., in January. Kerem Yucel/Agence France-Presse, via Getty Images

Right now in northern Minnesota, the Canadian oil-and-gas-transport company Enbridge is building an expansion of a pipeline, Line 3, to carry oil through fragile parts of the state’s watersheds as well as treaty-protected tribal lands. Winona LaDuke, a member of the local Ojibwe tribe and a longtime Native rights activist, has been helping to lead protests and acts of civil disobedience against the controversial $9.3 billion project. “I spend a lot of time,” she says, “fighting stupid ideas that are messing with our land and our people.” So far the efforts of LaDuke, who is 61 and who ran alongside Ralph Nader as the Green Party’s vice-presidential nominee in 1996 and 2000, have been in vain. The Biden administration declined to withdraw federal permits for the project, a stance that Line 3 opponents see as hypocritical given the president’s cancellation of the Keystone XL pipeline as well as his vocal support for climate action. Continue reading →

NurPhoto / Getty

Anyone who lived in or around New York City in the early 1970s might remember the rallying cry of the city’s upstart baseball team: “Ya Gotta Believe’.’ In more recent times, anyone anywhere might well repeat those words to any climate doubters or deniers. The first step to solving a problem is believing you have one. No pleasure whatsoever, but the following is necessary reading:

It’s Grim

The latest UN report is clear: Climate change is here, it’s a crisis, and it’s caused by fossil fuels.

By Robinson Meyer

A new United Nations–led report from hundreds of climate scientists around the world makes it clear: The human-driven climate crisis is now well under way. Continue reading →

A shortcut to organic farming. Source: Bloomberg

Since Sunday I have been thinking about what to plant, and how, with regard to our Escazu coffee regeneration project. Questions related to genetics are fundamental to agriculture, even if genetic engineering is controversial. I am only considering hybrids, not genetically engineered coffee varietals. We will use no pesticides or synthetic fertilizers,  nor have any been used on this land in nearly three decades, so our coffee will be grown according to organic standards. Whether we seek USDA certification is a topic for a later date.

But I am a proponent of organic certification. Not every farmer can afford it but if they could I would hope they consider it. That said, like any certification, there can be bugs in the system. Thanks to Amanda Little (whose work we first linked to five years ago, and again when her book was published) for investigating and bringing this to our attention, with the help of Bloomberg. It would seem to go without saying, but perhaps we all need to shout it out:

Organic Farming Should Protect Nature, Not Destroy It

A USDA loophole that allows farmers to cut down forests and clear grasslands to win faster certification should have been closed years ago.

Sustainable agriculture is having its political moment.

The Biden administration deserves credit for being the first to recognize that food system reforms can go a long way toward solving the climate crisis. Yet for all its big-picture vision, some critical details are getting overlooked. A big one is a loophole within the USDA’s National Organic Program that undermines its mission and impedes the nation’s path toward climate-smart agriculture. Continue reading →

Day 187, with 319 coffee seedlings

When posting yesterday I had in mind my coffee germination project. In addition to recycling bags to use for this stage of prepping for the bigger goal, I have been considering the question of varietals, including hybrids, to plant alongside these seedlings that are from coffee collected on this land 187 days ago, from coffee trees originally planted five decades ago.

Hacienda La Amistad coffee, roasted at the farm

On Saturday I was speaking with the man who farms and roasts one of our single estate coffees, the only one that is USDA-certified organic. He exhibited the new roaster at the farm, while telling me about an experimental varietal he has growing at 1,800 meters elevation, which he has nicknamed Purple Haze.

This fueled my imagination further down the road of how complex to get with our own re-planting options. Our seedlings will be mature enough to plant next May, and by that time I will need to have sourced the thousand or so other seedlings we have space for. We will have micro-lots within our micro-lot. If we plant varietals in clusters of 100, that would give us the option of ten varietals other than the varietal that was originally planted here. Or clusters of 50, allowing twenty other varietals? More likely clusters of 200, because over the next ten months surely we can do enough homework to figure out the five very best varietal options for this soil, climate and elevation. It’s time to start pondering and plotting those on the map…