To the Editor,
Re: Food literacy key to secure future, Guest Comment, Jan. 20.
I would like to thank Sharon Rempel for a well-written article stating it is urgent that we start building seed collections and root storage facilities in every community.
She states that government has to do more to help and give better legislation to get more small local farms running.
In the end, this local farm movement is only going to take off in leaps and bounds by committed grassroots movements. Many roadblocks are mentioned, but everyone knows that when you start this sort of business, you have to be experienced, resourceful, utilitarian, self-sufficient and innovative otherwise you will lose your shirt.
This movement’s focus is not about money, but about sustainability, self-sufficiency, community, independence, health, choice and freedom.
There are many people who are not content being forced to be pawns for the corporate industries and would love to live a simple life, growing food for themselves and trading the excess with their neighbours.
World trade was to add a spice to life, but not to dominate it.
Farmland needs to be protected from being turned into suburbs and industrial zones and we have to eliminate foreign real estate investment, as well as limit how much land our own citizens can horde.
If not, we destine the next generations to be slaves to debt, with much less freedom to pursue happiness and live in harmony with the natural world.
We need more land under the Agricultural Land Reserve and we should consider public co-op farms where people can live simply and work, while providing food for the community with crops grown by heritage seeds and animals of original genetic stalk.
You might think I’m a dreamer, but I’m not the only one.
Holden Southward
Nanaimo