Legalize hemp agriculture and save the planet.

April 25, 2008 was designated as the first annual date to commemorate the fight being made against a disease that strikes and kills millions of people all over the warmer regions of the world. Often referred to as a “disease without borders”, Malaria kills more than a million human beings annually, many of them old people and children under age 10. Malaria has been designated as the most destructive disease presently known to man, and has killed and disabled more people than any other cause since the dawn of history – including famine and warfare. The debilitating affects of the disease causes an estimated $15 billion worth of damage annually to the world’s economy due to lost productivity.

Because of the dangers of this disease, which seems to be on the upsurge in Asia, South America and Africa, the U.N. World Health Organization authorities declared in May, 2007, that a Malaria World Awareness Day would be inaugurated the following year to bring more attention to this devastating disease. And due to so many cases occurring on the African Continent, it was decided to change what was formerly called African Malaria Awareness Day to a world event to bring the problem to the attention of everyone living on this planet.

Malaria is caused by the bite of the Anopheles mosquito which carries four types of protozoan parasites. When the mosquito bites someone, it injects some of these parasites into the person’s bloodstream where they eventually reach the person’s liver. There, they multiply rapidly and cause the disease that brings on severe chills and high fever that lasts up to 48 hours or more each time the disease recurs. Malaria is a virtual “life sentence” for those infected by it, and can recur annually for the rest of a person’s life. Due to it’s severity during an attack, the disease can cause a number of severe complications, including heart failure; and as a result, it is often fatal to small children and people who are physically weak – especially older people, and those inflicted with chronic and acute ailments, such as HIV/AIDS. The most dangerous times for being exposed to the mosquitoes carrying this disease is in the evening hours when the sun sets and the early morning hours before sun-rise.

More than 100 countries, containing 40% of the world’s population, have problems with this disease. The African Rift Valley, that long, often marshy section of Eastern Africa is a virtual incubator for the Anopheles mosquito, resulting in the inhabitants of countries such as Kenya, Tanzania, the Congo, Rwanda, Zambia, and Burundi being some of the most devastated by this disease.

UN World Health authorities estimate that an investment of around $2.2 billion will be enough to control the disease. Although there are a number of medications to treat the affects of the disease, including that age old remedy quinine, the best treatment is prevention which can be had by simply providing people at risk, especially children, with mosquito netting when they go to sleep at night. With the augmentation of a world Malaria awareness day, it is hoped that more attention will be given to helping to control a scourge that has attacked mankind for centuries.

From extraction through sale, use and disposal, all the “stuff” in our lives affects our world and our communities at home and abroad in ways that are sometimes hard to comprehend. Yet most of this is intentionally hidden from the public view.

The Story of Stuff is a 20-minute, fast-paced, fact-filled, behind-the-scenes look at the underside of our production and consumption patterns in today’s society. The Story of Stuff exposes the connections between a huge number of environmental, health, economic and social issues, and calls us together to create a more just and sustainable world.

It’ll teach you something, it’ll make you laugh, it will raise your awareness and it just may change the way you look at all the “stuff” in your life forever.

www.StoryOfStuff.com

Much is being said these days over the difference of organic foods, especially meat, fruit, and vegetables over those produced with chemicals, and additives. Most supermarkets offer both organic and “regular” produce, and what most people notice first off is that organic fruits and vegetables are usually much smaller and not as “plump” as the ones grown with the assistance chemical fertilizers, insecticides, and other additives. This also is true for meat, with organic chickens much smaller and leaner than commercially produced ones, and organic beef much darker and with less fat. Of course the price of organic produce is also much more than non-organic varieties.

But in order to really appreciate the difference in organic versus non-organic foods, you really have to taste them Organic vegetables, such as tomatoes, cucumbers, peppers, etc., have a much more distinct taste; i.e., a tomato tastes like a one grown in your backyard garden, and not one that hardly has a taste at all. Fruit, especially seasonal summer fruit like plums, peaches, cherries, etc., really taste like the ones our grandparents used to grow. They may be smaller and not as well formed, but from a taste standpoint, the difference is clearly evident. Organic food scientists who have made a study in comparing the two types say that organic produce have anti-oxidants and flavinoids, which are not only much better for you from a health standpoints (they helps prevent cancer and heart disease and keep people looking younger) but they also help sharpen peoples taste buds.

Perhaps it is for this reason the organic wines are also gaining in popularity. Red wine, for instance is now acclaimed to be very healthy and helps reduce cholesterol levels due to the amounts of antioxidants and flavenoids found in the skin of the grapes. And if the grapes from which the wine is made form just happen to be organic, then they will have even more of these anti-aging ingredients. Those who have tasted grapes grown on a home grape arbor will agree that they taste much different, and better, than those found in supermarkets.

As for meat like poultry, a small, “free-running” chicken not only looks pinker but many attest that it tastes like a wild fowl. All those vitamins and antibiotics that commercially produced chickens have only make them look fatter and larger. One taste will definitely make a difference.

As more and more people turn to organic grown and produced foods, they see that quality is definitely better than quantity in regards to the foods they buy, making it good sense to choose organic grown foods.

This is an internesting article about the move from conventional farming to organic farming headed by the leaders of Prince Edward Island in Canada. I like the reference to the shiny new John Deere and the costs associated with conventional farming.

Gary Claudeheid, a long-time organic farmer and Green Party candidate, said people who argue that organic growing is not economically feasible fail to see the failing economics of conventional operations.

“Between 1950 and 1980, the Island lost 80 per cent of its farmers,” he said. “Between 1986 and 2001, it lost another 1,000. In the last five years, we’ve lost another 147. They are never taken into account.

“They like to point to the 750 farms on Prince Edward Island that are grossing over $100,000. But how much of that is left when they have to pay for a shiny, new, green John Deere machines, all the chemical fertilizer, insecticides, herbicides, fungicides, sprout inhibitors and all the other chemicals they are using?”

Labchuk said her party would restore some of the economic sense to organic farming by removing the subsidies that support chemical-based farming and offering money and training to help growers’ transition to organic methods.

Environmental dangers from over use of herbicides and pesticides in commercial, intensive farming has been known for years. One of the first warnings of damages from the use of pesticides in modern agriculture came from American novelist Rachel Carson in 1962 with her book The Silent Spring. Ms. Carson’s thought provoking book portrayed a bleak future in regards to birds and other wildlife that were being killed or mutated due to the over use of both pesticides and herbicides by farmers. Though written more than 40 years ago, she predicted that the ongoing effects of these chemical agents would be so far reaching that people might one day experience ’silent springs’ devoid of song and migratory birds that herald the changing of the seasons.

Though Ms. Carson’s warnings have not completely come to pass, the use of carious chemical agents, not only by agriculture but also by many people on their own lawns and garden plants, eventually find their way into the water that we drink, resulting in health hazards ranging from birth defects to cancer. Many studies have been made relating to environmental damage caused by these chemicals, some of the more common ones being sulfonylurea (SU) and atrizine types of herbicides which are used by farmers as ‘weed killers’ for crops such as corn and soybeans – both important food crops. These herbicides eventually find their way into ground water aquifers, and have been shown to cause a number of health problems in humans ranging from learning disorders to over aggressive behavior patterns. A well known pesticide, DBCP, was once wide used in American states such as California and Iowa. This pesticide, though now banned in most places still causes a number of diseases and health disorders, including male infertility (the main effect it was supposed to have on insects, rodents, and other pests).

In Iowa, for example, a study made in 1966, only four years after the publication of Ms. Carson’s book, it was found that more than half of that state’s ground water was already contaminated by weed killers. The situation in many other states in America is as bad or worse as intensive commercial farming methods still use many of these chemical agents in order to increase crop yields.

Organic farming methods, though still on a much smaller scale than that of commercial agriculture, is showing a better way to grow crops without causing harm to the environment. By changing to an organic lifestyle, including the care and maintenance of one’s own lawn and garden, people can help contribute to preserving our environment and improving our health as well. It’s a small start, but by eliminating insect sprays and weed killers on our own properties we can contribute to improving our planet’s eco-system.