HAPPY NEW YEAR......

Today is our last day in what can only be called a year of recognition by many.

I believe the community in general is very slowly awakening to the fact that we have some very real challenges ahead.......peak everything!

For the New Year ahead I wish for you all Peace, Compassion, Health, Love and all that is needed to keep you safe, secure, fed and somewhere you can call home.

Shopping Local......

Last week I went shopping to our local butchers, who also has a local fruit and vegie counter. He is producing our Christmas ham himself from local pork. His meats are all local or no more than a couple of hundred kilometres away, he knows his suppliers and can tell you anything you want to know about the product and the same goes with the local producers of the fruit and vegies. Now perhaps I am a bit of a nerd, but to me this is exciting, wonderful stuff!

In a world that is gripped by one financial crisis after another, in a world where the dollar needs continual growth but is attached to finite resources, it is about time we all took stern stock of how we can increase our own local resilience ready for the challenging times ahead where oil costs increase considerably....and we have already seen how that will make our food much more costly.

It's time to consider the real costs to a community that loses its local business base. Independent local businesses employ a wide array of supporting services. They hire architects, designers, carpenters, sign writers and contractors for construction. Opportunities grow for local accountants, insurance brokers, computer consultants, lawyers, advertising agencies and staff to help run it. Local retailers and distributors also carry a higher percentage of locally-made goods than the chains, creating more jobs for local producers.

In contrast, a new chain store typically puts in place a clone of other units, eliminates the need for local planning, and uses a minimum of local goods and services. In a company-owned store, the profits are promptly exported to corporate headquarters.....and that more often than not is overseas!

If we all chose to shop locally we would have more choice and a better price, it's the same old game of numbers. Instead we chose cheap nasty products, made god knows where most times by people who are paid a pittance and the money flies not just out of our community, but out of our country in many instances. Stop and think about your community right now... If it's anything like many smaller towns, the food is controlled by Coles & Woolies, if they left town tomorrow where would you be?

Local owners with much of their life savings invested in their businesses have a natural interest in the long-term health of the community. Community-based businesses are essential to charitable endeavors, frequently serving on local boards, and supporting a variety of causes. Local businesses build our community, give it greater strength when times are hard and often provide a far superior product.

Have you ever thought about your food miles when you're eating snow peas from China?

Food Miles in Australia: A Preliminary study of Melbourne, Victoria by Asha Bee Abraham and Sophie Gaballa, estimates the distances travelled for food items found in a typical shopping basket and the resulting greenhouse emissions from this transportation.

The research revealed that food items like oranges, sausages, tea, baked beans etc with ingredients sourced from overseas have seen more of the world than most people. The report estimates that the total distance travelled by 29 of our most common food items is 70,803 km—that's nearly two times the distance around the Earth.

Calculating road transport alone, the shopping basket travelled 21,073 km, almost the whole way around Australia's coastline. The resulting greenhouse gas emissions estimate for all food transporting trucks carrying these 25 items on any given day is the equivalent of 2,830 cars driving for a whole year. And that's just for one shopping basket of 25 items.

The Solution? What about choosing to buy organic, that will help the planet?

Well, no Food miles still count here, what you need to do is:
• Buy Locally Produced direct from farmers either at the farm gate, farmers markets or shops that buy local produce and sell on.
• Buy in Season avoid summer fruits in winter.
• Grow your Own - now we are talking food feet, not food miles (This is my all time favourite thing to do, nothing better than walking outside and picking your dinner)
• Learn to preserve the excess and
• Buy canned or bottled goods from your own country by preference.

Buying local is all about bringing resilience back into your community. It is about US taking responsibility for creating demand for local sustainable practices and doing something about it through our choices.

I think it is time to ask ourselves the hard question.....why buy another countrys product when we can support local, or at least Aussie! For many I fully realise there is a budget in mind, and not much room to move in it. But that is where smart shopping comes in, buying on special, using less and making it go further etc.......there are options that would allow even those on a budget to buy local, it just takes smart planning and usuage in most cases.

It eases the load on our environment, it builds local community resilience, it is often healthier, you have greater knowledge of the product you are purchasing, and being local you can build some great networks and friendships.

GM contamination continues...

The latest debacle over GM foods, again only a few towns away from our farmers here, the story on one of my favourite sites HERE.....Ian and Jodi James have been farming near the small WA town of Cunderdin for over 15 years. They’re proud to grow conventional canola that's not genetically modified. But on 3 November, a violent storm washed GM canola from a neighbours’ paddock across their farm.
Ian and Jodi suspected they would have GM canola seeds on their farm, so Greenpeace provided Ian and Jodi with free GM canola test kits.

Over two days of testing, they found numerous GM canola seeds up to twenty metres into their crop. Ian and Jodi were devastated. They have lost their crop, and now face the expensive task of trying to get rid of GM canola from their land. They might even lose their premium for GM-free canola in the future.

Ian and Jodi have lost their right to grow safe GM-free canola. Why should the James’ have to pay for the costs of GM canola contamination, when they didn’t want to grow it?

Greenpeace is urging the Western Australian Government to protect farmers like Ian and Jodi from the costs of GM contamination by introducing Farmers Protection Legislation.

Want to know what's in your food? Tough luck!!!
Around two years ago, the federal government set up an expert panel to make recommendations to improve Australia’s food labelling laws. They needn’t have bothered. The public’s call for comprehensive labelling and testing of all GM ingredients fell on deaf ears. While the panel’s recommendations weren’t as strong as we need, the government snubbed them anyway. Once again, Australians are being denied the fundamental right to know what’s in our food.

Baker's Delight commit to GM-free bread
With Australia on the brink of commercialising GM wheat, we called on the biggest bakery franchise – Bakers Delight – to support the call for better GM labelling and to rule out using GM wheat when it becomes available. Baker’s Delight quickly promised customers that they wouldn’t be using GM wheat in their baked goods.
When will mankind ever learn?.... believe me, there is much still to be discovered about GM effects, and none of it will be want we want to hear.

Rain, Rain and more Rain.....

Yesterday saw a huge thunderstorm here. We had an inch in about 30 minutes! Roads were flooding and of course I was loving every minute of it, but felt desperately sorry for the farmers who stand to lose money because of it!

Again the odd roof flew off here and there, one whole one landing neatly in front of the premises in the middle of the street!

Flash flooding of course, a few shops inundated with the surge of water poor things and one building hit quite hard with a lightening strike!

This street had completely vanished after about 15 minutes of the downpour.

As awful as it was for some I am so glad I don't have to water for at least 3 days.

Our government is at it again....

Just when does the bloody government actually do what the people want?? I am so fed up with the latest debacle related to the labelling of GM food!

The Commonwealth Government via Health Minister Nicola Roxon has decided:


Most GM ingredients should remain unlabelled. This includes: GM canola, soy, corn, and cottonseed oils; starches, sugars and other derivative from GM crops. Milk, cheese, honey, eggs, meat and fish derived from animals fed GM feed. Additives from GM bacteria and fungi.

Producers with GM contaminated products can avoid being monitored or tested. This means that companies such as Wyeth which produced GM contaminated soy infant formula don't need to be monitored to ensure their product is clean of unintended GM contamination in the future

GM labelling should eventually be dropped altogether.

Enough is enough, it is time we put pen to paper people!.....well, figuratively speaking anyway. If we don't take the stance now we cannot complain years later when problems arise....

So, using this link I made sure I was heard. The letter took me 2 seconds to do, I added a couple of paragraphs myself and with one click it was gone to those that make the decisions...my letter went something like this:

Attention: Members of the Australia and New Zealand Food Regulation Ministerial Council
Dear Minister,
The Blewett Report recommendations will leave most GM ingredients on our supermarket shelves unlabelled. This is unsatisfactory - 85% of the 7,000 submissions to the Food Labelling Review called for full GM labelling.

Please label all ingredients fully or partly derived from a GM crop or process. This includes ingredients from a GM crop (ie GM corn, canola, soy, sugar and cotton); milk, meat, eggs, fish and honey from animals fed GM feed; from GM derived additives, processing aids, colours and flavours.

Remember how safe Thalidomide was? It was not discovered how dangerous it could be until years later when the connection was made between birth deformities and the medication. GM food will be even more insidious and on a cellular level we are asking for trouble unless we complete more research before we consider adding it into our food chain.

I urge just one thing, one human right. Please allow me the freedom to choose what I want in my food by ensuring any and ALL GM food, partial or otherwise, is subject to compulsory labelling.

The letter goes bulk to:
Ms Katy Gallagher, Minister for Health AC
Ms Katrina Hodgkinson, Minister for Primary Industries NSW
Mrs Jillian Skinner, Minister for Health NSW
The Hon Konstantine Vatskalis, Minister for Health NT
The Hon Geoff Wilson, Minister for Health QLD
The Hon Tim Mulherin, Minister for Agriculture, Food and Regional Economies QLD
The Hon John Hill, MP, Minister for Health SA
The Hon Michael O'Brien, Minister for Agriculture, Food and Fisheries SA
The Hon Gail Gago, Minister for Agriculture, Food and Fisheries TAS
The Hon Bryan Green, Minister for Primary Industries and Water TAS
The Hon David Davis, Minister for Health VIC
The Hon Peter Walsh, Minister for Agriculture and Food Security VIC
The Hon Dr Kim Hames, Minister for Health WA
The Hon Terry Redman, Minister for Agriculture and Food WA
Federal Government:
The Hon Nicola Roxon, Minister for Health and Ageing - Federal
The Hon Catherine King, Parliamentary Secretary for Health and Ageing - Federal
Senator the Hon Joe Ludwig, Minister for Agriculture - Federal
New Zealand:
The Hon Kate Wilkinson Minister for Food Safety

Please think about sending in your thoughts too, you have until the 8th of December, 2011.

Climate change and our food....

Food prices have reached a record high this year, fueling unrest in regions like North Africa and the Middle East.

A recent study presented at 2010's UN climate summit in Cancun predicted that global warming could double grain prices by 2050 and leave millions more malnourished. This latest research, "Climate Trends and Global Crop Production Since 1980," was published in the journal Science.

Australia is the canary in the coal mine for climate-change impacts. The driest inhabited continent on earth, is regarded as highly vulnerable. A study by the country’s blue-chip Commonwealth Scientific and Industrial Research Organisation identified its ecosystems as “potentially the most fragile” on earth in the face of the threat.

Australia is but the first and most seriously impacted of the arid sub-tropical (and near-sub-tropical) climates that are facing horrific desertification from climate change.

Some regions are already at times near the upper limits for farming. The tropical north is vulnerable to staggering floods. The country is increasingly being whipsawed by human-caused climate change — just as the U.S. SouthEast is

“In southern Australia, and most clearly and strongly in southwest Australia, the warming will be accompanied by a drying, on average, that will create a special challenge and that is already being felt in the Western Australian wheat belt, leading to some major changes in farming patterns,” Garnaut said today, based on the climate outlook provided by models

World food prices are expected to gain in the first half of the twenty-first century, reflecting a rising population and higher incomes, slower agricultural yield growth and the effect of climate change

The drying trend has important consequences for the Western Australian wheatbelt. The growing season has become shorter and drier in the northeastern part of this area, and yields in this region have declined (Stephens et al. 2009). By 2050, changing rainfall and higher temperatures could result in yield losses of more than 30% (van Gool 2009).

We are fast running out of time to change our habits, and I suspect we have supassed the time to make big changes for our benefit. The challenges now I believe will be in learning how to manage what is coming over the next decades.

I now have 3 large shaded areas for growing vegies, those fruits that need it are also shaded, and next year it's water tanks all over the place.........what have you got planned or already in place?

Planting for December in the temperate zones of Aussie..

Just click on the list and you will be able to read:)

Courtesy of gardenate.com

Now this is Scary Stuff......

In a stunning move that has civil libertarians stuttering with disbelief, the U.S. Senate has just passed a bill that effectively ends the Bill of Rights in America.

This bill, passed late last night in a 93-7 vote, declares the entire USA to be a "battleground" upon which U.S. military forces can operate with impunity, overriding Posse Comitatus and granting the military the unchecked power to arrest, detain, interrogate and even assassinate U.S. citizens with impunity.

It's being called the most traitorous act ever witnessed in the Senate, and the language of the bill is cleverly designed to make you think it doesn't apply to Americans, but toward the end of the bill it essentially says it can apply to Americans "if we want it to."

...the detention mandate to use indefinite military detention in terrorism cases isn’t limited to foreigners. It’s confusing, because two different sections of the bill seem to contradict each other, but in the judgment of the University of Texas’ Robert Chesney — a nonpartisan authority on military detention — “U.S. citizens are included in the grant of detention authority.”

Americans need to stand up fast to this one I am thinking!

More on the story from HERE
Picture courtesy of: science.howstuffworks.com

Walking your own Path........

Tonight I read a friends post on how she is perceived by others around her when she talks about her lifestyle, it brought to mind some favourite quotes instantly so I thought it a good opportunity to voice my thoughts on the whole matter!

Often when we talk about our simple lifestyle it challenges others, and that's not always comfortable for them, perhaps it is because they know on a deeper level they too should be paying more attention to the simpler things in life like caring for our planet, sharing more resources, caring for those around us by being good stewards etc?

Perhaps it is because they have never been educated so they find the concept too complex to understand, or is it because they would find a simpler lifestyle too much hard work and prefer the easier consumeristic, instant gratification lifestyle?

For decades now I, like many of us, have been described in various ways, kook, greenie, mung bean etc. Does it bother me? No, because I know that what I am working towards feels right!

Don't ever let anyones opinions move you away from what you believe to be right, don't let anothers derision sway you from the path you have chosen, a good life is one lived honestly in every way.

How have I dealt with it over the years? I choose to either take that particular opportunity to educate the person or I ignore, either way I will stay true to who I am.......

Most people are more comfortable with old problems than with new solutions. ~Author Unknown

Be who you are and say what you feel, because those who mind don't matter and those who matter don't mind. ~Dr. Seuss

Great spirits have always found violent opposition from mediocrities. The latter cannot understand it when a man does not thoughtlessly submit to hereditary. ~Albert Einstein

The conventional view serves to protect us from the painful job of thinking. ~J.K. Galbraith

The individual has always had to struggle to keep from being overwhelmed by the tribe. If you try it, you will be lonely often, and sometimes frightened. But no price is too high to pay for the privilege of owning yourself. ~Friedrich Nietzsche

“To be a star, you must shine your own light, follow your own path, and don't worry about the darkness, for that is when the stars shine brightest”

Report warns of deadly climate change...........

A new report is warning Australians face dying in heatwaves and catching infectious diseases as a result of climate change.

The Climate Commission says climbing temperatures will lead to more natural disasters and changing rainfall patterns, which will have an impact on people's health as much as on the environment.

The report includes a worst-case scenario where deaths from hotter temperatures in Queensland and the Northern Territory could multiply tenfold by 2100.

The dire predictions were released as the United Nations' World Meteorological Organisation (WMO) released figures showing that 13 of the warmest years on record have occurred within the last decade and a half.

The year 2011 caps a decade that ties the record as the hottest ever measured, the WMO said in its annual report on climate trends and extreme weather events, unveiled at UN climate talks in Durban, South Africa.

"Our science is solid and it proves unequivocally that the world is warming and that this warming is due to human activities," WMO secretary-general Michel Jarraud said in a statement, urging policy makers should take note of the findings.
Story from HERE