Interesting article about the fast food chain Chipotle and how it has started to buy locally raised pork. A measure that presents an promising opportunity to farmers that have seek alternative farming methods. For decades, family-own restaurants and cafes have purchased some of their products from local farmers, adopting their menus to the local growing season. But for a national fast food chain to include local farmers into their list of suppliers is simply unprecedented. Although is definitely encouraging news that mark an trend away from organics and towards local foods, is too early to predict if other chains that shipped their food from all over the world will join the bandwagon.
Click HERE to read article
In other news, I've started to work on my garden plot, so stay tuned for some pics and thoughts
Wednesday, March 26, 2008
Thursday, March 20, 2008
The Financial Times: Expensive tastes: Rising costs force food up the political agenda
By Javier Blas and Jenny Wiggins
March 17 2008
permanent LINK
John Beddington, Britain's chief scientific adviser, had been in his
job for just two months when he outlined an unnerving scenario for his
new employers. The world, he argued earlier this month, faced an
enormous problem - one on a par with climate change - that
policymakers were nonetheless ignoring: food security.
To keep reading follow permanent LINK
March 17 2008
permanent LINK
John Beddington, Britain's chief scientific adviser, had been in his
job for just two months when he outlined an unnerving scenario for his
new employers. The world, he argued earlier this month, faced an
enormous problem - one on a par with climate change - that
policymakers were nonetheless ignoring: food security.
To keep reading follow permanent LINK
Wednesday, March 19, 2008
New link
For those of you considering a career in International Development, this website will be a good resource: http://www.studying-development.org/
Tuesday, March 18, 2008
Idealist; Nonprofit Career Fair
Hello there,
Just to let you know about a series of career fairs Idealist.org will be organizing. The one in Washington will be on April 2nd at G.W campus. for more info follow this link
Just to let you know about a series of career fairs Idealist.org will be organizing. The one in Washington will be on April 2nd at G.W campus. for more info follow this link
Thursday, March 13, 2008
Agriculture in Dogon Country
Hello readers our there.
It has really been a long time since my last post and I'm not sure who or what to blame. I've come to realize that the nature of this blog fluctuates in relationship to the need I feel for sharing experience with you, and lately I've been pretty selfish.
But not anymore, I just came back from a very exciting trip to West Africa and had the opportunity to visit Dogon Country in Mali, close to the border with Burkina Faso. Surrounded by dessert, Dogon Country refers to a series of villages located along a 150km escarpment and plateau. This dramatic landscape shelters one of the most "intact" cultures I ever seem: walking around their narrow mud house is like going back to prehistoric time. Unfortunately, the only sign of modernity is plastic junk that one sees scatter around....not too much though, and really very little compared to other places in Africa.
Picture above are one of the most common pieces of Dogon architecture: the granaries, usually filled with millet, sorghum and other indigenous grains, these will guarantee the food supply for the family until next rainy season. Tall and thin and made with a mix of mud and straw, they have to be above the ground to protect the grains from vermin. Inside, they are divided into diferent compartments that according to our guide represent the pattern of the cosmos. Dogon culture is very unique partially due to the harsh environment they inhabit and the long distance needed to reach the closest town. Very few product are imported from the urban centers and the only export, besides tourist souvenirs, are onions.
Onion were introduce by Marcel Griaule, a french anthropologist who exposed the Dogon to the rest of the world in the 40's. After living with them for 15 years, his studies concluded that the Dogon culture is extremely complex, a needed reputation for the people who many considered primitives. Among other things, he also taught them how to utilize their sandy soil to grow onions and helped them set up dams for irrigation. Today, the onions are sold throughout Mali and Burkina Faso. The picture above was taken at the village of Nombori, which is located at the bottom of the escarpment. For this reason, they have easier access to water allowing for thirsty vegetable to be grown. Up in the plateau, is really remarkable how as you walk from one village to another you see every little piece of land being utilized, with small plots of onions.
Getting back to the onion, the balls are then place in the roof of their huts. Once dry they are preserved and used for sauces. Other foodstuff are also dry in the roof to protect them from hungry goats and sheep that are commonly seem grazing around.
I had the opportunity to try millet fufu (boiled flour) with baobab sauce, made with dry onion leaves, fish powder, and baobab leafs, which if it wasn't for the slimy texture i would eat it everyday. Besides millet, eaten at all meals and in different ways, there is not much else. Those villages that have good access to water grow eggplants, squashes, tomatoes, and lettuce. But there is little meat, eggs, and milk. The tourist usually get a choice of beans and rice, couscous, or pasta, with a tomato based sauce a some chicken. Even though the food was ok, visiting latrines constantly and unwillingly became a big part of my trip.
For the Dogon, agriculture plays an essential role into their lives. Every year as the rain comes, sprouts of life pop up from the soil signaling a good crop. The harvest will determine their imminent future. Once the rain has gone elsewhere, houses will have to be rebuilted and gods called upon for the next drop of water. This continuous cycle has kept pristine a culture that rejects the values of the many in other parts of the world. So different, so wrong and so right, it is difficult to predict their future: undoubtedly a very uncertain one, with a climate that seems to get hotter and hotter, plastic that remains in the ground after the rain is gone and a dessert that keeps covering the little top soil left with infertile sand.
It has really been a long time since my last post and I'm not sure who or what to blame. I've come to realize that the nature of this blog fluctuates in relationship to the need I feel for sharing experience with you, and lately I've been pretty selfish.
But not anymore, I just came back from a very exciting trip to West Africa and had the opportunity to visit Dogon Country in Mali, close to the border with Burkina Faso. Surrounded by dessert, Dogon Country refers to a series of villages located along a 150km escarpment and plateau. This dramatic landscape shelters one of the most "intact" cultures I ever seem: walking around their narrow mud house is like going back to prehistoric time. Unfortunately, the only sign of modernity is plastic junk that one sees scatter around....not too much though, and really very little compared to other places in Africa.
Picture above are one of the most common pieces of Dogon architecture: the granaries, usually filled with millet, sorghum and other indigenous grains, these will guarantee the food supply for the family until next rainy season. Tall and thin and made with a mix of mud and straw, they have to be above the ground to protect the grains from vermin. Inside, they are divided into diferent compartments that according to our guide represent the pattern of the cosmos. Dogon culture is very unique partially due to the harsh environment they inhabit and the long distance needed to reach the closest town. Very few product are imported from the urban centers and the only export, besides tourist souvenirs, are onions.
Onion were introduce by Marcel Griaule, a french anthropologist who exposed the Dogon to the rest of the world in the 40's. After living with them for 15 years, his studies concluded that the Dogon culture is extremely complex, a needed reputation for the people who many considered primitives. Among other things, he also taught them how to utilize their sandy soil to grow onions and helped them set up dams for irrigation. Today, the onions are sold throughout Mali and Burkina Faso. The picture above was taken at the village of Nombori, which is located at the bottom of the escarpment. For this reason, they have easier access to water allowing for thirsty vegetable to be grown. Up in the plateau, is really remarkable how as you walk from one village to another you see every little piece of land being utilized, with small plots of onions.
Women take the green part of the onions and smash them into balls. Gender roles are extremely important in Dogon society, and women are not in the best place, at least in comparison to western society. For instance, when women have their period, they're isolated in little huts; they have no say in all village affairs, and genital mutilation is still widely practice. During the days that we spend trekking around the villages, we saw women do most of the work: they look for wood and collect water, they pound the millet and work the fields. Men would spend a lot of time at the villages' meeting place, the Togu-na or Case a' Palabras. Here is where all the village affairs are discussed, not surprisingly women are not allowed. Something neat about these Togu-na is that they are very low, about 3ft to 4ft high. The idea is that you cannot stand so arguments always remain at the same level, calmed.
Getting back to the onion, the balls are then place in the roof of their huts. Once dry they are preserved and used for sauces. Other foodstuff are also dry in the roof to protect them from hungry goats and sheep that are commonly seem grazing around.
I had the opportunity to try millet fufu (boiled flour) with baobab sauce, made with dry onion leaves, fish powder, and baobab leafs, which if it wasn't for the slimy texture i would eat it everyday. Besides millet, eaten at all meals and in different ways, there is not much else. Those villages that have good access to water grow eggplants, squashes, tomatoes, and lettuce. But there is little meat, eggs, and milk. The tourist usually get a choice of beans and rice, couscous, or pasta, with a tomato based sauce a some chicken. Even though the food was ok, visiting latrines constantly and unwillingly became a big part of my trip.
For the Dogon, agriculture plays an essential role into their lives. Every year as the rain comes, sprouts of life pop up from the soil signaling a good crop. The harvest will determine their imminent future. Once the rain has gone elsewhere, houses will have to be rebuilted and gods called upon for the next drop of water. This continuous cycle has kept pristine a culture that rejects the values of the many in other parts of the world. So different, so wrong and so right, it is difficult to predict their future: undoubtedly a very uncertain one, with a climate that seems to get hotter and hotter, plastic that remains in the ground after the rain is gone and a dessert that keeps covering the little top soil left with infertile sand.
WP Article on working abroad
Laying the Groundwork for Overseas WorkNearly Every Field Is International
By Lily WhitemanSpecial to The Washington Post. Sunday, March 9, 2008; K01
Michael Eschleman, the Peace Corps' country director for Paraguay, remembers discussing the guerrilla wars and revolutions of Latin America back in college.
"We said things like, 'The U.S. should do this' . . . or 'The campesinos in El Salvador should do that.'
"And suddenly, it hit me: How could I possibly know what our foreign policy should be, or recommend any course of action for other countries, if I had never visited them or even been out of the U.S.?"
Eschleman since has spent 15 years working in volunteer and then salaried positions on community development projects in Latin America for the Peace Corps.
If you would like to work overseas for the government, be aware that increased interest in foreign affairs has boosted competition for international careers, said Constance C. Jackson, associate administrator of the Agriculture Department's Foreign Agricultural Service.
Nevertheless, you can build credentials to impress federal employers:
¿ Pursue your passions: Experts on international careers agree that almost all fields have international applications. So Betsy Davis, chief of the CIA's Recruitment and Retention Center, echoes the advice of many federal recruiters when she recommends preparing for an international career by "picking an area of study that you absolutely love and doing well at it."
She said, "When you are good at something, it shows."
¿ Earn overseas experience: Study abroad or, during the summer or academic year, work on an overseas internship with the State Department, the U.S. Agency for International Development, the Foreign Agricultural Service, the International Trade Administration, or one of the international organization listed in the careers section of the State Department's Web site ( http://state.gov). Such internships offer experience with high-impact issues, including pollution, poverty and terrorism.
"The sky is the limit for interns who show aptitude," Jackson said. For example, one high-producing intern working in a temporarily short-staffed agricultural trade office in Moscow recently managed that office and oversaw preparations for a major trade show.
Peace Corps experience is also prized by federal employers. About a third of USAID's Foreign Service have it, said Thomas Davis, who works in USAID's human resources office.
¿ Become worldly: Learn about international affairs through courses, travel and extracurricular activities. "Follow domestic and foreign media outlets, such as the Economist and the BBC, that offer strong international coverage and may be available online," said Isabel Otero, who works to improve Irish cancer research and care with the National Cancer Institute's Ireland-Northern Ireland Cancer Consortium.
¿ Demonstrate your public-service mettle in the United States:"It would be great if everyone could go overseas, but if you can't -- and many people can't -- you can show your skills and dedication in different ways," said Marianne Myles, director of the State Department's employment office. She suggested joining service-oriented campus and community organizations. Others suggested working in disaster relief or in economically depressed areas in this country.
¿ Hold domestic internships: Otero worked as an intern at the National Institutes of Health during high school and college and thus got her foot in the door at the Department of Health and Human Services. After college, she participated in that department's Emerging Leaders Program, which eventually led to her job at the National Cancer Institute.
¿ Show leadership: Manage events, teams and seminars in school and lead projects at work, Myles said.
¿ Seek mentors: Solicit career advice from international professionals whose footsteps you would like to follow, Eschleman said. "Everyone loves to talk about their experiences," he said.
¿ Learn languages: Fluency in foreign languages is advantageous. But it's not a prerequisite, because many jobs provide language training.
¿ Join professional organizations: Network and stay current in your field by using online and in-person resources provided by professional organizations and organizations addressing international issues, including the Society for International Development and the American Foreign Service Association.
¿ Be persistent: Many job-seekers must submit multiple applications before landing overseas positions, Myles said.
By Lily WhitemanSpecial to The Washington Post. Sunday, March 9, 2008; K01
Michael Eschleman, the Peace Corps' country director for Paraguay, remembers discussing the guerrilla wars and revolutions of Latin America back in college.
"We said things like, 'The U.S. should do this' . . . or 'The campesinos in El Salvador should do that.'
"And suddenly, it hit me: How could I possibly know what our foreign policy should be, or recommend any course of action for other countries, if I had never visited them or even been out of the U.S.?"
Eschleman since has spent 15 years working in volunteer and then salaried positions on community development projects in Latin America for the Peace Corps.
If you would like to work overseas for the government, be aware that increased interest in foreign affairs has boosted competition for international careers, said Constance C. Jackson, associate administrator of the Agriculture Department's Foreign Agricultural Service.
Nevertheless, you can build credentials to impress federal employers:
¿ Pursue your passions: Experts on international careers agree that almost all fields have international applications. So Betsy Davis, chief of the CIA's Recruitment and Retention Center, echoes the advice of many federal recruiters when she recommends preparing for an international career by "picking an area of study that you absolutely love and doing well at it."
She said, "When you are good at something, it shows."
¿ Earn overseas experience: Study abroad or, during the summer or academic year, work on an overseas internship with the State Department, the U.S. Agency for International Development, the Foreign Agricultural Service, the International Trade Administration, or one of the international organization listed in the careers section of the State Department's Web site ( http://state.gov). Such internships offer experience with high-impact issues, including pollution, poverty and terrorism.
"The sky is the limit for interns who show aptitude," Jackson said. For example, one high-producing intern working in a temporarily short-staffed agricultural trade office in Moscow recently managed that office and oversaw preparations for a major trade show.
Peace Corps experience is also prized by federal employers. About a third of USAID's Foreign Service have it, said Thomas Davis, who works in USAID's human resources office.
¿ Become worldly: Learn about international affairs through courses, travel and extracurricular activities. "Follow domestic and foreign media outlets, such as the Economist and the BBC, that offer strong international coverage and may be available online," said Isabel Otero, who works to improve Irish cancer research and care with the National Cancer Institute's Ireland-Northern Ireland Cancer Consortium.
¿ Demonstrate your public-service mettle in the United States:"It would be great if everyone could go overseas, but if you can't -- and many people can't -- you can show your skills and dedication in different ways," said Marianne Myles, director of the State Department's employment office. She suggested joining service-oriented campus and community organizations. Others suggested working in disaster relief or in economically depressed areas in this country.
¿ Hold domestic internships: Otero worked as an intern at the National Institutes of Health during high school and college and thus got her foot in the door at the Department of Health and Human Services. After college, she participated in that department's Emerging Leaders Program, which eventually led to her job at the National Cancer Institute.
¿ Show leadership: Manage events, teams and seminars in school and lead projects at work, Myles said.
¿ Seek mentors: Solicit career advice from international professionals whose footsteps you would like to follow, Eschleman said. "Everyone loves to talk about their experiences," he said.
¿ Learn languages: Fluency in foreign languages is advantageous. But it's not a prerequisite, because many jobs provide language training.
¿ Join professional organizations: Network and stay current in your field by using online and in-person resources provided by professional organizations and organizations addressing international issues, including the Society for International Development and the American Foreign Service Association.
¿ Be persistent: Many job-seekers must submit multiple applications before landing overseas positions, Myles said.