Building Community

Biodiversity in Kanazawa: Autumn’s lesson

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Various traditional industries rely on the water resources of the region, from paper, gold leaf manufacturing and silk dyeing, to sake and soy sauce production. The arrival of autumn marks the start of many of the processes associated with these industries, as it is during the cold months of the year that water is clear. Biodiversity has supported Kanazawa’s traditional industries at all levels: through the water-regulating function of the forests, through the direct provision of plant materials, and through the workings of the microscopic diversity of organisms involved in the processes of fermentation central to much of the local food culture.

A write-up of the 2012 Transition Network conference. The best yet.

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Transition folks from around the world gathered last weekend at Battersea Arts Centre for the 6th annual Transition Network conference. In a week when the Arctic ice reached its smallest ever extent, scientists warned that the world’s weather could be on the verge of running amok and it was suggested that Saudi Arabia, always meant to be the ‘swing producer’ on whom the rest of the world could depend for reliable oil supplies, may become a net importer of oil by 2030, the theme of the conference was, appropriately, ‘Building resilience in extraordinary times’.

A life of abundance without money

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Daniel Suelo, 51, has spent the morning gorging himself on young green shoots of tumbleweed and fixing a rack to the back of his new (gifted) bike with a spool of bailing wire. Suelo gets around on a bike or by the flick of his thumb, on discarded spools of bailing wire and other useful throwaways, and on the generosity of others. Money has been absent from his life ever since he gave away the last of his savings twelve years ago, a move he says brought an authenticity and richness to his life that wasn’t there before.

A write-up of the 2012 Transition Network conference. The best yet.

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Transition folks from around the world gathered last weekend at Battersea Arts Centre for the 6th annual Transition Network conference. In a week when the Arctic ice reached its smallest ever extent, scientists warned that the world’s weather could be on the verge of running amok and it was suggested that Saudi Arabia, always meant to be the ‘swing producer’ on whom the rest of the world could depend for reliable oil supplies, may become a net importer of oil by 2030, the theme of the conference was, appropriately, ‘Building resilience in extraordinary times’.

Hopeful Harvest: Food and agriculture as a foundation for peace in Northern Afghanistan

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This apparent disconnect between the symptoms of a failed state and the remedies suggested by what is seen to constitute its healthy counterpart makes it difficult to imagine a way out of failed-statehood. We contend that it is necessary to rethink what a failed state is, to understand, at a rather more practical, grassroots level, the drivers of failed or successful societies.

The green tea ecosystem of Shizuoka

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Throughout Japan there exist landscapes called satoyama in which people live and work in harmony with nature by combining traditional wisdom with scientific knowledge to practice agriculture in a manner that nurtures biodiversity. This article complements the video brief that looks at green tea produced in the village of Higashiyama, Kakegawa City, Shizuoka by using grassland resources to protect and augment soil, yielding a high quality product and giving haven to other plants, some of them important to Japanese culture.