New videos of Simple Living Institute

Over the holiday break I had some free time to google search on the internet and I found some video footage of our Organic Growers Meeting and our newly released Local Food Guide on YouTube. I posted them on our media page on the website. Check em out at http://www.simplelivinginstitute.org/media.html

Keeping GMO's off your Plate

By: Dr. Samadhi Keever

To contact Samadhi visit: www.injoyhealthcare.com

Genetically Modified Organisms were first introduced into our food supply in the 1980’s. They appeared without consumers knowing what was happening…until recently. Currently there is a GMO scare circulating through the social media. GMO crops look, smell, and taste like normal food, so how can we protect ourselves?

A GMO By Many Names Is The Same:

GMOs are referred to by several acronyms and proper names: Genetically Modified Organism, GMO, Genetically Modified, GM, Transgenic, Transgene, and Bt (which is the name for a bacterium used during the genetic modification process). Plant seeds are often referred to as Bt or Round Up Ready, implying they are ‘safe’ to spray with the glyphosate herbicide called Round Up, which is manufactured by Monsanto.

There are hundreds of crops being experimented with using bacteria, viruses, antibiotics, plant, animal, and insect DNA and this is cause for alarm. Although there is much experimentation, not all of these science projects make it to the grocery shelves. Some that have made it to the shelves have been rejected. Years ago, the DNA from cold water fish was added to a tomato seed, producing a GM tomato plant that was cold-hearty. This failed in the market place because consumers didn’t like the flavor. Crossing a fish gene with a vegetable gene is suspect and the side-effects to human health are yet to be determined.

Current List of GM Foods:

The following Genetically Modified foods are being sold in our stores right now: corn, wheat, soy, canola, Hawaiian papaya, alfalfa, zucchini, and yellow crookneck squash. Buy organic! USDA Certified Organic guidelines (currently) do not allow GM foods to carry an organic label.

Sources of GM Foods in the Food Supply:

GM wheat, corn, and soy show up in most boxed or packaged ‘foods’ and this is what the scary statistics in the social media are pointing to. Wheat, corn, and soy are farmed in massive quantities. These crops are used by manufacturers to make things such as ketchup, vitamin supplements, eco-friendly, non-plastic corn utensils, veggie burgers and other vegan and vegetarian meat-substitutes, tofu, soy milk, corn syrup, energy bars, protein powders, cereals, breads, candies, snack ‘foods’, pastries, food additives, rennet, artificial sweeteners, enzymes, and the list goes on.

GM crops are used as feed for livestock and poultry, which translates into meat, eggs, and dairy containing GM constituents. Buy meat, poultry, and dairy from local farmers who you can talk with about what they are feeding their animals. Farm raised fish are also fed genetically modified grains. Get your fish labeled wild-caught and locally sourced if available.

Other sources of GM contamination are dairy products from cows injected with rbGH. This is a Genetically Modified hormone (created by Monsanto) to increase the production of milk. Organic milk does not contain rbGH.

Grass Roots…Taking Action, Get Involved!

There are many resources that we can utilize to stay aware and educated of what is actually in the food supply here in the United States. It is important to clarify ‘in the United States” because GM seeds and food are being exported to other countries.

There is now a voluntary Non-GMO seal that companies can receive to distinguish their product from GMO competitors. If you see a product labeled with a Non-GMO seal, support this company by purchasing their product. Getting this seal is a costly process that is not mandatory. Many of these companies are small, independent businesses, which have elected to put their product through this expensive, voluntary testing regime to earn this seal.

Our shopping dollars influence what is being sold in the stores. GMOs are not allowed in USDA Certified Organic Foods. Buy ORGANIC! There is a Non-GMO Shopping Guide which lists companies that guarantee there are no GM ingredients in their food. Download the Non-GMO Shopping Guide online for free (see Resources).

The Institute for Responsible Technology is working diligently with groups such as The Organic Consumers Association and The Center for Food Safety. These organizations are the leaders taking large corporations such as Monsanto to court in a monumental effort to keep GM crops from entering into our food supply. They are working to create a mandatory label on foods that have GM ingredients. Support these organizations and sign up for their email newsletters. The Organic Consumers Association fuels the Millions Against Monsanto Campaign; join this effort on their website (see Resources).

Shopping for locally produced items is beneficial for our local economy and gives us a chance to meet the folks involved in growing, raising, packaging, and selling the food we eat. Farmer’s Markets and local food stores such as the Florida Homegrown Co-op in Orlando and Essential Health in Altamonte Springs provide locally sourced foods.

Make your own grass roots movement…grow your own! GM seeds do not make it into the home garden. Having your own garden is a wonderful way to keep your green thumb on the pulse of your own food supply.

Resources:

Institute for Responsible Technology (http://www.ResponsibleTechnology.org)

Center for Food Safety (http://www.CenterForFoodSafety.org)

Non-GMO shopping guide (free download) ( http://www.NonGmoShoppingGuide.com)

Organic Consumers Association (http://www.OrganicConsumers.org)

Millions Against Monsanto Campaign (http://www.OrganicConsumers.org/monsanto/index.cfm)

Uncertain Peril (book) by Claire Hope Cummings

The Future of Food (movie)

Food Inc. (movie)

Florida Homegrown Co-op (http://www.homegrowncoop.org)

Essential Health Market (http://www.hooversmarket.com)

Community Supported Agriculture

Local farms and local farmers

Farmers Markets

Your own garden

The Winter Park Urban farm experiment

The Winter Park Urban Farm is an urban farming experiment in the heart of Winter Park. We will be meeting once a week throughout this Fall to work the farm and learn about urban agriculture. The mission is to take a vacant residential lot in Winter Park and convert its fallow land into a productive harvest garden.

With 11 weeks to work with we are looking to see just how much produce we can grow and bring to market at this year’s Winter Park Harvest Festival. Along the way we will beoffering volunteers and our “ag-curious” neighbors free lessons on the in’s and out’s of organic agriculture.

Join Tia Meer and John Rife for the next farm days at the Winter Park Urban Farm scheduled for Tuesday October 4th from 4-6pm and Thursday October 13th from 10am till noon . We will be planting more biointensive beds of vegetables and checking on our baby bean, broccoli, cabbage, collard, cucumber, carrots, and pea plants. Bring your favorite shovel! More info at http://winterparkharvestfestival.com/market/urban-farming-experiment/466

Making Connections: Anarchy & Permanent Culture

Permaculture is about allowing natural systems to exist. Its about helping them to become more diverse and therefore, strong, healthy, and “more productive”. Modern thinking and philosophy involves that you apply force to a system in order to bend it to your will, that we become "masters over nature". The conventional approach is that a system will either perform as you instruct it, or be destroyed and replaced. And I do mean DESTROYED. Current landscaping techniques vitiate healthy natural systems so that they can install a particular order that is convenient to manipulate and control, but that devastate millions of years of perfectly balanced ecosystems. This can sometimes be repaired, but the overall pollution may make some areas toxic breeding grounds, incapable of sustaining life.

The good news is that natural, organic systems, although complex, can be “guided” along with ever diminishing need for human intervention by the use of bio-mimicry. Of course the answer is not to destroy the natural systems in the first place. Our best option would be to allow the system to interact, while introducing beneficial elements that offset our use of an area.

These natural systems, I believe, are the essence of anarchism. Anyone who has observed nature can tell you is that when you change the natural balance of a system, the end results are almost always a disaster. Anarchism is about belonging to natural systems. Those that evolve from free interaction between autonomous actors, both in nature and in human social structures. And as with permaculture, it is necessary that each actor be allowed to evolve and grow. As the anarchist-ecologist Murray Bookchin put it,

"The notion that man must dominate nature emerges directly from the domination of man by man...But it was not until organic community relation...dissolved into market relationships that the planet itself was reduced to a resource for exploitation."

Unnatural systems force actors to perform in a rigid manner, or risk destruction. Natural systems allow actors to unfold as a part of their environment, providing fertile ground that promotes growth, diversity, and resilience, not destruction.

We, as living organisms, evolve along with our environment. The mutilation of these natural systems destroys not only that system or resource, but destroys life on a cellular level that even human stewardship cannot redeem. Fortunately, we don’t have to rely on artificial science to fix the problems humans create in their environment, including their social structures. Natural systems already know how to deal with those problems. If only we would let nature reign.

Simple Living Organic Grower's Meeting – the Seed Exchange

Get your seeds ready and arrive early at 6:45pm on August 17, 2011 at Leu Gardens for Simple Living Institute's August Seed Exchange. For details, check out:

Simple Living Calendar

Seed Exchange Guidelines

See you there!

shayla@simplelivinginstitute.org

Orlando Permaculture Design Course

We are pleased to offer the second Permaculture Design Course at the Econ Farm in Orlando, FL. This will be a weekend-format 72-hour course that will give you an in-depth understanding of Permaculture design concepts and applications in the Central Florida region. Participants that attend all sessions of this class and complete the final design project will receive a certificate in Permaculture Design.

Permaculture is a design for sustainable living. Permaculture's foundation of principles and design concepts are universal and can be suited for any region or location. The principles of permaculture can help us reduce society's overuse of industrially produced resources which are destroying the Earth's ecosystems and help us transition to self-reliant homesteads.

Course Dates:
September 17 and 24
October 1, 8, 15, 22, and 29
November 5 and 6

Fee: $1,150 members / $1,200 non-members
Advanced Registration Required! Class size limited to 12 people.
Registration ends Sept 7th, 2011
Contact us to request the course overview
Tia Meer at (321) 217-8492
tiameer@gmail.com
www.simplelivinginstitute.​org/econfarm.html

Mead Garden Community Garden

Join us for a volunteer work day at Mead Garden's Community Garden in Winter Park. The community garden is also looking to fill some vacant plots. Meet at the garden site at 8:45am and bring hat, sunscreen, water, and tools to trim brush and trees. More info and map to the garden site at http://winterparkharvestfestival.com/gardening/community-garden-day-mead-gardens-this-saturday/417