Hi, this is Geoff.
Welcome to the July 29th installment of the Friday Five. I'm still here in Malaysia working on an incredible project that I will continue to update you on in the coming weeks and months. Here's a quick 5 minute overview that I'd like to share with you to give you a sense of its tremendous scale. And more importantly, as a reminder that scale should never scare a good permaculturist off: As Bill was fond of reminding me, the same principles work whether it's a backyard food forest, or a massive, several hundred acre design.
Don't forget that there are a ton of gorgeous pictures about this project that we've been uploading to our Instagram account? Much, much more coming up....
Let's jump right in:
Cows, vindicated: We've heard stories about how cows are a significant cause of global warming. It turns out that the bad rap was somewhat sensationalist and a bit unfair, and that -- in fact -- crop monocultures have contributed more to global warming than any other source. Even more, it looks like grass fed beef can actually help combat global warming. More on this here.
War, terror, or climate? Watching the news, one would think that war, terrorism, and other dramatic events are the biggest impactors on many lives. It turns out that climate change and other extreme weather disasters have far greater impact, displacing one person each and every second, 3 to 10 times more than conflict and war. Just because you can't see it in a 30 second clip doesn't mean it's not happening. If politicians ever get around to declaring a "War on the War on the Environment," permaculture would be the # 1 "weapon."
A different kind of skyscraper: Ready for a, literally, vertical forest? These two skyscrapers in Milan (256 feet + 344 feet) have more than 700 trees and 90 species of plants. As cities become more dense, this trend of going up, up, and away is sure to gain in popularity.
David versus Goliath: A touching story about a small group of thoughtful citizens trying to do the right thing against big odds. A nice mix of community, environmentalism, and honest, hard work.
In case you missed it: Graham Bell reflects on Gardening With Bugs, and Suzan Simard gives a great TED talk about trees talking to each other (thank you, Will Hacket-Jones for passing that along!) If you enjoy these posts from our sister site, the non-profit Permaculture Research Institute, be sure to bookmark the site as several new articles go up weekly, or check out thousands of other past articles, here.
That's it for the Friday Five - short and sweet as promised.
Feel free to forward to a friend. Anyone can sign up for the next batch.
Cheers, and have a great weekend
Your friend,
Geoff
