Incredible Edible - Todmorden's Good life: Introducing Britain's greenest town (The Independent)
The town centre is dotted with "help yourself" vegetable gardens; the market groans with local meat and vegetables, and at all eight of the town's schools the pupils eat locally produced meat and vegetables every lunchtime.
"It's a complete turnaround," said Pam Warhurst, a former leader of Calderdale Council, board member of Natural England and the person who masterminded the project – called Incredible Edible – and motivated her friends and neighbours to join in. "Our aim is to make our town entirely self-sufficient in food production by 2018 – and if we can carry on at the same rate as we've done over the past 18 months since we had our first meeting and set this initiative up, we're going to make it."
And the scheme's leaders are now hoping to export their idea: two weeks ago the town held a conference on how to make Incredible Edible-style initiatives work elsewhere, and more than 200 people from across Britain attended.
They heard the story of Todmorden's transformation, starting with what Ms Warhurst calls the "propaganda planting" of vegetables around the town centre 18 months ago. Nick Green, who runs a converted mill that provides workspace for local artists, took on the job of doing the planting. He said he chose the first venue – a disused health centre – because it was in the middle of the town and would attract plenty of attention. "We wanted everyone to see what we were doing, so they could ask questions and ultimately join in," he said. "The old health centre has plenty of land in front, so it was ideal. I didn't ask anyone's permission: I just went there with my spade and my seeds and I planted cabbages and rhubarb."
in contrast... great article by Ivor Tossell on the [uselessness] of FarmVille
(biggest technology-for-the-good-of-humanity fail)
When gamers become recruiters
When everyone else on the block has a virtual pig, you want one too
Published on Sunday, Nov. 29, 2009 11:24PM EST Last updated on Monday, Nov. 30, 2009 3:29AM EST
As 2009 winds down, the world of Facebook has fragmented into two camps: the people who are pretending to be farmers, and the rest, who are busy wishing a plague of locusts upon them.
Jason Logan / The Globe and Mail
from The Globe and Mail / Technology column
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and finally ....
from cutandpaint.org
