So should it be any surprise that when we break bread and eat together with people from backgrounds different than our own, fear falls away and we find previously unanticipated common ground?

If there is a corollary to that principle, it is that when we get outside to work side by side together to restore food-producing landscapes and to recover historically declining food species or varieties, we harvest an even more delicious capacity to respect one another and move toward long-term ...

In rural areas I know well, the elders I know love the land but hate the feeling that their grandchildren will have to leave their homes and move elsewhere to find livable wages and satisfying livelihoods.

What if we helped them find jobs helping to recover rare wild food species and to increase the food-producing capacity of their rural landscapes through restoring habitats for fish and game, wild foraged plants and other non-timber natural products? What if family members had a ...

This week, Jews and Christians are mulling over these words from a time when thousands of refugees hungry for food and justice had fled Egypt and were anxious about their future:  “And this is how you refugees shall eat it: with a belt on your waist, only sandals on your feet, and your shepherd’s staff in your hand. You shall eat it in haste, in hope of safely passing-over.”

We need a food movement that is fully responsive to the millions ...

Two trends within the community-based restoration movement should interest all environmentalists; they are a.) the ecological restoration of food-producing landscapes; and b.) the recovery of wild species threatened by both historic overharvesting and habitat degradation.

There are roughly 4000 species of edible plants and 250 species of edible fish and game in North America. From my surveys over the last decade, it appears that about 17% of the species are being recovered by collaborations involving tribes, other hunters, fishers and foragers, ...

Need some good news? Grassroots efforts –largely free of governmental, multinational corporations and national philanthropic foundations– have increased the diversity of cultivated food plant varieties in the U.S. food system from 9720 varieties in the mid-1980s to 21,640 varieties in the mid 2010s. THAT’S 2.2 TIMES MORE FOOD PLANT DIVERSITY THAN WHAT THERE WAS IN OUR FIELDS, GARDENS, ORCHARDS AND TABLES 30 YEARS BEFORE!

We have gone from just 375 non-profit and micro-enterprise seed and nursery outlets in the U.S. in ...

The new Seed Trade Census released by the Seed Savers Exchange reports that over 12,892 open-pollinated varieties of vegetables, culinary herbs, legumes and grains are now available in the United States, more than twice the number (5534) available in 1981, when the census began.

Many of those annual seed crop varieties have been restored for use in our gardens, on our farms and on our tables by people like you, working through informal networks in and among communities of growers independent ...

With regard to achieving long-term successes in edible species recovery and foodshed restoration, we now know that the diversity of such players involved in such efforts, has everything to do with the successful revival of the richness of nutritious foods and delicious drinks that we are beginning to see in communities all across the continent.

In essence, the best means of assuring a diversity of foods for our food security has everything to do with sanctioning and supporting a diversity of ...

Often times, members of poor rural communities tell environmentalists “We are with you as long as you bring to our families more livelihoods, rather than just eliminating jobs from extractive industries.” We can now affirm that a steadily increasing number of both rural and urban “green” jobs have been generated due to the groundswell of interest in such foods and in the healthy landscapes and waters which spawn them.

With Borderlands Restoration Network that is based where I live in Patagonia ...

Let me mince no words: The conservation movement needs to be more inclusive, which may mean that it is less confrontational and more humble. Individuals of all classes and ethnicities have felt increasingly disempowered by the prevalence of top-down decision-making about lands, wildlife and plants that they had known and loved. In many cases, they have become disenfranchised from policy-making processes that ignore their local knowledge, dismiss their cultural or faith-based values, and care less about the economic impact of ...

More than just our food security is at stake if we don’t soon take the middle path. Don’t you think it’s time to encourage all of us to imagine something other than living in a divided country, where we all buy into the infamous “zero sum game” of winners vs. losers? We need to engage in a different set of social behaviors and more inclusive processes with regard to democratic decision-making and community-based restoration. The overall health and security of ...

What’s so special about working outdoors planting trees or reintroducing fish stocks with someone else from another culture, race, profession or professed faith? Why should any of us presume that such endeavors matter far more than anything else we do? Well, for one good reason– time spent restoring nature also helps restore us and our bonds with others. While It is true that over much of the course of human history, such earthward gestures and restorative endeavors were undoubtedly commonplace ...

Globally, the diversity of foods in most diets is shrinking, with those diets becoming more homogenized from one country to the next, more nutrient-depleted, and more Westernized. But there is a counter-trend worth watching in North America, and it is not restricted to or even driven by privileged foodies: our diets are diversifying again due to affordable access of many vegetables, fruits and other foods. Because of remarkably successful community-based collaborative efforts by you and others, the diversity of seeds ...

Over the next few weeks & months, I’ll be telling you a story of how biocultural restoration — the healing our lands AND our communities — is changing America for the better. The story is not merely about the men and women who have planted trees or reintroduced wildlife for the good of their neighborhoods. It is more broadly about people of all cultures, races and classes as well as all walks of life who have volunteered their time to ...