Steve,
Well said. And I agree. I attended a "Consensus Building"
professional development program (PDP) in Missouri last year and it
was the BEST PDP I have ever attended, including the multitudes of
conferences we as extension folk attend. Getting groups of people
together who appear to be on the "opposite" side of the fence, soon
begin to realize they do have things in common. Barriers and walls
begin to break down and progress is made.
Debi Kelly, Project Manager
Missouri Alternatives Center
628 Clark Hall
Columbia, MO 65211
573-882-1905
kellyd@ext.missouri.edu
______________________________ Reply Separator _________________________________
Subject: Re: Rage against USDA
Author: steved@ncatark.uark.edu at internet-ext
Date: 5/12/98 1:40 PM
Strong opinions seem to be a regular part of the discussion, but I think they
can be expressed with more substance than fuzzy attacks against big
brother; i.e., USDA the Evil Empire.
When you get all the stakeholders (organic farmers, consumers,
environmentalists, [oops! the Govenor of Arkansas said he likes
the term conservationist instead of environmentalist because
enviro-types worship nature], conservationships, stewardship-
oriented conventional farmers, university types, and USDA) to
sit at the same table and eat a meal together, you are likely to
strike up a conversation with the person sitting across from you.
Next thing you know, you find that you have a common background
("yeah, I was raised on a strawberry farm back in Iowa....my mom collected
eggs and green onions and sold them at the Farmers' Market"). Next
thing you know, you're talking about USDA-sponsored research and
education that has benefited sustainable agriculture and organic farmers
over the past 10 years.
Did you know that USDA's Deputy Secretary Richard Rominger's son is
an organic farmer in California?
Did you know that Grace Gershuny on the USDA NOP staff is a
longtime organic agriculture advocate who published the following:
* Editor, "Organic Farmer: The Digest of Sustainable Agriculture"
Quarterly journal published for 4 years as a project of Rural Education
Action Project
*Gershuny, Grace, and Joseph Smillie. 1995. The Soul of Soil: A
Guide to Ecological Soil Management, 3rd Edition. agAccess, Davis,
CA. 174 p.
*Gershuny, Grace. 1993. Start with the Soil. Rodale Press, Emmaus,
PA. 274 p.
Did you see that NOP website.... responsive to public input,
featuring thousands of on-line responses for public viewing?
Did you know the Keith Jones with USDA NOP worked with the organic
program at Texas Department of Agriculture for years?
The conundrum, it seems, lies somewhere between the 1990 vision of a
USDA-approved organic program and the 1998 version of how it should
be implemented.
But it looks like the players are participants at the same conference----the one
where lots of people are wearing tennis shoes, cowboy boots, and jeans----rather
than that confrontational conference where one side looks like Luke Skywalker
and the other side looks (and speaks) like Darth Vader.
Two cents hitting the bottom of a tin cup, clink!
Steve Diver
Fayetteville, AR
--
steved@ncatark.uark.edu
To Unsubscribe: Email majordomo@ces.ncsu.edu with "unsubscribe sanet-mg".
To Subscribe to Digest: Email majordomo@ces.ncsu.edu with the command
"subscribe sanet-mg-digest".
To Unsubscribe: Email majordomo@ces.ncsu.edu with "unsubscribe sanet-mg".
To Subscribe to Digest: Email majordomo@ces.ncsu.edu with the command
"subscribe sanet-mg-digest".