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Resilience System


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US: Food Security

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Food supply, food politics, and food safety in the US, inclusive of global concerns and needs

Group focusing upon the food security needs of the US, and world.

Members

Allen Clark Bob Ross Carl Taylor Christine Springer Corey Watts david hastings
drvroeg Gavin Macgregor... John Hoffman Kathy Gilbeaux LintonWells LuisKun
Maeryn Obley mdmcdonald Michael Gresalfi Rahul Gupta Ray Shirkhodai Samuel Bendett
Siftar Tim Stephens tom.mcginn William Lyerly

Email address for group

us-food-security@m.resiliencesystem.org

Seeking A Saner Food System, Three Times A Day

Image: Not all cows get to spend their days with soft green grass under hoof. For many, the picture isn't so pretty, according to the book Farmageddon.

Image: Not all cows get to spend their days with soft green grass under hoof. For many, the picture isn't so pretty, according to the book Farmageddon.

npr.org - July 31, 2014 - Barbara J. King

For Philip Lymbery, head of the U.K.-based Compassion in World Farming and his co-author Isabel Oakeshott, a visit to California's Central Valley amounted to an encounter with suffering.

In Farmageddon: The True Cost of Cheap Meat, Lymbery and Oakeshott write that the mega-dairies of the Central Valley are "milk factories where animals are just machines that rapidly break down and are replaced." At one huge dairy they visited, cows stood idly outdoors, some in shade and some in the sun.

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Radioactive Fish Found In California: Contamination From Fukushima Disaster Still Lingers

            

A fisherman displays his haul of Bluefin Tuna.

CLICK HERE: STUDY - Radiocesium in Pacific Bluefin Tuna Thunnus orientalis in 2012 Validates New Tracer Technique

huffingtonpost.com - by Aaron Sankin - February 22, 2013

Nearly two years after a powerful earthquake triggered a leak at Japan's Fukushima Dai-ichi nuclear plant, the effects of that disaster are still being felt on the other side of the planet.

A report released earlier this month by researchers at Stanford University's Hopkins Marine Station found that bluefin tuna caught just off the California coast tested positive for radiation stemming from the incident.

The study looked at the levels of radiocesium, one of the most common results of nuclear fission reactions, in Pacific Bluefun Tuna--largely as way to track the species' migratory patterns as the fish make their cross-oceanic journey in search of prey.

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Groundwater Depletion in Texas, California Threatens US Food Security

submitted by Samuel Bendett

                                                          (CLICK HERE TO ENLARGE IMAGE)

      

Groundwater depletion has been most severe in the purple areas indicated on these maps of (A) the High Plains and (B) California's Central Valley. These heavily affected areas are concentrated in parts of the Texas Panhandle, western Kansas, and the Tulare Basin in California's Central Valley. Changes in groundwater levels in (A) are adapted from a 2009 report by the U.S. Geological Survey and in (B) from a 1989 report by the USGS.

Homeland Security News Wire - May 29, 2012

The U.S. food supply may be vulnerable to rapid groundwater depletion from irrigated agriculture; for example, from 2006 to 2009, farmers in the south of California’s Central Valley depleted enough groundwater to fill the U.S. largest man-made reservoir, Lake Mead near Las Vegas — a level of groundwater depletion that is unsustainable at current recharge rates

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Maine Congresswoman Unveils Bill to Support Small Farms

Congresswoman Chellie Pingree (D-ME) announced Monday she will introduce bail that would "significantly change the nation's food policy" by supporting local and regional farmers. The package of reforms and new programs, dubbed The Local Farm, Food, and Jobs Act, would encourage the production of local food by helping farmers and ranchers and by improving distribution systems, building on the success of farmers markets across the country.

Source: Food Safety News  Author: Helena Bottemiller | Oct 25, 2011

"This is about healthy local food and a healthy local economy. When consumers can buy affordable food grown locally, everyone wins," said Pingree, who owns an organic farm in North Haven, Maine. "It creates jobs on local farms and bolsters economic growth in rural communities."
Pingree tied local food system growth to creating jobs all over the country.
"We've seen explosive growth in sales of local food here in Maine and all across the country. This bill breaks down barriers the federal government has put up for local food producers and really just makes it easier for people to do what they've already been doing," the congresswoman said.

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Feeding America - Hunger & Poverty Statistics

Hunger & Poverty Statistics, although related, are not the same.  Unemployment rather than poverty is a stronger predictor of food insecurity. Below are important hunger facts and poverty statistics from Feeding America.

Poverty 

  • In 2009, 43.6 million people (14.3 percent) were in poverty.
  • In 2009, 8.8 million (11.1% percent) families were in poverty.
  • In 2009, 24.7 million (12.9 percent) of people ages 18-64 were in poverty.
  • In 2009, 15.5 million (20.7 percent) children under the age of 18 were in poverty.
  • In 2009, 3.4 million (8.9 percent) seniors 65 and older were in poverty.

Food Insecurity and Very Low Food Security[2]

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