Beauty & Brains Farming

I have always lived in the Philippines – am I too far away from New York City to care about what happened to the World Trade Center’s Twin Towers on 11 Sept 2001? Asking for a friend! Today, Sunday, 11 Sept 2022, I opened my Lenovo ThinkPad laptop and typed “Sept 11” exactly like that, pressed Enter , Google Chrome announced onscreen: “About 23,300,000 results.” 23 million mentions – so how to digest all that?! First, I had to browse – fast. Along the way, I decided to look for what lesson(s) did we learn from the Sept 11 terrible Islamic terrorist attacks on the United States of America, the world’s symbol of democracy. Here are my picks: Wikipedia says: The September 11 attacks… were four coordinated suicide terrorist attacks carried out by the Islamic extremist network al-Qaeda against the United States. Number of deaths: 2,996. Date: 11 Sept 2001, at 8:15 PM GMT+8. Attack types: Aircraft hijacking mid-flight & ramming against the World Trade Center [New York City] a

As an agriculturist and a communicator for village development, I love the “Young Farmers Challenge” (YFC) of the PH Department of Agriculture (DA), YFC being born in 2021. The deeper I look at the YFC, I see that the challenge is actually double-edged: “Learn to love farming” and “Learn to make it more rewarding.” Bella Cariaso says, “Young Farmers Program Kicks Off” (01 Sept 2022, Manila Times , manilatimes.net ). Last year, 2021, Rosette Adel says the DA “launched a program that seeks to provide financial grant assistance to youth interested in the agri-fishery sector” (11 June 2021,   “DA Seeks Competitive Youth For ‘Young Farmers Challenge’ Agribusiness Grant,” PhilStar Global , Philstar.com ) – but Ms Rosette herself does not provide the exact date of launching of the YFC; we leave it at that. More importantly, I note that Ms Bella says the YFC is attracting the youth to farming in any of the following areas: production, processing, packaging, fabrication of farm machinery,

Ma'am Leni has a unique hand gesture in this Facebook sharing of Ann Gatmaytan of Radikal by Joseph Vicente Dimla that quotes, “True leaders have a servant’s heart” (08 Sept 2022). Maria Leonor “Leni” Gerona-Robredo , ex-Vice President of the Philippines and founder & inspiration of Angat Buhay Foundation, has a servant’s heart. Another way of putting that is this: Ma'am Leni is a Servant Leader. “Service is the heart of our business, and people are its soul” – Morley Gold Standard ( morleynet.com ). I sensed that as her personal business, and yes, I voted for Leni Robredo as my President in the 09 May 2022 PH elections (see my essay, “Ma'am Leni, Angat Buhay, Remembering Adam & Eve: Here Is How The Females Can Show The Males How To Take Very Good Care Of Their Garden Of Eden!” 17 Aug 2022, Beauty & Brains Farming , blogspot.com ). Launched in Oct 2016; as of 21 Dec 2021, “Angat Buhay” has partnered with 372 organizations, mobilizing P 520 million wort

Time for the girls teach the boys how to farm using their brains! In Agriculture so far, the boys have shown they are not using their brains, insisting on applying chemical fertilizers, which disastrously results in Climate Change! I began writing about Angat Buhay Leni Robredo 2 years ago (see my essay, “In Looking At The Crown Of Thorns, I Found The Clowns” 03 April 2020, Beauty & Brains Farming . blogspot.com ): There was this news that some high PH government officials wanted to probe Vice President Leni Robredo for “competing against” PH agencies in providing much-needed assistances during this coronavirus lockdown, and Marigs Laririt shared a picture-story on Facebook quoting Ms Leni as saying, “I didn’t know it was competition. I didn’t see any competitors!” Ms Marigs says, “Ay, parang friends ko kung sumagot si Mam.” (Ay, with Mam, it’s just like my friends answering back.) Ms Leni’s is a two-handed backslap, and you can imagine the lady laughing! I say: She is the h

Why is it that Filipino rice farmers insist on the expensive chemical fertilizers when they can use much-cheaper organic fertilizers and get higher yields? Asking for a friend! Congress doesn’t care about Climate Change, only about Filipino farmers. Last June, Catherine Talavera says, lawmakers were asked to allocate “ P 27 Billion To Fund Fertilizer Subsidies” (01 June 2022, Philippine Star , philstar.com ): The government would need to provide around P 27 billion worth of fertilizer subsidies for… rice farmers to support their production this cropping season as fertilizer prices continue to rise, the Federation of Free Farmers [FFF] said. FFF National Manager Raul Montemayor said that a P 10,000 per hectare subsidy is needed to cover the increases in the prices of fertilizers. Note: The P 10,000/ha is only to cover the increases in fertilizer cost. Mr Montemayor says a farmer uses 6 bags of fertilizer. “If a farmer uses six bags of fertilizer, and the cost has increased by

Girls Vs Boys, using intelligent science with organic vs chemical farming, low cost vs high costs, high returns vs low returns – with the rotavator reinvented by me and Angat Buhay! (“Lifting Life”) I blogged this Wednesday morning at 6 AM, “Ma'am Leni, Here Is My Proposal For You – Love For Food, Healthy Organic Foods Grown By Girls, Starting With Village Sagñay!” (07 Sept 2022, CoViD21, covid21fah.blogspot.com ). I’m proposing a reinvented rotavator. But first, let’s see where I'm coming from through the eyes of others: You have to empower farmers. Farmbetter says, (undated, “Empower Farmers To Build Resilience To Climate Change,” farmbetter , farmbetter.io ): In 2019 we created farmbetter – a mobile app… to put tailored and actionable know-how directly in the hands of the farmer. That “farmbetter” is artificial intelligence (AI) in aid of conventional agriculture – nice, but hardly anti-Climate Change! IoT For All says (“Smart Farming: The Future Of Agriculture,”

PH girls are minding the stores and PH boys are minding the farms – but not growing healthy, organic foods! So? So, let the girls teach the boys how to grow the food of their lives! I note that Angat Buhay village in your part of PH (06 June 2021, “Sagñay, Camarines Sur launches social housing project, Angat Buhay Village,” Bicol Express News , bicolexpress.news ). You VP Ma'am Leni (in photo) graced the groundbreaking ceremony at Barangay Del Carmen, the site for 50 houses for families who had been dwelling in hazard-prone places. So, with my proposal, we will have a perfect combination: healthy villages growing healthy foods! Above, already we have organic foods in Naga City such as offered by “Red Platter” ( bicolhomepage.wordpress.com ). The whole Angat Buhay Village should grow their own organic foods – for villagers to eat healthy, and to sell much more to the public. Good food, better cash. Initially, the 50 families settling in Del Carmen Angat Buhay Village do not

About 55 years ago, in 1966, I came across the book Soil Development ( published 1952) written by Edward H Faulkner , American original thinker-farmer, displayed at the open shelves of the library of UPCA, now UP Los Baños. That’s when I began to think organic farming gave us healthy foods. It was something like, “Health comes from the soil.” Here comes Earwin Belen with his Facebook sharing (05 Jan 2022), “Still True In 2022!” (image sources: “WiFi,” m.facebook.com ; fruits, EcoWatch , ecowatch.com )   “Organic food is not healthier” – British Alan Dangour . “Organic food is healthier” – British Carlo Leifort . Eh? Karen McVeigh says “Organic Food Not Healthier, Says FSA,” (29 June 2009, The Guardian , theguardian.com/ ). Findings over the past 50 years were reviewed by a team of the London School Of Hygiene & Tropical Medicine headed by Dr Alan Dangour . “We have concluded that there's no good evidence that consumption of organic food is beneficial to health based o

Vi.Deo – No, not Virtual God but Vibrant God, if not Visible God. God does not need any glorification from us mortals; He is glorious by Himself – but He needs to be portrayed as to be vibrant, if not visible to us, Roman Catholics, at least every Sunday at mass, via the gospel! I, blogger of 22 years, realize only today, Sunday, 04 Sept 2022, we Roman Catholics have ignored the power of the virtual presentation (Vi.P) to expound and explain the gospel. Vi.P – the New World explaining the Old World. Expecially because the Bible is extra difficult to understand. Vi.P also signifies virtual pencils for portraits. (“Pencils” image from Jen H, The Daily Post, wordpress.com ) The top image is from The Feast Facebook webpage, the guest priest at the PICC presenting the gospel, Luke 14:25-33: Great crowds accompanied him on his way and he turned and spoke to them. “Anyone who comes to me without hating father, mother, wife, children, brothers, sisters, yes and his own life too,

I have 2 friends, “The Left” and “The Right” (Male and Female), and our friendships go back deep into the early 1960s. “The Left” has always been a writer; “The Right” has always been a non-writer – and right now are both wanting and struggling to write their last book and testament (autobiography) – both are suffering from Writer’s Block! The Writer’s Block of “The Left” tells you that experience is not a guarantee for success; that of “The Right” tells you everyone needs help! (image sources: male from storymind.com , female from writersblog.co ) Both the Storymind and Writer’s Blog advise that you first find “inspiration” – the problem with that is, “What do you do if you can’t find inspiration?!” Storymind says, “One way to beat Writer’s Block” – and proceeds to list 5 tips! So, here’s some free anti-Writer’s Block advices from me: Go digital. The writers shown in the images above are primitive, sorry to say – they belong to the age I will call “Early Digital” – finger

ANN says billionaire Bill Gates believes “All rich countries should move to 100% synthetic beef” ( Author Not Named , undated, “Reject Bill Gates’ Impossible Burger,” Organic Consumers Association , organicconsumers.org ). That’s Gates’ contribution to the re/solution of Climate Change!? His best is not good enough! Still from ANN: Bill Gates has invested in Impossible Foods whose CEO, Pat Brown , says his genetically engineered synthetic meat substitutes will replace the use of animals by 2035. Hah! It would be impossible to convince me, a Filipino, to eat synthetic meat – I love the taste of lechon and fried chicken, for instance. You’d think the Impossible Foods pitch would be about the horrors of factory farming. Instead, Gates and Brown take aim at regenerative organic agriculture and grass-fed beef. According to Fortune.com: “Gates and Brown believe that genetically modified seeds and chemical herbicides, in the right doses – and not land-intensive organic farming – are

Today, Friday, 02 Sept 2022, I post this essay as the 1000 th in this blog “CoViD21” – short for “Communication for Village Development in the 21st Century.” Blogging since 2000, I have decided to dedicate myself unrelentingly to village development – an area much neglected. Actually, the 999 essays published before this one appeared in my blog “ Towards A New Eden” but which I have come to the conclusion that building a New Eden is too much of a promise, and developing villages is a dream within one’s reach in a lifetime. The development of villages I have in mind is via Regenerative Agriculture (RA). Rodale Institute introduced the term “Regenerative Organic Agriculture” in 1989 “to distinguish a kind of farming that goes beyond sustainable” (undated, Rodale Institute, rodaleinstitute.org ). So, I now believe that “Sustainable Development” is inadequate! We must go after “Regenerative Development,” especially via Agriculture. At this point, I must say that the application of

British naturalist Sir David Attenborough has been calling on the leading nations of the world to “adopt tougher climate targets” ( Timothy Reuter , 02 Nov 2021, “David Attenborough: It Could Soon Be Too Late To Tackle Climate Change,” World Economic Forum ( weforum.org ); “Every day that pass by in which we don’t do something about it is a day wasted. If we don’t act now, it’ll be too late.” “The UN said greenhouse gas concentrations had hit a record last year and the world was ‘way off track’ in capping rising temperatures.” Not only that. “Attenborough said leading nations had a duty to help poorer countries because industrialization had been one of the major factors in driving climate change.” “Industrialization had been one of the major factors in driving climate change” – and in the Philippines, I digital campaigner for combatting physical climate change, am looking at this: Agriculture is the hugest contributing factor to climate change! (Image sources: “Climate Change”

Do you know what is missing in the fight against Climate Change when it comes to Agriculture, and Agriculture only? This essay could be an eye-opener for many, including IRRI, PhilRice, and UP Los Baños. Here is the 40-year old World Resources Institute (WRI) talking down Regenerative Agriculture, saying “Regenerative Agriculture: Good For Soil Health, But Limited Potential To Mitigate Climate Change” via Janet Ranganathan, Richard Waite, Tim Searchinger & Jessica Zionts . The WRI is the 12 th website I have consulted today, Wednesday, 31 Aug 2022, and I abruptly stopped when I read it because it’s eye-popping – here is an institute telling me that RA has “limited potential” for arresting Climate Change! Sorry, but the World Resources Institute does not know enough about Regenerative Agriculture. At least, the 3 above-mentioned WRI authors don’t! The WRI authors say pertinently: Regenerative agriculture has become the darling of many policymakers, food companies and farme