Science means having to say "I'm sorry", by Jahi Chappell

http://www.iatp.org/blog/201309/science-means-having-to-say-%E2%80%9Ci%E2%80%99m-sorry

I’m sorry, but saying that the Green Revolution saved millions of lives is unscientific 

Used under creative commons license from MikeBlyth.

Video Conferencia de Peter Rosset: Agroecología y la Vía Campesina

Hans Herren wins Right Livelihood Award

http://www.rightlivelihood.org/herren.html

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Credit: Peter Lüthi

Hans Herren / Biovision Foundation (Switzerland)

“for his expertise and pioneering work in promoting a safe, secure and sustainable global food supply”.

The Swiss agronomist/entomologist Dr Hans R. Herren is one of the world’s leading experts on biological pest control and sustainable agriculture. When a new pest threatened the cassava root in Africa, he designed and implemented a successful biological control programme that has been credited with saving millions of lives. Later, Herren was the co-chair of the International Assessment of Agricultural Knowledge, Science and Technology for Development (IAASTD), endorsed by 59 countries. Today, Herren is helping farmers in Africa to combat hunger, poverty and disease through ecologically sound agriculture with his Swiss-based Biovision Foundation. With his theoretical and practical work, Herren has proven that an agriculture anchored in agro-ecological principles can nourish a world with a growing population and changing needs.

Soberanía alimentaria: un nuevo reto a conquistar en Puerto Rico

http://www.miprv.com/soberania-alimentaria-un-nuevo-reto-a-conquistar-en-puerto-rico/

Por Georges F. Félix
Sociedad Científica Latinoamericana de Agroecología (SOCLA) – Capítulo de Puerto Rico

La Sociedad Científica Latinoamericana de Agroecología (SOCLA) surge como opción para promover la reflexión, discusión e intercambio científico sobre agroecología entre investigadores, docentes y agricultores de diversas nacionalidades. La SOCLA organiza cada dos años el Congreso Latinoamericano de Agroecología.

Al presente, se han realizado Congresos en Colombia (2007), Brasil (2009) y México (2011) y recientemente culminó el IV Congreso de Agroecología en la Universidad Nacional Agraria de La Molina en Lima, Perú entre el 10 y el 12 de septiembre de 2013. Estos congresos marcan el estado del arte de la agroecología en el mundo, con perspectiva latinoamericana, este año enfocado en “La pequeña agricultura como base de la agricultura del siglo XXI”. En estos eventos, SOCLA reúne académicos y agricultores organizados, propiciando el diálogo y acuerdos que se difunden a través de la Carta Agroecológica al final de cada evento.

Delegación de Puerto Rico al IV Congreso Latinoamericano de Agroecología en Lima, Perú.

NY Times article: Misgivings About How a Weed Killer Affects the Soil

http://www.nytimes.com/2013/09/20/business/misgivings-about-how-a-weed-killer-affects-the-soil.html?_r=0

By STEPHANIE STROM
Published: September 19, 2013

David Eggen for The New York Times

Jon Kiel, left, and Verlyn Sneller of the agriculture company Verity with a corn stalk produced without a glyphosate-based herbicide.

La ciencia detrás de la protesta

Ocupándonos del futuro

FOR THE FULL ARTICLE:
http://thelede.blogs.nytimes.com/2013/09/21/reporter-denies-writing-article-that-linked-syrian-rebels-to-chemical-attack/?_r=1&

Reporter Denies Writing Article That Linked Syrian Rebels to Chemical Attack

By ROBERT MACKEY

Updated, 7:58 p.m. | Three weeks after an obscure Internet news service claimed that Syrian rebels had admitted responsibility for the deadly chemical attack outside Damascus in August, a veteran foreign correspondent whose name and reputation lent credibility to the story has denied writing the article.

The journalist, Dale Gavlak, is an American freelancer based in Jordan whose work has been published frequently by The Associated Press. In a statementsent first to the British blogger Eliot Higgins, who writes the highly-regardedBrown Moses blog, Ms. Gavlak insisted that her byline should never have been attached to the article, which was published on the Web site MintPress Newson Aug. 29 under the headline, “Syrians in Ghouta Claim Saudi-Supplied Rebels Behind Chemical Attack.”

Syria: the "peace" movement sinks lower

http://ww4report.com/node/12643

Assad's useful idiots protect chem attack base

Submitted by Bill Weinberg on Sun, 09/22/2013 


They've really outdone themselves this time. The last time we checked in on Cynthia McKinney, she was floating outlandish conspiracy theories about the Boston bombings. Now, Redress Information & Analysis is among the websites to take note of what she just posted to her Facebook page—that she is in Syria to sing the praises of the Assad regime and cheer on those serving as human shields. That is merely predictable. But a close reading reveals a truly special degree of either cynicism or dupery (we actually aren't sure which):

I am in Syria now with former Attorney General Ramsey Clark, where residents enjoy free education and free healthcare. Visited a Damascus hospital, the Grand Mufti, a school that has been turned into residences for Internally Displaced Persons. Ended the Day with Ogarit Dandash who founded "Over Our Dead Bodies," a group of young people who climbed atop Mount Qasioun and dared U.S. bombs to target them. They are still there in defiant resistance to any war against Syria. Mount Qasioun should be the site of a peace party not bombing strikes.

Does "Mount Qasioun" sound familar? It should. A week ago, Human Rights Watch crunched the UN data to determine where the rockets in the Ghouta attack had been fired from. In the words of the New York Times: "the government's elite redoubt in Damascus, Mount Qasioun, which overlooks and protects neighborhoods and Mr. Assad's presidential palace and where his Republican Guard and the army's powerful Fourth Division are entrenched."

Isn't that cute? McKinney is cheering on some folks who have generously volunteered to protect with their bodies the military base that Assad's regime uses to launch poisonous gas attacks on the Syrian people! Also cheering on these hapless cannon fodder are the usual assortment of cranks on the conspiranoid-left (Before It's News) and conspiranoid-right (Lew Rockwell, Western Journalism Center). Ramsey Clark, of course, is an old hand at this stuff, having similarly shilled for Saddam Hussein. The NY Times' The Lede blog also takes aim at McKinney for praising Assad's Syria for its "free health care."  Yes, thank you so much for the free health care, Bashar... 'cuz we're really gonna need it after all the cluster bombs and poison gas...

The Assad-suckers will not relent. In the style of 9-11 conspiracy theorists, they do not acknowledge when their dubious claims get shot down, but just happily move on to another, hoping nobody will notice. For instance, the Mint Press News story they had all pinned their hopes on, alleging that the rebels were behind the Ghouta attack, has now utterly collapsed. So they are all rushing to the new claims of similarly marginal NSNBC that "former intelligence officer" Michael Maloof is in possession of a secret US Army report showing that "al-Qaeda acquired and used chemical weapons" in Syria. No way to check up on this, of course, and Maloof's bona fides seem to prominently include right-wing mouthpiece World Net Daily. NSNBC itself is one of those deceptively named websites (like the hateful AlJazeerah.info) that tries to trade in on confusion with a legitimate news source. One of its leading lights is apparently F. William Engdahl, whose dictator-shilling conspiranoia we have called out before.

Meanwhile, Consortium News, which we really hoped knew better, is parroting the discredited wackiness from Veteran Intelligence Professionals for Sanity (VIPS).

They just aren't interested in getting better, are they?

Otra ganadería es posible

http://viaorganica.org/otra-ganaderia-es-posible/

Por Carmelo Ruiz Marrero,  Haciendo Punto en Otro Blog, 13 de agosto 2013

Se puede hacer ganadería en armonía con el ambiente, y con prácticas que son perfectamente aplicables al ambiente caribeño

Un Lares por Oscar

Casa abierta en refugio de vida silvestre en Cabo Rojo

Cineforo sobre la privatización de la educación

Protesta contra foro de Monsanto este jueves

Video: Vote YES on I-522

"This is one of the official campaign commercials by the Yes on 522 -- the ballot initiative to label genetically engineered food in Washington. For more information and how to ensure your right to know what's in your food, visit us at www.yeson522.com."

Preocupado Monsanto por su imagen en Puerto Rico

Comunicado, 18 septiembre 2013

Frente de Rescate Agrícola

Nada Santo Sobre Monsanto

Como parte de la campaña de relaciones públicas para enderezar la imagen duramente afectada en los últimos meses, la compañía Monsanto de Puerto Rico se presta a ofrecer un foro a puertas cerradas con una selección minuciosa de invitados. Los invitados al foro coordinado por Monsanto, que incluyen profesionales y científicos de la agricultura, han sido rigurosamente seleccionados asegurándose de no invitar a personas que disientan con la mencionada compañía.  Según nos indican nuestras fuentes, incluso han revertido la invitación de numerosas personas que ya habían sido invitadas al ser identificadas con expresiones contra Monsanto y los transgénicos.

El supuesto foro educativo de Monsanto titulado “Mitos y Realidades de la Biotecnología Agrícola” se ofrecerá por los propios funcionarios de la compañía el próximo jueves en el hotel Four Points by Sheraton en Caguas. “Claramente su intención es perpetuar los mitos que ellos mismos han creado sobre las falsas bondades de los transgénicos.  Se trata de una actividad completamente parcializada con la intención de lavar el cerebro a los que trabajan la agricultura del país. Se encuentran desesperados ante una opinión pública mayoritaria que se ha volcado contra ellos durante este año en Puerto Rico”, declaró Salvador Tió, portavoz del colectivo Nada Santo Sobre Monsanto.

                  Como respuesta a esto, el colectivo Nada Santo Sobre Monsanto junto al Frente de Rescate Agrícola y otras organizaciones han convocado una manifestación este jueves a las 3:30 PM en las afueras del hotel donde se desarrollará el foro coordinado por la compañía dedicada a los transgénicos. “Nuestra intención es alertar y educar responsablemente a la ciudadanía sobre las verdades y las amenazas que representa esta tecnología a Puerto Rico”, manifestó Tió.

En el mes de junio la titular del Departamento de Agricultura Myrna Comas exhortó a los oponentes de Monsanto a proveer evidencia sobre los impactos negativos de la compañía y sus productos transgénicos. Ante esta solicitud, el colectivo llevó a cabo una revisión de la literatura científica que ha evaluado esta tecnología. “Hemos recopilado más de 60 publicaciones científicas, recogidas en más de mil páginas donde se documenta de manera contundente el peligro y las amenazas que representan  los transgénicos. Utilizando la evidencia empírica y el método científico, estas publicaciones apuntan a que contrario a los mitos que propaga Monsanto y las demás compañías, esta tecnología constituye una amenaza directa para la salud humana, contaminan los recursos agrícolas, promueven la aplicación de plaguicidas tóxicos, monopolizan la semilla y producen súper plagas,  todo esto sin que se genere una mayor producción de comida”, declaró el agrónomo Ian Pagán, portavoz del Frente de Rescate Agrícola. Este documento, según solicitado, fue entregado a la secretaria de agricultura en las pasadas semanas y el colectivo se encuentra en espera de una reacción de la secretaria. 

Contactos:

Ian Pagan Roig- 787-666-0625

Salvador Tió- 787-390-7880

PD: Se adjunta también copia del resumen de la revisión de literatura entregada a la secretaria de agricultura donde se evidencia los peligros de los transgénicos. 

-- 

=====

La agricultura es la espina dorsal de un pueblo - Hostos 

Personas contacto:

Agro. Ian Pagan: (787) 666-0625

Entra y participa a nuestro Blog: 

http://frapuertorico.wordpress.com/

  

En Facebook, búscanos y únete:

https://www.facebook.com/FrenteDeRescateAgricolafra?fref=ts

Canal en Youtube:

https://www.youtube.com/user/FRAPuertoRico                                                              

Chemtrails

http://www.earthisland.org/journal/index.php/elist/eListRead/
conspiracy_theories_fuel_climate_change_denial_and_chemtrail_beliefs/

Conspiracy Theories Fuel Climate Change Denial and Chemtrail Beliefs

Article by David Suzuki

...wondering why some people believe in phenomena rejected by science, like chemtrails, but deny real problems demonstrated by massive amounts of scientific evidence, like climate change.

 I’m a scientist, so I look at credible science — and there is none for the existence of chemtrails. They’re condensation trails, formed when hot, humid air from jet exhaust mixes with colder low-vapor-pressure air. This, of course, comes with its own environmental problems.

But what interests me is the connection between climate change denial and belief in chemtrails. Why do so many people accept a theory for which there is no scientific evidence while rejecting a serious and potentially catastrophic phenomenon that can be easily observed and for which overwhelming evidence has been building for decades?

Docto en agroeco

Video: Por un futuro sin hambre

Video de la Asamblea Nacional Campesina, ARCA/Vía Campesina Honduras. "Por un Futuro Sin Hambre" 29 de agosto 2013.

Mucho más que ecología

PARA LEER EL ARTICULO ENTERO:
http://pr.indymedia.org/news/2013/08/54998.php

Es mucho más que ecología
por Carmelo Ruiz Marrero  

Haciendo Punto en otro Blog - 19 de agosto 2013

¿Es la agroecología la mera ausencia de agroquímicos ambientalmente nocivos en la agricultura? ¿Para ser agroecológico basta con reemplazar los insumos tóxicos con insumos amigables con el ambiente? La sustitución de insumos nunca debe ser más que una estrategia a emplearse en el periodo de transición de una producción agrícola convencional a una ecológica, tal sustitución nunca deber ser un fin en sí.

Pero desgraciadamente los espacios de la agricultura orgánica han sido invadidos por vendedores de insumos alternativos: pesticidas orgánicos, herbicidas orgánicos, fertilizantes orgánicos, etc. Y aquí no estamos hablando de pequeños agricultores haciendo composta o pociones de nim para vender en mercados orgánicos los fines de semana. Nos referimos a grandes corporaciones, las mismas que venden agrotóxicos para la agricultura convencional. La producción orgánica fundamentada sobre la sustitución de unos insumos por otros no amenaza los intereses de estas megaempresas. Al contrario, le presenta nuevas oportunidades de lucro en un momento histórico en que el agro convencional está siendo cuestionado con creciente insistencia desde todos los ángulos. 

What if Assad really did it?

Read this article without judging. That is, do not judge till you have read all of it. Both the pro-war right and the anti-war left are playing fast and loose with the facts about Syria. I know this is not a popular thing to say.

 

THE FULL ARTICLE IS AVAILABLE IN THIS LINK:

http://ww4report.com/node/12620

Syria chemical attack: rush to denialism continues

by Bill Weinberg on Fri, 09/13/2013 - 23:35

• Greater Middle East
  
• Arab Revolution
  
• chemical warfare
  
• conspiranoia
  
• idiot left
  
• Syria

EXCERPTS:

Human Rights Watch on Sept. 10 released a report, "Attacks on Ghouta: Analysis of Alleged Use of Chemical Weapons in Syria," examining what are said to actually be two suspected chemical attacks on the "opposition-controlled suburbs of Eastern and Western Ghouta, located 16 kilometers apart, in the early hours of August 21." The report relies on witness accounts of the rocket attacks, physical remnants of the rockets, and symptoms exhibited by the victims as documented by medical staff. "Rocket debris and symptoms of the victims from the August 21 attacks on Ghouta provide telltale evidence about the weapon systems used," said Peter Bouckaert, emergencies director at HRW and author of the report. "This evidence strongly suggests that Syrian government troops launched rockets carrying chemical warheads into the Damascus suburbs that terrible morning."

******

What charming bedfellows: pseudo-left ideologues like Chossudovsky with ex-CIA spooks likePhilip Giraldi. We've noted how the paleocon right is this time around joining with idiotic sectors of the "left" to shill for Syria's dictator. In another example, former CIA analyst Ray McGovern (a perennial conspiranoid) serves up similar fare in an interview with an Internet TV outfit calling itself "Left Voices."

My op-ed on Syria

http://www.progressive.org/do-not-bomb-syria

Don’t bomb Syria. Start peace talks instead.

Carmelo Ruiz-Marrero

Neither President Obama nor some opponents of war with Syria are being forthright when they say they are standing up for the people of that country.

By advocating bombing Syria, Obama is likely to end up killing hundreds if not thousands of innocent people in Syria.

He says he is responding to a war crime, but he would be committing a graver war crime by launching attacks on Syria. Justice Robert Jackson at the Nuremburg Trials said the biggest war crime of all is to engage in an aggressive war.

As for delivering an oppressed people from tyranny, we have the recent example of Bush’s war in Iraq (based on bogus reports of weapons of mass destruction) and NATO’s violent intervention in Libya. Neither ended well.

Even as over 1,000 Syrians were being killed by chemical weapons, nearby Egypt’s murderous military went on a rampage and murdered hundreds of demonstrators. Secretary of State John Kerry won’t even cut off military aid to Egypt, let alone bomb that country “to protect the innocent.”

Double standards are all over the place. The United States used Agent Orange in Vietnam and depleted uranium shells in Iraq. Israel used white phosphorus in Gaza. All are versions of chemical weapons, and all did enormous harm.

That being said, those who oppose Obama’s war plans would be well advised not to give Syrian dictator Assad a free pass.

Since the Arab Spring spread to Syria, Assad’s forces have murdered tens of thousands of people for demanding the same things as protesters in Egypt, Tunisia, and so many other places of the world: freedom.

Sadly, some the same voices that speak out against U.S. military intervention have for the most part kept quiet about Assad’s crimes.

The slogan “No war in Syria” is downright absurd. There already is a war in Syria, and it has killed over 100,000 people in barely a couple of years.

And the calls against foreign intervention in Syria are downright hypocritical if they do not include Russia, which has for years armed Assad’s forces to their teeth.

Let’s stand by the Syrian people. They don’t want to be bombed by Western “liberators,” but they don’t want a genocidal dictator either.

What they want is peace. What they want is freedom.

And the best way to get there is to bring all sides to the peace table.

Documental 9.70 de Victoria Solano

El documental 970 relata la historia de un grupo de campesinos a los que el Gobierno de Colombia le incautó y destruyó 70 toneladas de arroz. En defensa de los intereses de empresas trasnacionales en el marco de Tratado de Libre Comercio entre Colombia y Estados Unidos. Los impactos de la resolución 9.70 en el campo colombiano.

Intro a la agroeco

WBAI debacle

http://www.villagevoice.com/2013-09-04/news/wbai-death-by-democracy/

WBAI's Death by Democracy

Warring activists cause a legendary public radio station to implode

By Tessa Stuart Wednesday, Sep 4 2013

For years, observers inside and out had been prophesying the death of WBAI, birthplace of the nationally syndicated alternative news program Democracy NOW!. The station has not turned a profit in more than a decade. The last year has been particularly tough.

Millions of dollars in debt, and unable to pay staff or rent, WBAI has devoted a staggering 169 days to pledge drives since October. Quacks and conspiracy theorists solicited donations by dangling gifts like magic water capable of curing cancer and books that claim, matter-of-factly, that the world is secretly ruled by shapeshifting reptilian overlords.

For more perspectives and info on WBAI's downfall, read this piece by Bill Weinberg: http://ww4report.com/node/9655

Syrian Anarchist Challenges the Rebel-Regime Binary View of Resistance

http://truth-out.org/news/item/18617-syrian-anarchist-challenges-the-rebel-regime-binary-view-of-resistance

Friday, 06 September 2013 00:00By Joshua Stephens, Truthout | Interview

As the US intensifies its push for military intervention in Syria, virtually the only narrative available swings from the brutal regime of Bashar al-Assad to the role of Islamist elements within the resistance. Further, where dissent with the US position appears, much of it hinges on the contradiction of providing support for Al Qaeda-linked entities seeking to topple the regime, as though they represent the only countervailing force to the existing dictatorship. But as Jay Cassano recently wrote for tech magazine Fast Company, the network of unarmed, democratic resistance to Assad's regime is rich and varied, representing a vast web of local political initiatives, arts-based coalitions, human rights organizations, nonviolence groups and more. (The Syria Nonviolence Movement created an online, interactive map to demonstrate this intricate network of connections.) 

Paro agrario en Colombia

Novedades de GRAIN | 4 de septiembre 2013

Movilización campesina en Colombia pone los reflectores sobre las semillas

El 19 de agosto, las organizaciones campesinas colombianas iniciaron un paro nacional agrario. Bloquearon carreteras, regaron leche sobre los automóviles y básicamente dejaron de producir comida para las ciudades.

¿El problema? Que están siendo asfixiados por las políticas gubernamentales. El Estado no proporciona casi ningún apoyo al sector campesino de pequeña escala. Al contrario, promueve un modelo económico y social que sirve a los intereses de una acaudalada y minoritaria élite.

Los tratados de libre comercio (TLC) firmados recientemente con Estados Unidos y la Unión Europea están atentando contra los productores colombianos, que no pueden competir con las importaciones subsidiadas. El gobierno colombiano ha estado promoviendo activamente los acaparamientos de tierra por parte de las grandes corporaciones, muchas de ellas extranjeras (Monica Semillas de Brasil, Merhav de Israel, Cargill de EUA), con el fin de impulsar los agronegocios orientados a la exportación a expensas de los cultivos familiares orientados a la soberanía alimentaria.

No hay duda alguna de que los campesinos colombianos pueden alimentar muy bien al país, de una forma que proporciona empleos, dignidad y un ambiente saludable. Pero el gobierno está tan firmemente atado a un modelo económico que sirve a los intereses de sus amigotes que se niega a impulsar el cultivo familiar de pequeña escala. Debemos todos apoyar la lucha popular agraria en Colombia para darle la vuelta al modelo. No es demasiado tarde todavía.

Debemos todos apoyar la lucha popular agraria en Colombia para darle la vuelta al modelo. No es demasiado tarde todavía.

Lea el articulo aquí: http://www.grain.org/e/4780

Syria: denialism delegitimizes 'anti-war' position

By Bill Weinberg

TO READ THE FULL ARTICLE:
http://ww4report.com/node/12602

EXCERPTS:

Heeding these voices does not mean we have to support Obama's intervention. But it does mean that we have to find ways to do so that do not betray and alienate Syrians who have for over two years been fighting for freedom and are now fighting for their very lives. The "anti-war" movement, such as it continues to exist, has been abjectly failing to do this. Leading the charge into shameful betrayal, of course, is the International Action Center...

******

 If any anti-war effort is to actually be in solidarity with Syrians, it must put the voices of the Syrian civil resistance front and center, and seek leadership from them. Our natural allies in Syria are in this democratic resistance, and they will need solidarity whether the US intervenes or not. And while the Local Coordination Committees—the original body of the unarmed civil resistance, still active at the grassroots level in Syria, in spite of everything—remains opposed to either armed insurgency or foreign intervention, they see their primary struggle as against the dictatorship. If the anti-war forces in the West do not offer solidarity in that struggle, they forfeit all legitimacy to oppose Obama's intervention.

An open letter on Syria to Western narcissists

http://humanprovince.wordpress.com/2013/08/29/an-open-letter-on-syria-to-western-narcissists/

...the current conflict in Syria isn’t just of academic interest to me; it’s personal as well. This is partially why I have so little patience for some of the rhetoric I’ve been seeing from Western leftist circles, where this conflict seems like nothing more than a rhetorical bludgeon for scoring ideological points. This has been illustrated by the passing around of an article by Robert Fisk, who asks, “Does Obama know he’s fighting on al-Qa’ida’s side?” This lazy and facile opinion piece assures us that if the US attacks Syria, then “the United States will be on the same side as al-Qa’ida.” It is the flip side of the rhetoric that was so evident in the run-up to war in Iraq that equated any opposition to an idiotic war with support for Saddam Hussein. Well, guess what? There are lots of perfectly fine opinions that might put you on the same side as al-Qa’ida. Just to name one: if you’re against drone strikes in Yemen, Pakistan and Somalia, as I am, then you’re also “on the same side as al-Qa’ida” according to this logic.

******

Lest I be accused of shilling for American intervention here, let me set a few things straight. In addition to endangering my family’s lives, the proposed “punitive strikes” that are all but inevitable probably won’t make anything better on the ground, and may make things worse, which is why I’m against them. My opinion on American intervention in general and in this conflict in particular (about which more in a subsequent post) is that the US is not to be trusted to act in anything but what it sees as its interests, and often a woefully short-sighted understanding of those interests to boot. So no, Washington does not really care about those children killed last week in a chemical attack, just as it didn’t care about the Iranians or Kurds killed in previous ones. Consequently, my feeling is that a vicious, and viciously short-sighted, realpolitik in Washington would probably like nothing better than to let its enemies fight indefinitely in Syria, burning the country to the ground as they do so. 

But please, don’t let the conflict in Syria be about opposing America. Let it be about Syria, and what might actually help Syrians – you know, the actually existing people who are dying by the tens of thousands in this brutal war. But if you can’t do that, then do me a favor, and please shut up.

Curso a distancia: “Soberanía alimentaria: Introducción a las Políticas Públicas en Agrobiodiversidad”

Pronto comienzo del curso a Distancia “Soberanía alimentaria: Introducción a las Políticas Públicas en Agrobiodiversidad”, a través de Acción por la Biodiversidad, a cargo de Nelson Alvarez Febles.

Objetivo del curso: Capacitar en el manejo de los aspectos claves de las políticas públicas que inciden sobre el manejo y control local de la biodiversidad agrícola por parte de las comunidades. Se buscará fortalecer las capacidades para el análisis y la acción. La agrobiodiversidad se enfoca desde la perspectiva del sustento y la diversidad cultural, e incluye a la agricultura, pesca, pastoreo y silvicultura en el contexto de la búsqueda de la Soberanía Alimentaria. Sustento es todo aquello que nos provee a los humanos lo que necesitamos para vivir: la salud a través de las plantas medicinales, los alimentos vegetales y animales, fibra para vestirnos, materiales de construcción, placer estético, entre otros muchos aportes que nos provee la biodiversidad. La meta del curso es dotar a los participantes de herramientas para comprender cómo las políticas intervienen sobre su realidad local, y a la vez ofrecer opciones para promover cambios. 

Los temas a trabajar serán: Agrobiodiversidad y la evolución del concepto de soberanía alimentaria; Alimentos en el mundo, estrategias agroindustriales: ¿escasez o falta de acceso?; Los transgénicos, destrucción de la agricultura bajo control local y comunitaria; La agroecología y la agricultura familiar pueden alimentar al mundo; y La soberanía alimentaria como opción política y sustentable.

http://www.biodiversidadla.org/Principal/Secciones/Noticias/Curso_a_Distancia_Soberania_alimentaria_Introduccion_a_las_Politicas_Publicas_en_Agrobiodiversidad 

'Anti-war' movement still betraying Syrian people

WORLD WAR 4 REPORT

Defending the Fourth World, Deconstructing Overseas Contingency Operations

TO READ THE FULL ARTICLE:
http://ww4report.com/node/12589

by Bill Weinberg on Sat, 08/31/2013  

We noted over a year ago that the increasingly poorly named "anti-war" movement (more of a gaggle than a "movement," and highly selective in being "anti-war") was betraying the Syrian people by failing to even acknowledge Bashar Assad's atrocities, and portraying the opposition as all CIA pawns or al-Qaeda jihadists or both. Now that Assad is apparently escalating to genocide and the US threatens air-strikes, is there any sign that the "anti-war" forces have been chastised into a more honest appraisal? Sadly, no.