Orion Magazine - November-December 2008

his seventies, leads us into the forest. Every few hundred yards he stops and points out an edible palm, fruit, or nut tree. “Es his-torico,” he insists, because it pro- vided food during “la epoca guerrilla.” One palm yields cooking oil, and another tree produces nuts that can be roasted and ground into ?our. The jungle served as the guerrillas’ home for many years, providing food, shelter, and safety, and it is doing so again.

The revolution of Nuevo Horizonte is no longer being fought with guns, but with education, sustainability, and the integrity of the natural and human community. “The >ght is not over,” Tono says.

— Greg Gordon

PEDAL PEOPLE

northampton, massachusetts—The Pedal People troll our streets almost every day, bicycling not for play but for work. They tow six- and eight-foot trailers behind their bikes, each stacked with eight plastic containers roughly the size of recycling bins, and collect neighborhood garbage and recycling to haul to the local transfer station. The program is popular enough that on some streets the garbage truck need visit only a single address or two— leaving the rest of trash collection to a bicycle quietly rolling from house to house.

Last year the Pedal People moved beyond individual service and won a contract with the city to collect garbage from downtown waste cans. Stores have begun using them for local deliveries of furniture, and residents can call on the trailers for house moves within town (they can carry up to three hundred pounds). Their website ( www.pedalpeople.com) boasts that they’ve moved everything from cats to solar panels.

Six years into the business, the two founders, Ruthy Woodring and Alex Jarrett, have expanded their operation to a cooperative of eleven, and now they’re offering a new service: pickup of com-

postable material. If you can’t or don’t want to compost yourself, you can leave a bucket of scraps out with the garbage. And for those who prefer the smell of cut grass to mowers and blowers, they do gas-free, chemical-free yard care, with all tools, including human-powered mowers, brought by bicycle. It’s a message in action: look what we can do gas-free.

Since signing up, my own household has become much more conscious of how much we throw out each week. It’s impossible not to be when we see the Pedal People folks sweating in the summer and toiling uphill through slush in the winter, pulling the weight of everyone’s leavings.

—Elissa Alford

FROM HANDOUTS TO HOW-TO

tucson, arizona—Everywhere you go in America, prices are rising: of gas, goods, and especially food. It’s getting tough for many Americans, and even food banks are having a hard time getting by—their prices are rising, too. But at this time of economic downturn, the Tucson Community Food Bank ( www.communityfoodbank.com) is demonstrating how long-term thinking can solve food insecurity. The Food Bank believes that gardening isn’t just a pastime for the well-to-do, but that it’s an important adaptation that anyone with access to a little space, water, and sunlight can make.

I recently attended a gardening workshop at the Tucson Community Food Bank. The event took place in a beautiful seven-thousand-square-foot organic demonstration garden next to the Food Bank, in an industrial part of town. The garden was >lled with tomatoes, beans, chiles, and other vegetables, proving that good food can be grown anywhere. The chicken coop

was bustling with chickens eating garden scraps, and the compost pile stood off to the side, a testament to e;cient “waste” management.

The workshop, this one in

English but they also offer them in Spanish, taught the basics of how to start your own garden, from picking the best spot in your yard and selecting appropriate plants, to how to water e;ciently. We learned how to compost kitchen scraps and how to be more self-su;cient in general. And the program extends its reach beyond the classroom walls. The Food Bank gives away free compost to new gardeners until they can develop their own supply, and even offers free on-site consultations; an expert will come to your house to help you design a garden that works for you. It also holds weekly farmers’ markets where fresh vegetables and eggs can be purchased at affordable prices. The Tucson Community Food Bank isn’t just offering food, it’s offering good food.

The best part of these programs is that they facilitate a shift in thinking from handouts to how-to. By creating your own garden and growing your own food, you learn skills that improve your quality of life while also improving your economic situation. Gardening at home reduces the need for fossil-fuel-derived fertilizer and fuel for transportation. And it builds community too, since many gardeners end up sharing their excess harvest with neighbors.