Not hip, righteous

The blah about whether the young people who are giving up city life for something more rural and productive are “hip”, “cool” or what is fun to watch, but not all that illuminating. It has, however, flushed out an interesting article from April’s Atlantic magazine, which I might never have seen. A Papaya Grows in Holyoke explains how “A crime-plagued mill town in Massachusetts has discovered the roots of urban renewal,” and those roots, you will not be surprised to learn, go deep into the ground. Of course the story may not tell the whole truth, we’ve always known that, but it is a heart-warming read.

Via cheflovesbeer, who says: “It is easier for the kids if some of the hip kids do it”.

Nibbles: Carnival, farmer schools, zero-till, drought, barley, ag college, organic choc, ICTs

Sorghum to Swaziland; coals to Newcastle?

I’m having a little trouble getting my head round this one. The “Republic of China on Taiwan” funded a successful project to teach Swazi farmers how to grow sorghum in areas with little rainfall. You might have thought that at least a few local farmers would have known how to grow this staple, but apparently all had been forgotten in the rush to cotton and maize. The Swazi Minister of Agriculture also said that education assisted the move away from sorghum:

Sorghum needed someone in the fields to chase away birds and because most children now go to school, maize then became popular.

The farmers who took part in the project were happy enough with the result. I just hope they don’t keep their children away from school to work as scarecrows.