'Good' food movement expands as outbreaks, recalls prove dangers of industrial agriculture

Sunday, October 17, 2010 by: Ethan A. Huff, staff writer
Tags: good food, agriculture, health news

(NaturalNews) Fears over the safety of store-bought food are growing, and for good reason, considering the frequency with which contamination outbreaks occur these days. But the good news is that a "good" food movement is also growing, centered around local, organic growing methods that trade corporate food dominance for the old-fashioned ways of raising food -- ways that naturally keep food clean and contaminant free.

Individuals like Gerald Hairston, a West Va.-native who helped formally organize a group of community gardeners in Detroit, are helping to lead the way in revolutionizing the way Americans view food. And they are helping to reignite a passion and love for slow, honest food raising methods that our ancestors relied on for their daily fare.

Agriculturally-minded individuals with a passion for reconnecting people with the land have been transforming Detroit's otherwise vacant, decaying landscape into backyard gardens, hydroponic greenhouses and even small animal pens for years -- and such efforts are transforming the minds of those in the local community that are learning to appreciate the value of locally-grown foods.

Hairston's band of "Gardening Angels", as he termed them, began teaching Detroit's youth about how to raise food back in 1992, and ever since then, the initiative has only continued to grow. Adults and children alike are immersed in such "urban agriculture" programs and have developed a new appreciation for, and connection with, the food that they eat.

And Detroit is hardly the only place where the food revolution is occurring. Backyard farming is popping up in cities all across the country as people learn not only how to do it, but how rewarding it can be. Backyard chicken coups, for instance, are a great way to get fresh eggs every day that are not only healthier than store-bought ones, but also free from salmonella.

Sources for this story include:

http://www.alternet.org/food/148171/good_foo...