Interview: Grace Gershuny on the Past, Future of Organics Reflections of a Revolutionary Interview by Mark Keating Grace Gershuny is widely known as an author, educator and organic consultant. A back-to-the-land Vermonter since 1973, she began her longtime involvement with the organic grassroots movement by organizing regional conferences and developing an early certification program for the Northeast Organic Farming Association (NOFA). In 1994, USDA recruited Gershuny to serve as its lead organic standards specialist where over the following five years she helped lay the foundations of the National Organic Program. Co-author of The Soul of Soil, a seminal work on practical organic soil management, her new book is entitled Organic Revolutionary: A Memoir of the Movement for Real Food, Planetary Healing and Human Liberation. Still raising her own vegetables and chickens, Gershuny currently teaches in the Green Mountain College online Masters in Sustainable Food Systems program and serves on the board of the Institute for Social Ecology. (more…)
Interview: Author, Advocate Courtney White Unites Groups at Odds through Regenerative Agriculture Finding Common Ground “Courtney, the Berlin Wall fell down up here.” These were the words of a Forest Service District Ranger back in 1998. He was talking about the wall between ranchers and environmentalists in the region, and people passing out the hammers and helping with the teardown were, and still are, called the Quivira Coalition. Courtney White, the subject of this month’s interview, co-founded Quivira in 1997 because he was dismayed and disheartened by the nasty, unceasing legal and ideological dogfighting over the disposition of Western lands. He thought it might be a good idea, for example, if environmentalists heard from scientists about the importance of fire to restoring grass. Or if ranchers and farmers heard from a peer about the advantages of moving livestock around, and heard it while conservationists and environmentalists were in the room. As the ranger indicated, the simple idea of bringing people together to relax the grip around each other’s throats and learn a few things, turned out to be terrifically well-timed and apt. After 17 years as director of Quivira, White decided to concentrate full-time on writing books, of which the eminently useful Two Percent Solutions for the Planet is only the latest example. Reached at home in Santa Fe, he graciously agreed to reflect on the past two decades of building coalitions and opening eyes. (more…)