Berry Good

Berries, so delicious, so nutritious, but what is in the humble berry for your conventional grocer. Berries are one of the most heavily sprayed crops of fruits, treated with multiple herbicides, insectides and especially fungacides, metalaxyl, malathion, paraquat and the organophosphate chlorpyrifos. This equates to 7 known or probable carcinogens, 22 hormone disruptors, 12 neurotoxins and 6 developmental reproductive toxicants.

Organic Berries are berry good, no toxic cocktail to contaminate your precious fruit, worth every cent. Your health is worth it!!!

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TAHINI CHOC CHIP COOKIES

Due to popular demand, here is the delicious recipe for the Tahini Choc Chip cookies, ENJOY.

TAHINI CHOC CHIP BISCUITS

2 cups ORGANIC rolled oats (not quick-cooking)
1/2 cup ORGANIC light wholemeal flour
1/2 cup wholemeal flour
1 teaspoon ground cinnamon
1/2 teaspoon baking soda
1/2 teaspoon salt
1/2 cup tahini
4 tablespoons cold unsalted butter, cut into pieces
2/3 cup ORGANIC raw sugar
2/3 cup packed light brown sugar
1 large ORGANIC FREE RANGEegg
1 large ORGANIC FREE RANGE egg white
1 tablespoon ORGANIC vanilla extract
1 cup semisweet or bittersweet ORGANIC chocolate chips
1/2 cup chopped ORGANIC walnuts

1. Position racks in the upper and lower thirds of the oven; preheat to 180 c. Line 2 baking sheets with baking paper.

2. Whisk oats, flours, cinnamon, baking soda and salt in a medium bowl. Beat tahini and butter in a large bowl with an electric mixer until blended into a paste. Add sugar and brown sugar; continue beating until well combined—the mixture will still be a little grainy. Beat in egg, then egg white, then vanilla. Stir in the oat mixture with a wooden spoon until just moistened. Stir in chocolate chips and walnuts.

3. With damp hands, roll 1 tablespoon of the batter into a ball, place it on a prepared baking sheet and flatten it until squat, but don't let the sides crack. Continue with the remaining batter, spacing the flattened balls 2 inches apart.

4. Bake the cookies until golden brown, about 16 minutes, switching the pans back to front and top to bottom halfway through. Cool on the pans for 2 minutes, then transfer the cookies to a wire rack to cool completely. Let the pans cool for a few minutes before baking another batch.

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Eat a rainbow

It's the colour of food that makes it amazing(along with the taste). Within each color are brightly coloured, disease-fighting phytochemicals called antioxidants. Studies suggest that single plant pigments need other phytochemicals within that plant and from others to provide all their benefits. Supplements do not offer the same protective benefits as foods. So the best way to get your complete vitamin dose is to eat a rainbow, eat as many natural foods as you can on your plate. The more colours, the more amazing antioxidants we provide for our bodies.

On a basic level, it does make more sense than eating a monochrome, all white dinner for example. Each group of antioxidants are represented by different colours, lets take carotenes for example, in our food they range in colour from deep yellow to deep red. Carotene acts as our defense mechanism to resist carcinogens. Carotenoids can offset the effects of exposure to environmental toxins such as air pollution and cigarette smoke and help the body to protect the body against sun damage.

The Reds, Purples and Blues
Top choices: strawberries, blueberries, raspberries, saskatoon berries, cranberries, apples, cherries, pomegranates, red grapes, beets, red cabbage, black rice.

The antioxidants in these are very potent, work as an anti-inflammatory . They rid the body of free radicals and cytokines, which have been linked with neural and cellular breakdown from aging.

Orange reds, tomatoes, papayas, pink grapefruit, watermelon, guava, red peppers

Lycopene and carotene rich foods may substantially reduce your risk of lung cancer, as well as other cancers. (Adding some oil, when serving them will make it easier for your body to absorb lycopene. )

The Greens
Top choices: spinach, cos lettuce avocados, broccoli, asparagus, watercress, cabbage, kale, brussel sprouts

Green chlorophyll has disease-fighting, but it's the yellow under-pigment, lutein, in leafy greens that really benefits eye health. Eyes absorb lutein which protects them from light and free radical damage

Dark leafy vegetables, like spinach and broccoli, help build resistance to colon cancer.

So go and sing a rainbow, better yet, eat a rainbow.

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Farmers are the Solution, this is the truth

This is an article that is available on www.biodynamics.net.au

Farmers are the solution©

There is growing concern and attention being directed to climate change and the environment. It is the farmers who can solve our environment problems - everyone else can slow the process of creating carbon emissions but only farmers can reverse them.


1. CARBON: "We require only 10% of our productive, degraded lands to absorb the estimated 6.1 gigatonnes of carbon dioxide emissions to make a carbon negative world possible in our lifetime" www.amazingcarbon.com/SummariesHORSHAM.pdf Note: biological carbon sequestration is very different to carbon GEOsequestration, a physical process.


2. SOIL: Australia loses 6.97 tonnes of soil per hectare per year across the entire continent. www.deh.gov.au/soe/2001/land/land01-5html Humus holds the soil as well as increasing drought tolerance

3. WATER: In a river catchment basin such as the River Murray (1,057,000 square Kilometres) a 2% increase in humus would equate to an increase in water –holding capacity of 33,824 gigalitres of water (which is approximately equivalent to one Olympic pool per 10 hectares).
http://www.biodynamics.net.au/documents/PlainOldDirt-Compactversion2006edn..doc

4. ECONOMY: Australia imports approximately $4 billion in agricultural chemicals. This is approximately $30,000 per farmer. If we can free ourselves from this requirement we have more resources: $4 billion - to spend in local communities - annually.


Politicians can encourage and scientists inform, only the farmers can achieve outcomes on the scale required, effective immediately.

Biodynamic Agriculture Australia Ltd is a not-for-profit, national, membership association with over 1,200 members. We educate, train and support farmers in the adoption of carbon efficient agriculture and the implementation of sustainable methods that are environmentally regenerative, simple and low cost to apply as well as providing high quality food and fibre.


Hamish Mackay,

CEO,
Bellingen, bdceo@biodynamics.net.au

August, 2007


Further information

The loss of water holding ability in Australian soils has initiated a devastating cycle of terrestrial and marine degradation ranging from the visible effects of soil erosion to the slower and more insidious effects of dryland salinity, acidity and marine sedimentation.
http://www.biodynamics.net.au/documents/PlainOldDirt-Compactversion2006edn..doc p6


The British Royal Society has estimated potential carbon dioxide sequestration on the worlds 2.5 billion acres of agricultural soils at 6.1 to 10.1 billion U.S. tons per year for the next 50 years.
http://www.newfarm.org/depts/NFfield_trials/1003/carbonsequest.shtml


Physical Processes of Humus Formation
Kay (1997) describes the formation of stable humus in the soil as a physical process by which humus material and inorganic matter interact; protecting the organic carbon from further microbial attack and in the process, sequestering organic carbon.
http://www.biodynamics.net.au/documents/PlainOldDirt-Compactversion2006edn..doc p8


Water-Holding Capacity Increase for One Hectare for Varying Levels of Humus Increase

Using the guideline ratio, which has been established for additional water retention the following gains can be expected.

Humus Increase Increased Volume of Water Retained /ha (to 30 cm)
(OC% x 4,000,000kg x 4)
0.5% 80,000 litres (average 2004 level)
1 % 160,000 litres
2 % 320,000 litres
3 % 480,000 litres
4 % 640,000 litres
5 % 800,000 litres (pre-settlement level)


The Clarence Valley catchment has an area of 2,300,000 ha, a 0.5% increase in humus (organic carbon) would therefore store an additional 184,000,000,000 litres of water following an adequate rainfall event.
http://www.biodynamics.net.au/documents/PlainOldDirt-Compactversion2006edn..doc p11

Green Revolution

“Irrigated farming takes two-thirds of all water abstracted from rivers and underground reserves. This is largely because of the green revolution. The ‘high yielding’ plant varieties that have kept the world fed as populations doubled over the past 30 years turn out to be high-yielding only when measured against land area. Measured against water use, they are generally worse than the crops they replaced. They produce less crop per drop.

The world grows twice as much food as it did a generation ago, but abstracts three times as much water to do it.”

Guardian Weekly; Supplement Every Last Drop, p 2, September 29 – October 5 2006 Vol 175/No 15/Printed in Sydney. The article is based on When the Rivers Run Dry, by Fred Pearce, published by Eden Project Books.


See also DVD: How to Save the World available $30 incl.GST p&p at www.biodynamics.net.au

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