עדכונים מהבלוג

הכניסו את כתובת המייל לקבלת עידכונים מהבלוג:
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June 12, 2012

For many years now I have been roaming the fields of our country, studying local agriculture, its history and present. I try to understand the pros and cons of every agricultural system, from modern monoculture to dry farming, permaculture and more. I am dealing with questions of crops, environment, marketing, economics and community.

I have learnt, only this week, that most of the local wheat is grown by dry-farming in the Negev, and that the government subsidies it (by law) to make it worth for the farmers to grow. Nevertheless, and in spite of the fact that that there are taxes on imported wheat, more that 80% of our wheat for consumption is imported. How does that happen? That answer is financial, of course. The government created a protection system against the import of wheat, but not against the import of parts of the grains. The big companies want to make profits, so they import the parts separately, and there is no limit to that. They can thus buy cheaply endosperm, bran and sprouts. Thus, most of the whole wheat bread sold in supermarkets (the flour in the breads consists of parts that have come from different locations) is not flour that was ground from whole grains.

Dry agriculture is based on rain and on the moistness of the earth. It is called “Ba’al” agriculture, after the ancient Canaanite god of storm and fertility. To this day it is still dependent of the rains. Last  week I visited the Ba’al fields of Kefar Kana with Hussam Abas. He showed me how he and his friends grow watermelons, pumpkins, cucumbers, tomatoes and mor only from local seeds and without irrigation, based on their vast knowledge of local agriculture. They told me how their parents planted hawthorn trees near the fields, because barn owls build their nest on hawthorns, and one owl can eat all the fiels-mice. They also told me that they used to plant a carob tree between olive trees, because some pest that causes damage to the olives prefer the carob. They also told me that if I take a water melon that has just been picked, and stand it on its “sting” at home, it will keep fresh up to two months. They told me how the seeds of the vegetables change hands from one generation to the other. We sat in the shade of a sukkah near the village when a group of people arrived and started to pick Ibrahim’s vegetables. He said that he grows the vegetables for them, and they – family and friends, can pick as much as they want.

Enriched by all this information, I took Hussam with me to visit Sa’ar Sela, who uses permaculture in the field of Sede-Ilan, not far from Kefar Kana. Sa’ar is one of our suppliers – we receive a box of vegetables every week from his farm. We went around the fields and Hussam was surprised to see irrigation everywhere. I told him that both Ibrahim (the farmer from his village) and Sa’ar are doing the same thing: “community agriculture”: they both use agriculture that is good for the environment, and sell their crops to their families and their community. The difference is that Sa’ar waters his crops, and Ibrahim sprays his crops with chemicals. Why don’t we create a situation when Sa’ar learns not to use water and Ibrahim learns not to spray? This cooperation may create environmentally safe local agriculture that will bring friendship between the farmers who are so close to each other – and so far from each other.

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