Food is the Ecology of Life

While we are stepping into the New year, 2019, another milestone in the lives of billions of humans, to recreate for themselves a future not only for ourselves but generations to come forth.. 

I take this opportunity to narrate some portion of the discourse on our platter as FOOD FOR THOUGHT which Dr. Vandana Shiva gave to Ambavadis..

Doctor who Dares.. she is the crusader, the torch bearer who is the ray of hope in farmers life. Indian farmers, who have not only go their hands coated and burnt in chemicals and fertilizers, but their lives too have suffered drastically when the artificial world took over these nature growers and feeders. Suicides, BT cotton, BT brinjal, overuse of fertilizers, farmer suicides etc. these issues are just a tip of the iceberg!!

WE are in a fragile moment for the future of earth but that of humanity as well, if we don’t protect the mother earth, humanity will go for a toss.

We are living in a period of fake rivers, fake bees, fake news, fake food which is a big issue, if we reconnect ourselves back to the earth and ourselves, with the realisation that we are made of earth and so is the entire humanity. Entire humanity is of that connect, nature connect!!

Reconnect itself will solve so many problems. Especially communal killing, the only realisation which needs to be brought in today is that “we are part of the same earth family; we are earth and humanity connects. Each of us is just 10% you, 90% is the microbes in you; we are because of the other, we are because of the microbes.”

In the recent past, we have got the realisation of the Second brain which is spoken about in Ayurveda a lot, is our GUT!! Our gut is so rich and so is our soil rich, they need an organic environment, the right food, and right microbes. Packaged food cannot give the gut the right living microbes as it is dead food. Therefore, organic farms are better; they help us sustain soil, retaining the right nutrition and microbes in the soil.

Fertilizers create dead soil, so does packaged food, not allowing life to enter our GUT. The dead food we are eating today is one major cause of neurological problems, which are on a high rise. Therefore, it’s high time that in a technological era, farmers need to be recognised as Annadatas and the givers of nourishment.

We have to save the soil, as we are sons of the soil, there is no planet B, we cannot move to Mars. The only answer is to start saving seeds which will grow again, create a living economy, which is about cultivation, create food communities, connect with farmers, bring vegetables directly. Farmers have to create to create their own economy, that’s the need in order to stop suffering and get out of the traps of cyclical debt.

Let us learn from farmers, the quality of patience and toil under which they go.. and overcome the disaster of consumerism, Supermarket mentality which is our own creation to just go and shop, for interim relief!! Shopping isn’t the solution!! Farmers get minimum out of this market model, as low as one percent.

Looking at the fast pace of Ecology collapse, we will have to create a direct organic chain, where the consumer pays half, the farmer gets double. This will not only help the current organic produce cost challenge but help us connect and recreate with sensitivity....

A WIN WIN SITUATION!!

We can begin taking small steps till we realise...Food is not a product or commodity and we are not a consumer. Let us Regenerate!! Food is us, respect food, as Life; not a commodity