Food insecurity is a major buzzword (buzzphrase?) in the mainstream media these days. I’ve seen a flurry of articles recently about the issue, from both global and local perspectives. These are the horror stories that have stuck in my mind:

• The price of food is climbing – but not everyone feels the pinch the same way.
• Two billion people – and 200 million children – are chronically undernourished.
• The rapid growth in farm output seen in the 20th century has slowed to the point that it is not keeping up with food demand.
• The present method of conventional crop production “cannot meet the challenges of the new millennium.”

Pretty dire, right? We’ve grown enough food to have the population of the planet explode, only to find that the way we’ve grown all this food is messing us up even further. Excuse me while I go bury my head in the sand.

But maybe we’ve known what to do all along. The United Nations’ Save and Grow paradigm is supposedly a new one, but people have been planting this way for ages (until Big Ag showed up). And the Rodale Institute’s 27 year study of organic vs. conventional corn and soy yields shows that organic is just as productive as growing with chemicals.

Better Living Through Chemistry sounded great – but growing organic may be what saves the food supply.