TEDx Manhattan: Changing The Way We Eat

On Saturday, March 7th, people from all across the country tuned in to watch over a dozen speakers talk about what we can do to take action to change our food system. I have to tell you, some of these speakers nearly brought me to tears. You must check this out.

• Joel Berg ? New York City Coalition Against Hunger
• Dana Cowin ? Food & Wine
• Alkemia Earth ? DJ and plant-based nutritionist
• Robert Graham, MD ? Lenox Hill Hospital
• Henry Hargreaves ? Photographer and artist
• Kendra Kimbirauskas ? Friends of Family Farmers, SRAP
• Nikiko Masumoto ? Masumoto Family Farm
• Michele Merkel ? Food & Water Watch
• Danny Meyer ? Union Square Hospitality Group
• Danielle Nierenberg ? Food Tank
• Ali Partovi ? Angel Investor
• Stephen Reily ? Seed Capital Kentucky
• Stefanie Sacks, RD ? Culinary nutritionist, author
• Anim Steel ? Real Food Challenge
• Shen Tong ? FOOD-X
• Marcel Van Ooyen ? GrowNYC
• Ietef ?DJ Cavem Moetavation? Vita ? Eco-HipHop
• Green Bronx Machine ? ?TEDxManhattan Award Winner
• Deb Eschmeyer – Lets Move!

Some topics that were touched upon were equality for women farmers, how US laws favor large agribusinesses, health through hip hop, food as medicine, why organic really isn’t more expensive, what we need to end hunger… and more! ?Click here for a link to all of the speakers videos from Saturday.

Smart Meters Being Opposed for Health Reasons

There is new meter technology introduced by National Grid and PSEG that is about to enter your home. These new meters are able to monitor your use of electricity and gas and report it directly to the utility company. Not only does this new technology hone in on your personal data but it could also be harmful to your health.

Children, pregnant women and people with pacemakers are particularly vulnerable to the health impacts of exposure to RF radiation, especially the type of short-burst, high-level signals transmitted by smart meters. The FCC is currently reviewing its own standards for RF radiation, which were last updated back in 1991, long before these devices were invented.

Click here to learn how to opt-out of this new technology.

Women Helping Women in the Food and Farming Sector

More and more over the last decade, women have been drawn to farming. There has been a dramatic increase in the number of farms run by women, and women dominate the new entry farming scene.

Part of the reason women may be advancing in agriculture is that this sector, especially small-scale, sustainable agriculture, is highly dependent on relationships. While the effectiveness of networks proves valuable across all sectors, it is immediately apparent in agriculture where businesses depend on a web of relationships-distributors, mechanics, vets, town supervisors, seed providers, feed suppliers, fence fixers, chefs, neighbors, customers and policy makers. Women are using networks to help each other succeed.

Public Health Officials Know Vaccines Can Spread Disease

It is well known to public health officials that recently vaccinated people could potentially be spreading the very disease that they were vaccinated against. The term is called “vaccine shedding” and the window of time where this can occur varies from 1 week to a few months, those numbers are alarming. In the case of the measles outbreak in Florida, this could very well be what is happening, but unfortunately, the public is quick to blame unvaccinated people.?”Vaccine failure and failure to acknowledge that live virus vaccines can spread disease have resulted in an increase in outbreaks of infectious disease in both vaccinated and unvaccinated individuals,” says Leslie Manookian, producer of The Greater Good. “CDC should instruct physicians who administer vaccinations to inform their patients about the risks posed to others by those who’ve been recently vaccinated.”

Infections with Dangerous Gut Microbes Still on the Rise

The infection, caused by a bacterium known as Clostridium difficile, or C-diff, causes nearly 500,000 illnesses in the United States each year and kills about 29,000, according to the federal Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. ?Some patients end up having to have part of the colon removed to finally eradicate a C-diff infection. And even in those cases the infections frequently recur repeatedly ? which can be severely debilitating and eventually fatal.

Farmers Put Down the Plow for More Productive Soil

Soil-conservation farming is the new method that is being used by more and? more farmers. This way of farming can revive degenerated earth, minimize erosion, encourage plant growth and increase farmers? profits, their proponents say. Farmers say their crops thrive even through droughts and flooding. ?One of the ways in which they conserve the soil is by the use of no-tillage farming. Farmers use tilling to prepare the land for sowing but such treatment of the soil degrades it, killing off its biology, including beneficial fungi and earthworms, and leaving it, as Mr. Archuleta puts it, ?naked, thirsty, hungry and running a fever.?