Kelley

A Garden for Earth Day

By 2050, scientists say the world's farmers will need to double their agricultural output to feed us all.
Twice as much food.
For twice as many mouths.
In just 40 years.
Where will all this new food grow?
If the wheat fields continue their warp into subdivisions, where will our bread come from?
Will we drink orange juice made from incubated seedlings grown in a white sterile building tended by mad glove-wielding scientists who call themselves farmers?
Will "organic" be impossible?
Will biotechnology and genetically modified organisms be the only option?
In 40 years, my baby son will be a middle-aged man. What will his dinner plate look like then? What will he be feeding his children?
Will they know where it came from? And will it look like the food we know?
They say that hybrid seeds will produce more, sustain us longer, conserve the earth's resources.
Maybe so.
Time will tell.
I do know that it's time to make a change.
A garden-sized change.
One day my son will tell his own kids
That he saw his dinner sprouting from seeds in the ground
Before it appeared on his plate.

Cindy

Rhododendron. Nothing is more Washington than this!