It’s been said that soil without biology is just geology—an accumulation of lifeless minerals unable to spawn healthy plant growth. And as intense monocropping production practices increasingly remove more life from the ground than they return, it sends that soil closer to fossilization via what conservationist Barry Fisher calls, “the spiral of degradation”: eroded, compacted…  Read More →

In the 1980s, we helped start the Winona Farmers’ Market in Winona, Minn. Today, downtown Winona is buzzing with activity on Saturday mornings, with 40 vendors selling vegetables, fruits, meats, flowers, baked goods, dairy, honey and all sorts of delicious and healthy products, all grown and processed within a 50-mile radius of Winona. The Farmers’…  Read More →

NOTE: Land Stewardship Project Healthcare Organizing Committee member Al Kruse recently wrote this letter to the editor of the Marshall Independent: The April 27 Marshall Independent editorial about healthcare gets one important thing right: We have a lot of work to do to make quality, affordable healthcare available in our rural communities. Unfortunately, it is…  Read More →

On day two of our trip, we visited EDUCA (which stands for the Spanish equivalent of “Services for an Alternative Education”), an NGO located in Oaxaca City. It was housed in a two-story building, with a wall out front and a formidable door. EDUCA was formed in 1994 to promote civil participation, indigenous rights and…  Read More →

We didn’t realize the counter-cultural nature of the visit we made to Espacio Kruz. Because we didn’t know the history of the uprising in the state of Oaxaca that created the Holy Virgin of the Barricades. What Román Kruz and his family are doing on their small piece of property looks like homesteading and simple…  Read More →

First, some background: I grew up on a conventional hay, corn and soybean farm in western Iowa and moved to Rochester, Minn., for work after getting a mechanical engineering degree from Iowa State University. I like engineering, but after a few years of working in an office environment, I was feeling the urge to get…  Read More →

Last month in a special report, the Star Tribune newspaper revealed how much water pollution from agriculture is costing taxpayers. At $125 million in 2014 alone, the price of industrialized, monocrop agriculture is significant and only likely to grow. In north-central Minnesota, we have an opportunity during the next few weeks to prevent some of…  Read More →

Over Thanksgiving, I was perusing the Dairy Star at my brother-in-law’s house in Stillwater, Minn. Having grown up on a dairy farm, I still like to see how the industry is doing. A column by Sadie Frerichs called, “The Negative Impacts of Health Insurance,” caught my eye. Because of the recent health insurance rate increases…  Read More →

I am tired of hearing about the negative role of government, especially as it relates to the Affordable Care Act. I lived for almost 20 years without health insurance and avoided the doctor except for an emergency. Unless you have experienced collection letters and the follow-up calls, you have no idea what they do to…  Read More →