Prince Charles, Slow Food, and Sustainable Agriculture
A friend of mine recommended this New York Times piece about Prince Charles and his involvement in the Slow Food Movement. Be sure to listen to his speech on small-scale and sustainable agriculture given at the Terra Madre conference in Turin, Italy (2004).
“The one resource the developing world has in abundance is people so why are we promoting systems of agriculture that negate this advantage and contriubte directly to further human misery and indignity.”
“I can only say that for some reason I felt in my bones that if you abuse nature unnecessarily and fail to maintain a balance, then she will probably abuse you in return,” he wrote in his new book, “The Elements of Organic Gardening,” written with Stephanie Donaldson (Weidenfeld & Nicolson).
What surprised my friend and myself as well is how clear and honestly he speaks about poverty and it’s attachment to food and agriculture. Who knew the Prince of Wales was such a progressive chap?
April 25th, 2007 at 3:36 pm
The Prince of Wales as been a progressive chap for quite some time. I remember reading about his efforts in organic farming at least 10 years ago.
April 25th, 2007 at 4:08 pm
Well I meant that kind of rhetorically. I knew about some of the agricultural stuff however it’s the way he connects it to poverty and class issues that I found to be surprisingly progressive.
April 25th, 2007 at 9:47 pm
Sorry - didn’t realize I was taking things unnecessarily literally! :-) And I hadn’t known about the connections with poverty/class issues until I’d commented and THEN listened to the speech!
April 26th, 2007 at 12:20 pm
His thoughts and passion are encouraging. I’ll have to check out that speech (when I’m not at work!)
; )