Heinberg on "Growing Security"

In this wonderful essay from May 2004, Heinberg chats about his own experience increasing his food security, gives a great list of helpful books, makes an important point, and uncovers an interesting bit of history:

snips:

Even if Janet and I were to become spectacularly successful at growing all of our own food sustainably, we would still face a serious problem. As energy resources become scarce and the life-support infrastructure of modern suburbia breaks down, people who haven’t had the same forethought that we have will endeavor to survive in any way possible—and some of these people will be violence-prone folks with nothing to lose. Under such circumstances, individualist survivalism will be pointless; the best insurance against crop theft and general chaos will be community solidarity. Entire neighborhoods will need to be organized for collective security and for cooperative food-growing efforts. To be effective, efforts along these lines will need to start before the breakdown.

Fortunately, there are precedents for the widespread adoption of backyard and community gardening. As David M. Tucker has documented in his fascinating book Kitchen Gardening in America: A History (Iowa State University Press, 1993), during previous periods of economic and political turmoil city and suburban dwellers have responded by turning lawns and golf courses into potato beds. I had previously heard of the Victory Gardens of World War II; I didn’t realize that the phenomenon was even more widespread during World War I, and that in both instances it began not with a government program, but, according to Tucker, with spontaneous citizen action:

The war gardening of 1917 emerged from consumer fear of rising prices and actual food shortages. Threatened railroad labor strikes and the anticipated American entry into the European War created speculative food hoarding in the inter of 1916–17, leading to an inflationary price spiral that quickly doubled the cost of most food staples in New York City while onions soared 700 percent in cost and cabbages 2,000 percent.

Volunteer community gardens appeared throughout the country, including school gardens and gardens for the poor. Only later did the government decide that this was a good idea and begin a propaganda campaign to encourage the effort.