Symposium to Explore Land Grant Response to Globalization, Climate Change

How should land grant universities prepare to respond to the impacts of globalization and climate change on agriculture, natural resources, and communities?

A daylong symposium on that topic will kick off the western region joint summer meeting of land grant universities, being hosted by Washington State University. The meeting will attract leaders from colleges of agriculture and natural resources, Extension, and agricultural research stations from 13 western states and four Pacific territories.

The symposium will be held on Monday, July 20, starting at 8:30 am, at the Semiahmoo Resort near Blaine, Wash., launching the three-day meeting.

At noon, the symposium will hear from Rajiv Shah, President Obama’s nominee to become U.S. Department of Agriculture Undersecretary of Research, Education, and Economics and Chief Scientist. He will discuss the impacts of poverty, population growth, energy depletion and globalization in developing countries. Shah has been Director of Agricultural Development for the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation. In that role he managed the foundation’s programs focused on reducing poverty and hunger by improving agricultural productivity.

The cost to attend the symposium is $35 per person.get more details here.

My Boat Trailer Tire - A Green Story

Sometimes the opportunity to be green comes at an unexpected time. In fact I didn't even consider this a green story until I told my business partner John about it.

Last week my sister flew up and we planned to all the family and my boat over to Chelan. It gets us the warm, sunny part of the State, but it's about a 4 hour drive and over mountain pass. Anyway I realized that I needed a new spare tire for my boat trailer since years before I had had a blowout in the middle of nowhere and trailer tires are specialized and it was hard to get one. Anyway, one shouldn't leave home without a spare, especially on a long trip. So, I starting calling around, and best price I could find for tire and rim was $250 pretty much anyway I sliced it.

Then my brother in law had an idea. Call the guy who fixes trailers and see if he has a spare 'spare' laying around. So, off we go, we had to jack up the trailer and take one of the tires off just to make sure if we found one the bolt pattern would match. So we go visit this guy who has a small business and he's got all kinds of spare stuff and old parts and sure enough, he sold me one for $50 that would work just fine.

So I saved a couple hundred dollars, put back into service something that was just laying around, and helped a small business guy put a few bucks into his pocket.

And that's the green story of my boat trailer tire.

Cash for Guzzlers

I've been following this issue closely because of it's potential impact not only here in Washington State, but Nationwide. Follow the progress of the Cash for Guzzlers or Cash for Clunkers legislation as it works it's way through Congress and becomes law. Surprizingly there is oppositiion from environmental groups, among others.

How much land area does it take to support your lifestyle?

From our friends North of the border comes this quiz to find out your Ecological Footprint, your biggest areas of resource consumption, and learn what you can do to tread more lightly on the earth.

I found the interface to be a bit clunky but worth slogging through, apparently it would take 3.2 Planet Earths to support us if everyone lived like me. Hmmm.

Recycle Books, Cd's and Stuff and profits from their resale goes to environmental groups

This is what we in the marketing biz call a "two-fer". Not only do you recycle your old stuff (as opposed to throwing it out) but then the money your old stuff resells for goes to environmental causes. So you save the environment and help the environment all at the same time.

I haven't tried it yet, but it sounds darn cool and it's a non-profit group so all the better. Sounds like the motivation I need to clean out my closet....

The group is called Eco Encore and here the scoop.

Happy conserving!