The BELIZE BREEZE®

If the biomass currently wasted in Belize were turned into soil amendments, it would be worth millions of (US) dollars. Compost and mulch is the key to both organic agriculture and bioremediation. You must actually create your own soil, and so you can never have too much of these materials. All that is necessary to turn “lead” into “gold” is access to a chipper-shredder or a backyard compost pile.

Belize’s greatest natural resource is its climate. Abundant rainfall and sunshine allow plants to grow with little or no human assistance. Millions of tons of oxygen-producing, carbon-sequestering biomass grow here every year. You usually see this green and brown gold sitting or burning by the side of the road, dumped into waterways, or trucked to a landfill or vacant lot. Instead of being treated as the invaluable resource it really is, tree limbs, grass, brush, and agricultural waste is treated as being “garbage.”

          It is impossible to emphasize the importance of returning these materials to the Earth in the form of compost and mulch. Adding organic materials to whatever type of subsoil you have accomplishes three important things. It creates topsoil, the living layer of microorganisms that make land-based life on Earth possible. It allows clay soils to drain, and sandy soils to retain water. And it helps to rid the landscape of unsightly and smelly piles of half-burned vegetation.

        The ultimate goal of organic practice is to end up with raised bed 2-3 feet higher than grade. And by “grade,” I mean the historic flood plain. You don’t want years of hard work to wash away in a storm. You should be able to reach your hand into this humus/loam and pull up a handful of earthworms. If you build it, they will come. These annelids are a gardener’s best friend. Their tunnels aerate the soil, and their droppings are super-fertilizer. Worm “castings” also reduce or eliminate fungal diseases.

        When I was a wee tad, the whole neighborhood would be awakened once a week by the “garbage men.” Mainly Sicilian immigrants, they would come yelling and banging the garbage cans before sunrise, letting everyone know how much they hated their job. Today, these guys are Waste Management Inc., a multi-billion dollar, multi-national corporation.

        Now every residence in most communities receives three color-coded 50-gallon wheeled bins. Newspaper and cardboard goes into the black one. Glass and plastic bottles and cans, as well as other plastic and metal goes into the blue bin. Kitchen and yard waste go into the green one. Waste Management resells the glass, plastic, and metal. The contents of the green bins are taken to a municipal facility where it is turned into compost. Residents can get all they can haul away for cheap or free.

        The bad news is that it takes cooperation between the public and private sectors to implement a comprehensive recycling program. The good news is that unlike the urbanized developed countries, almost every household in Belize has the room to make their own compost pile. Kitchen and yard waste can be turned into fertilizer in as little as two weeks.  Spoiled hay, wood chips, chipped corn-cobs and stalks, or palm fronds between beds or rows prevent the paths from becoming muddy.

        In addition to yard clippings and vegetation removed for development, agricultural waste is a potential source for materials that can be used to make composts and mulches. Corn stalks, husks, and cobs, sugarcane stalks, coconut husks, banana tree leaves, palm fronds, bean straw, rice, peanut, and cocoa hulls, shredded paper and cardboard; all make excellent soil amendments. Fish, kelp, bone, feather, blood meal, manures, wood ashes, and various minerals can be applied directly to the soil, but in my opinion these materials usually should be incorporated into composts.      

        Bioremediation is the process of restoring habitats damaged by de-forestation, erosion, and pollution. Wood-chips can be used to stabilize stream banks and to mulch newly-planted or established shrubs and trees. Mulch conserves water by slowing evaporation, prevents soil from becoming too hot, inhibits the growth of weeds, and acts as a time-release fertilizer.

"Aquaculture is a double-edged sword, however.
Its use as a production method has the potential
to relieve some ofthe overwhelming pressures on
natural fish species. All too often,however, the
techniques used in aquaculture are, in and of
themselves, harmful to the environment, especially
in cases wheremarket forces cause high competition
between aquaculture projects.
The destruction of mangroves and the salination
ofgroundwater inareas where intensive shrimp farming
is practiced is one well knownexample. Another example
is that of a freshwater fish of African origin -
tilapia- which, on one hand is optimal because
of its capacity to reproduce and grow quickly and
ability to survive in low-oxygen water bodies such
as stagnant ponds, yet is also extremely carnivorous
of the eggs and young of its own and other species,
having, in fact led to the depletion of a fish indigenous
to Costa Rica, the Guapeta."

Tilapia and the Environment

http://www1.american.edu/ted/TILAPIA.HTM

"FAO has recommended climate change adaptation measures among 90,000 poor rural families in the dry corridor. The proposed measures, which would cost around 18 million dollars over the next four years, would improve the soil's water retention capacity, make use of integrated agroforestry systems, guarantee access to seeds, and promote backyard gardening."

GUATEMALA: 25 CHILDREN DIE OF STARVATION

http://www.allbusiness.com/medicine-h...

GUATEMALA CITY, Sep. 11, 2009 (IPS/GIN) - The deaths of 25 children from severe malnutrition this year in Guatemala, mainly in the eastern province of Jalapa, shows that the specter of hunger is still haunting the country, aggravated by the global economic crisis and drought.