Victory Gardens or War Gardens emerged during World Wars I and II. Governments around the world encouraged its citizens to start growing their food to reduce pressure on the food supply, to feed the troops, and to boost morale. When you learn to grow your food, there is a grand feeling of accomplishment and pride. The ability to feed yourself, your family, and your neighbors is priceless.

Fast forward 80 years, and we have a different kind of war that we are all facing. Industrial agriculture is our greatest enemy. This industry is making millions of us sick or worse, killing us and is the number one contributor to climate change.

During the Vietnam War, the US Government established a program named Operation Ranch Hand. Through this program, they manufactured a nasty chemical cocktail, Agent Orange, to clear thick forests to see and kill people easier. WTF?? At the end of the war, the US government had a surplus of this Agent Orange, so what did they do with it? They sold it to a company named, Monsanto who then put a sparkly label on it and started selling it to us as this magical bug and weed killer! Wow, it’s much quicker to spray this chemical on my plants than it is to follow nature's rhythms and remove pests naturally. Of course, they did not tell us that the product is dangerous to human health.

Around the same time, the US government started subsidizing only the farmers who were using their recommend products, ie, Roundup or previously known as Agent Orange, and growing the crops that made them the most money. These crops are used to make processed, packaged foods that have a much longer shelf life than fresh fruit and vegetables. These big brands of manufactured foods now fill the aisles in our local supermarket chains. Making it an extremely profitable business plan for everyone involved, except the farmers!!

Herein lies the problems and why we must all start our Organic Victory gardens ASAP. The profit driven farming techniques used in industrial agriculture are destroying the nutrient fertile soils needed to grow healthy foods. We are facing massive food shortages. Climate change is causing drought and famine in many areas around the globe, and we can only expect this to grow. Natural disasters such as fire, flood, hurricanes, and tornados are increasing and intensifying every year, thus making it impossible to depend on a global, industrial-sized food-producing model. We have no idea when or where the next crisis will appear.

Why do we have to add the word “organic” to victory gardens? Simply to define the techniques to growing a healthy, sustainable food supply. Back in the days of the first victory gardens, people were not using chemicals, or synthetic materials to grow food, and the size of the garden was manageable and able to be sustained. They used strategies that were based on the natural cycles of life on earth and relied on the seasons and weather patterns to direct to next crops.

By May of 1943, there were 18 million victory gardens in the United States. There is no reason why we can’t make this a global reality of today. What is the urgency you ask, or maybe not, because you have seen the mayhem that COVID19 is causing to our food systems around the world?

The smartest thing we can do is to learn to grow our food and become self-reliant. Building an Organic Victory Garden is something that you can do at home with your family, or you can take it to the next level and head up a community garden. Whatever you decide, just start today. The world needs you!

If you need suggestions or information about growing your food or building a compost pile, or you have a project that you would like to share!! Please send me an email at sara@greenmaya.mx, and together we will come up with a plan that works best for your situation.

Aho Mitakuye Oyasin (For all my relations) 🙏

Many Blessings,

Sara Renshaw @ The Green Maya Project

P.S. During this time of quarantine, it is more vital than ever that we get our daily dose of nature. Keep your distance from others but step outside, feel the breeze (or the freeze), listen for the birds, smell the air, go for a nature discovery walk if that is possible or sit under a tree with a good book and put your bare feet on the Earth.

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