Dec 15, 2016
Dear friends of Sustainable Solano,
As I am looking back at the eventful and transformative year of 2016, I would like to express my deepest gratitude to all people who helped co-create Sustainable Solano: the Board, our volunteer leadership team, our funders and supporters, and all of you who made a personal commitment to make a difference, to participate in something bigger than ourselves, to nurture heart-based initiatives for the good of the whole.
In 2017 we will continue to refine and shape the vision for the organization, to deepen our understanding of our current situation and to develop strategies to help making Solano County more environmentally and economically sustainable, socially just and personally fulfilling place to live and work.
We will continue with meaningful conversations in the community, beginning with a seven-week “Game Changer Intensive” offered by Pachamama Alliance as a follow up to the Awakening the Dreamer Symposium. Everyone can participate in this program! Our goal is to provide opportunities for face-to-face meetings in Solano County allowing us to deepen the connections we felt so profoundly with each other at the Symposium and to engage with each other in new and existing initiatives that facilitate change at the local level and beyond. Learn more and to register.
Our sustainable landscaping efforts will continue with monthly tours of Benicia demonstration permaculture food forests, installation of demonstration gardens in Fairfield and Vallejo, and a series of talks and workshops in Benicia, Fairfield and Vallejo – watch for regular updates on our calendar.
We invited professional landscapers, both established and new, to explore our Land Caretakers Program. Sustainable Landscapers Association of Solano County is forming now – please email info@sustainablesolano.org if you are interested in learning more.
Calling all the players in Solano local food movement to get to know each other and to join our efforts to create a robust, healthy, inclusive local food system in the county. We are planning to have a Solano Local Food Summit in the spring of 2017. If you are interested to learn more, please email info@sustainablesolano.org.
For cooking classes and talks on healthy, local food throughout the county, please check our calendar regularly (and let us know if you would like to promote your efforts of brining wholesome local food to our communities through our website and newsletter).
I am looking forward to see you at these upcoming programs and events. Please let me know if you have suggestions, ideas or questions. I wish you a peaceful and restful holiday season!
In gratitude,
Elena Karoulina
Executive Director
Sustainable Solano
Oct 27, 2016
Over 150 people gathered at the Empress Theater in Vallejo to watch the premiere of the documentary “SEED: The Untold Story”. It was an alarming and moving account of seeds, its story and its modern fate to become a commodity just like anything else these days – nature, land, money, people….
Few things on Earth are as miraculous and vital as seeds. Worshipped and treasured since the dawn of humankind, these subtle flecks of life are the source of all existence. Like tiny time capsules, they contain the songs, sustenance, memories, and medicines of entire cultures. They feed us, clothe us, and provide the raw materials for our everyday lives. They are life itself!
Yet in our modern world, these precious gifts of nature are in grave danger. In less than a century of industrial agriculture, our once abundant seed diversity—painstakingly created by ancient farmers and gardeners over countless millennia—has been drastically winnowed down to a handful of mass-produced varieties. Under the spell of industrial “progress” and a lust for profit, our quaint family farmsteads have given way to mechanized agribusinesses sowing genetically identical crops on a monstrous scale.
For eons, cultures around the world have believed seeds to be our birthright: a covenant with the earth shared by all and passed down across generations. But today, our seeds are increasingly private property held in corporate hands. A cadre of ten agrichemical companies (including Syngenta, Bayer, and Monsanto) now controls more than two-thirds of the global seed market, reaping unprecedented profits. Genetically modified crops (GMOs) engineered in their sterile laboratories dominate farmers’ fields and dinner tables in the United States and countries around the world.
People everywhere are waking up to the vital importance of seeds for our future. Seed libraries, community gardens, and a new generation of passionate young farmers are cropping up to shift the balance toward a more sustainable and sovereign seed paradigm. A David and Goliath battle is underway, and the stakes couldn’t be higher.
How can you participate on the right side of this battle, right here, in Solano County?
Get educated, demand our right for seed and food sovereignty, grow heirloom and open-pollinated seeds, use seed banks and seed exchange, and support local farmers who are doing things right – through our Community Supported Agriculture and Solano Grown.
Oct 10, 2016
Save the Date: Awakening the Dreamer Symposium Comes to Solano County
Are you ready for a deeply transformative experience? On December 3rd, 2016 from 10am-2pm, the Awakening the Dreamer Symposium comes to Solano County at Solano County Events Center in Fairfield, offering a dynamic multimedia half-day workshop that uses videos, personal reflection, and group activities to engage people everywhere as the co-creators of an environmentally sustainable, socially just, and spiritually fulfilling world.
Register for this free event.
Imagine:
- Having everything we need to create a sustainable, just, and fulfilling world
- Understanding the unique contribution you can make in your community
- Feeling hopeful about the future of our planet and species
You don’t have to just imagine these things–together, we can make them real. Participants will leave the Symposium empowered to take clear steps to embody their vision for a better world, and having established new connections to work with others on common issues for the common good of the whole.
The Symposium is developed and distributed by The Pachamama Alliance, a San Francisco-based nonprofit started at the invitation of indigenous people of Ecuador’s Amazon rainforest. Through the Symposium and other workshops, they work to generate widespread awakening at the grassroots level and a transformation of our worldview, such that humanity becomes committed to restoring and protecting the environment and moves towards social justice and spiritual fulfillment.
For even more details on the Symposium and The Pachamama Alliance, please visit:
www.pachamama.org
Pachamama Alliance Workshops and Events
Awakening the Dreamer: A Transformative Workshop for People and Planet (Video):
https://youtu.be/n8zaUjvCJOY
This Symposium will be open to anyone who wishes to take practical steps to bring about transformation to the environmental, social and spiritual presence of humanity on the earth. We hope you join us!
Jul 24, 2016
By Ken Williams, Solano Grown Board Treasurer
Benicia Community Gardens is delighted to spread the word about Solano Grown, a local, Solano-only Farmer’s Market–online and all year round. Solano Grown is a volunteer operated non-profit organization. Their goal is to support small crop producers of Solano County through an online farmer’s market specializing in locally grown produce. The virtual marketplace–in collaboration with the Horticulture Department of Solano Community College, which acts as its sole food hub–provides a venue for farmers to sell their products without having the extra cost of setting up at a Farmer’s Market or putting up their own websites.
Wildflower Honey from Pleasants Valley Honey Company
Mixed zuchinni from Robledo Produce (picked daily)
The marketplace is open through the winter, and is updated weekly. A quick check of this month shows farmers selling vegetables, fruits, starters, nuts, oils and vinegars, eggs, honey, and other natural goods.
To purchase locally grown speciality crop products from Solano County Farmers become a member of Solano Grown by going to www.solanogrown.org and signing up. Solano Grown is a non profit organization in support of local farmers offering on line ordering from the various farmers and pickup at the Horticulture Building 1000 at Solano Community College in Fairfield on Thursdays from 3:00 PM to 5:30 PM. They also offer delivery to your home or work for an additional $5.00 per order.
The Solano Grown online marketplace opened in the spring of 2010. In 2011, Solano Grown was awarded a National Association of Counties Achievement Award for its creative marketing efforts. But its mission is about far more than a market. As a cooperative marketing organization, Solano Grown continues to connect consumers directly with producers and encourage the purchase of local specialty crop items, but it is also an educational resource. The organization promotes local consumer culture within the community. Its members volunteer with Youth Ag Day (held annually at the Solano County Fairgrounds). It is a presence at many community events to inform the public about the importance of buying local.
Solano Grown strives to support the local community, and a local organization needs local support! Are you a farmer, consumer, educator, or home gardener? Do you have an interest in supporting the organization with your ideas and contributions? Then come be a part of our local agricultural community. There are currently openings for volunteers and board members to nourish and support Solano’s growers and producers, and empower its consumers.
For more information about being a part of the Solano Grown organization, email Ken Williams at kennav27@aol.com.
