by Rowan Dunlap

The approach of summer in Alaska is marked by the return of daylight and vegetation, warming the heart of every Alaskan. Our world of darkness, forty below weather, and blankets of white snow obscuring all color is replaced by lush greenery, wild flowers and fresh produce, something many do not expect from an artic desert. The water stores up through the winter in the form of snow and the long days of sunlight (reaching nearly 24 hours of sunlight on the solstice) fuel a vibrant agricultural community.

As a child in Fairbanks, Alaska, the Tanana Valley Farmers’ Market was a destination only topped by the state fair for excitement. People bring their families, their pets, make new friends and run into old. I went with my mother when I was too young to drive and later it was a favorite rendezvous spot for my friends and me. This farmers’ market is one of many in Alaska that serves as a thriving community gathering spots and a source of prized local produce in a state where 90% of food products are imported.
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A view of the Nile in Luxor, Egypt.

By Rowan Dunlap

You may wonder how Egypt, a desert country with only 3.4 million hectares of cultivated land, can sustain its population of over 78 million. The answer is quite simple, it can’t.

If there is one thing I learned during my semester in Egypt, it’s that Egypt is a country of paradoxes. It is common to see a donkey cart rolling through the middle of downtown flanked on either side by brand a new Mercedes Benz, to see lonely bands of Bedouins roaming the desert and yet Cairo is one of the most densely populated cities in the world. The contrast between Egyptian past and Egyptian present is constantly on one’s mind. The state of agriculture falls into the same paradoxical dichotomy. One can take a high-speed train through the Nile Delta past fields laced with donkey paths and farmed with wooden hand tools but if one takes a train in the opposite direction, it is the Aswan High Dam that you find, an enormous technological project that drastically changed the face of agriculture in Egypt. (more…)

In Vancouver this October, young people from around the world stood up for what they believed-literally. The young people, ages 14 to 26, were delegates to the annual Community Food Security Coalition. As a way to foster dialogue about the movement, participants were asked to place themselves along an imaginary line according to how much they agreed or disagreed with a read statement.

Below are some of the statements and a few of the opinions expressed.

Statement #1: I feel like I am part of a movement.

“Actively choosing how you spend your money, time, and energy IS the revolution. This means having control over your own life and needs, it means not letting outside forces have control over you.”

“Saying movement sounds like a pretty big claim, but just by agreeing with the movement, you are part of it. You don’t have to be radical but by saying this is what I believe in and what I stand for makes you part of the movement.”

“In my work I build raised beds with volunteers and teach others how to build raised beds themselves. I’m always surprised at how many kids show up, some of them very young, and they’re excited to get involved. It’s not just about adults getting food, it’s also about teaching kids that they can grow their own food and provide for themselves. It’s hard to change the mind of someone older, but when we teach a kid it sinks in and then they’ll teach their kids and it spreads.”

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At reap/sow, we’re all about pushing the boundaries. In this section, we bring you news of advancements weird enough to have been cooked in the lab. In fact, one of them was! Can you distinguish imposter from innovation? One is fake…two are real examples of imagination on the move.

Farmer on Farmer

Jerry Miller saw a problem and set out to fix it. That problem: farmers’ love lives. With schedules that few people outside the farm community understood, or could accommodate, farmers he talked to were finding it hard to find a mate. So Jerry decided that farmers should get with times, and get online. With the slogan “You don’t have to be lonely, Now there’s farmers-only,” farmers have joined the online dating generation. (more…)

by Brian Depew

In this inaugural edition of Reap/Sow you can read hopeful stories about young people engaging in our food and agriculture systems. I cannot emphasize how important these stories are to me. (more…)