The Edible Schoolyard Project
In 1993, Alice Waters, the world famous chef of Chez Panisse Restaurant, started a non-profit organization with Neil Smith, the principal of Martin Luther King Jr. Middle School in Berkeley, CA, "to create and sustain an organic garden and landscape which is wholly integrated into the school’s curriculum and lunch program." See The Edible Schoolyard Project.

Greening of MacDonalds?
Controversy swirls around the world's largest fast food restaurant chain for some of its practices. Recently, the food giant seems to have taken an environmental turn. You be the judge. Chicago Tribune article, "OCA Challenges McDonald's Greenwashing," 4/17/02. See McDonald's Social Responsibility Report, and p. 18, on "Environmental Sustainability." See McDonald's USA - Environment page. See a book review of the recently acclaimed book, "Fast Food Nation: the Dark Side of the All-America Meal" by Eric Schlosser.

Finding Food in Farm Country
The study, "Finding Food in Farm Country, The Economics of Food & Farming in Southeast Minnesota," looks at agricultural inputs and outputs in the region, and the way they relate to food purchases. According to co-author Ken Meter, the study is "a central tool for the emerging Southeast Minnesota Farmers Network that is building a local food system in the river basin. It includes a concise review of environmental issues that surround current farming practices, and some startling data about the erosion of wealth from the area." This erosion of wealth includes about $800 million extracted from the region's economy per year. The 2001study was funded by the University of Minnesota's Southeast Minnesota Experiment in Rural Cooperation, and the USDA Food Security Grant program with additional support from the Bush Foundation of Minnesota.

The Polyface Farm, "Emotionally-, Economically and Environmentally-Enhancing Agriculture"
Joel Salatin's 550 acre Polyface Farm in the Shenandoah Valley of Virginia provides a model of profitable and satisfying family farming. Salatin is not your everyday alternative farmer, but a real innovator, creating interdependent biological farming systems that work. Read about Joel Salatin and Polyface Farm:
"Emotionally-, Economically and Environmentally-Enhancing Agriculture," p. 1-2, a keynote speech by Joel Salatin at the Kerr Center for Sustainable Agriculture in Oklahoma.
"Down on This Farm the Times They Are A-changin'," Smithsonian Magazine article , July 2000.
"Family Friendly Farming," Acres USA article by Joel Salatin, June, 2000. Search the Acres USA bookstore for titles by Joel Salatin, as well.

U.S. News and World Report Cover Story
"A fat nation: America's 'supersize' diet is fattier and sweeter–and deadlier"
We at the Upper Mississippi Basin Stakeholders Network ask if there's a connection between the health of the land and the health of the people...? Read the article, available free online for just two weeks from August 19, 2002: "Pretty, dark-haired Katie Young has been successful at most things. She's a nearly straight-A student, a big hitter on her softball team, and a good dancer. But like so many Americans–kids and adults alike–the New Orleans 10-year-old struggles with one thing: keeping her weight under control."
(by AMANDA SPAKE, U.S. News and World Report, 8/19/02)

USDA Economic Research Service
Organic Farming and Marketing Briefing Room
The ERS offers a nice website on organic agriculture and its impact on the U.S. economy.