2019/01/04

Cuba, a Model of Sustainable Agriculture Towards Global Food Security – COHA

Cuba, a Model of Sustainable Agriculture Towards Global Food Security – COHA

Cuba, a Model of Sustainable Agriculture Towards Global Food Security

By Debora Iozzi, Research Associates at the Council on Hemispheric Affairs
To download a PDF version of this article, click here.
With the collapse of the Soviet Union and the tightening of the U.S. embargo, the early 1990s saw Cuba facing a severe food crisis and a collapse of more than 30 percent of the island’s GDP. In order to tackle this grave moment, in which the Havana’s government was unable to deliver adequate food supplies to the population, Cubans were forced to develop a new method of farming: urban agriculture, hopefully a sustainable way of land exploitation and food production. Even though it was not the result of a deliberate government policy, but rather an unfortunate consequence of helpless events, the results of this new system led Cuban authorities to adopt specific measures to incentivize its expansion. This effort rendered the island a world leader in sustainable agriculture and its food production system became a model for other countries in the world to follow, especially developing societies that should be guarded against any damaging transformations.
A Model of Sustainable Agriculture Born out of Necessity
Following the collapse of the Soviet Union, Cuba faced a grave shortage of oil supplies, which cut it off from cheap imports. The island was plunged into what was called the “Special Period in Peacetime”, further hardened by the relentless U.S. embargo. Indeed, in 1996 the Cuban Liberty and Democratic Solidarity Act – also known as the Helms-Burton Act – strengthened the already existing embargo against the island, applying sanctions extraterritorially to foreign firms trading with Cuba. The lack of fuel, fertilizers, and other farm inputs decreased agricultural productivity. According to statistical data, the per capita food production annual average growth was negative, by -5.1 percent, between 1986 and 1995.[i]Farmers had to switch to predominantly oxen traction because of fuel scarcity.[ii] Oil shortages also forced producers to move closer to consumers since fossil fuel-powered transportation was limited. City dwellers were the first hit by supply shortfalls, and, in order to effectively respond to the food crisis, they started to occupy unproductive state lands to produce their own food. Additionally, ordinary citizens used balconies, backyards, and roof terraces for cultivation and raising livestock.[iii] Furthermore, rural farmers, out of necessity, adopted agro-ecological methods due to the lack of oil-based pesticides and fertilizers. Without having it as a main goal, they started to practice sustainable farming as a way of food production in order to guarantee nutritious and accessible food for everyone while natural resources are managed in a way that maintain ecosystem functions to support current as well as future human needs.[iv] This includes a full participation of farmers, pastoralists, and other rural dwellers who might benefit from the economic development. Sustainable agriculture includes promoting urban farming, which improves food security and favors equitable access to resources, managed in the most efficient way. The Cuban government understood the potential of this spontaneous citizens’ initiative. The government soon started supporting and encouraging urban agriculture through a number of measures, which entailed the revision of property rights, a significant change for the socialist system. Cuba went through a drastic revision of the work paradigm: it shifted towards a decentralized production model and an acceptance by farmers that they obtained benefits from their own labor. The possibility of gaining from their efforts functioned as a major incentive for workers who had a greater interest in maximizing their production. The reorganization of agricultural production consisted mainly in converting the large state farms into smaller, more efficient, cooperative farms and distributing land in usufruct to small producers.[v] Farmers had the right to enjoy the use of the soil and take advantage of its products, without necessarily owning the land. The aim of the Cuban leadership was to improve agricultural production and cut, if not eliminate, food imports into the country. For this reason, it supported the creation of the Department for Urban Agriculture at the Ministry of Agriculture in 1994 and of the National Group for Urban and Sub-urban Agriculture (GNAU) in 1998. [vi] The GNAU coordinates and promotes the development of sustainable urban agriculture in Cuba and was charged with encouraging the recycling of nutrients and wastes. It frames guidelines with agro ecological principles and directives for individual production of compost and seeds, local use of resources, and organic plant protection for Cuban producers.[vii] Later in 2008, the newly installed government of Raul Castro adopted Law Decree 259, a land reform targeted at the distribution in usufruct of unproductive parcels. In 2011, Lineamientos, a reform package aimed at modernizing the Cuban economy placed a large emphasis on agricultural production. In 2012, Law Decree 300 provided for the construction of buildings on the usufruct land, and the planting of forests and fruit trees.[viii] The government, moreover, started to work on creating additional commercial possibilities for farmers, providing training and access to agricultural inputs. The promotion of Cuban agriculture had become so important that domestic food production was declared a national security issue.[ix]
Riding on Agroecology
Cubans were not aware of their environmentalist turn. The scarcity of resources and farm inputs brought farmers to experiment with new methods and organic pest control. Organic principles were followed and locally available resources were used. They practiced crop rotation, intercropping, used green manure, and planted hedges. Furthermore, they used repellent plants such as common thyme, basil, marigold, maize or ruddles to reduce pest infestation or to attract beneficial insects.[x]Government educational programs endorsed sustainable farming methods, but farmers used, above all, traditional knowledge derived from elders or their childhood memories.[xi] Those new practices that we could define as agroecology represents “a whole-systems approach to agriculture and food systems development based on traditional knowledge, alternative agriculture, and local food system experiences.”[xii] It turned out to be a model of food production that guarantees the preservation of natural resources and relies on minimum artificial inputs, from a sustainable perspective. A cornerstone of agroecology is diversification of both crops and farming methods –including livestock integration– that contributes to the promotion of biodiversity and of a more efficient use of resources, such as sunlight, water, soil and natural pests. Diversification intensifies natural processes such as photosynthesis, nitrogen fixation, absorption of soil phosphorus, and the enhancement of biological activity both above and below ground.[xiii] This diversification represented also a change of paradigm in Cuba, after the ultra-specialization on export of sugar and derivative products to the USSR during the Cold War.
According to the World Wildlife Fund (WWF) bi-annual Living Planet Report 2016, Cuba is the most sustainable country on the planet.[xiv] Indeed, the Fund created an environmental footprint index that combines human development and the exploitation of natural resources. The island was found to have both an acceptable ecological footprint per capita, using an exemplary amount of energy and natural resources, and an acceptable Human Development Index rating. Such indicators demonstrate that a sustainable system of food production is compatible with a high level of literacy, life expectancy and low infant mortality.[xv]
The Path Towards Global Food Security
According to the data collected by the Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO), some 795 million people in the world do not have enough food to lead a healthy active life – about one in nine people on Earth.[xvi] This is a clear indication that the promotion of industrial agriculture has failed to deliver satisfactory results. Industrial food systems affect human health and broader ecological systems. There has been a dramatic increase of non-communicable diseases linked with poor quality of food consumption, with obesity being described as a pandemic.[xvii] Worldwide obesity has more than doubled since 1980; in 2014, 600 million adults were classified as obese. This phenomenon is not restricted to industrialized societies; in developing countries it is estimated that over 115 million people suffer from obesity-related problems.[xviii] Worse, industrial agriculture has tremendous environmental costs. Not only do chemical pests and fertilizers contaminate the surrounding areas, but they also contribute to the increase of carbon dioxide emissions, accelerating the pace of climate change. Out of the total emissions released in the atmosphere by agricultural activities, 11.5 percent comes from chemical pests and fertilizers.[xix] The consequences of industrial land exploitation includes the desertification of agricultural land, deforestation, water consumption and contamination, land degradation, as well as global warming. Indeed, environmental fallout is not limited to agricultural production, but pollution continues to be present in all the other phases of the process, from food transportation to processing, and from storage to retailing.[xx]
A sustainable agricultural model, such as the Cuban one, may be looked at as an alternative to improve food security and environment health. Even though its development was due to necessity, Cuba’s urban agriculture has become a model for the rest of developing world. Cuba has a socialist political system in which property rights and agricultural policies are managed in a centralized way, significantly different from the rest of the world. As a result, the whole production process has been consigned to government oversight, from the distribution of the land, seeds and agricultural inputs to commercialization. However, the evidence of the island’s success in sustainability highlights the potential of urban agriculture, or “urban agroecology”, as a way of food production for sustainable megacities and even smaller towns around the world. Cities usually depend on imports from rural areas for their supply of water, energy or food. Thus, city dwellers are usually more vulnerable to unpredictable changes, such as a national food crisis.[xxi] Therefore, food production within a city may reduce the dependency on external resources. Sustainable agriculture also promotes the amelioration of human health, encouraging the consumption of fresh fruit and vegetables. Indeed, following the changes in the agricultural system in Cuba there was a marked decline in death rates from diabetes and heart diseases.[xxii]  Diabetes incidence decreased by 53 percent from 1986 to 1996 when the agricultural production change was taking place.[xxiii]Moreover, urban agriculture could provide employment and an income opportunity for marginalized parts of a city’s population; in addition to this, greater inclusion and community building could be side effects of urban farming, which could contribute to making cities more livable and pleasant, improving the population’s standard of living.[xxiv] Furthermore, sustainable and urban agriculture could be a way to achieve food sovereignty, a term defined as self-sufficiency and national autonomy for food production. Developing countries could view this goal as an interesting one to attain, and provide them with the flexibility to shift their monetary resources from food import to local investments.
Agroecology and sustainable agriculture could be a solution to hunger and food security, and it is also a resilient system of food production. This means that it resists harmful environmental factors while recovering faster from the impacts of extreme climate events that recently are becoming more usual due to the impact of climate change. A survey conducted in the provinces of Holguin and Las Tunas forty days after hurricane Ike hit Cuba in 2008 found that diversified farms experienced losses of 50 percent compared to 90 or 100 percent in monocultures.[xxv]Likewise, agro-ecologically managed farms showed a faster productive recovery (80–90 percent) 40 days after the hurricane hit.[xxvi] Actually, many countries are already adopting this model not only in Latin America, but also in other regions of the world, including countries such as Laos and Malawi, and should be followed by countries such as Haiti in order to enable more communities with poor land quality to fight malnutrition.[xxvii]
The development of urban agriculture will be difficult to promote and implement since there are many barriers to its unbridled success. Some of the challenges to face are access to land, the recognition of land rights, water availability, low soil fertility, pollution, and inexperience of new farmers, as well as the presence of cheap products on the market, produced in heavily subsidized agricultural sectors in the Western world. Also, urban land is usually a more valuable commodity than rural land and its use is fiercely contested.[xxviii] The quantity of water needed for food production could be difficult to find in a city. Furthermore, urban soils are usually polluted and near roads or industrial areas that could contaminate the products.[xxix] However, the urgency of food crises in developing countries and the negative impacts of climatic events on food production constitute a major effort towards the promotion and spreading of sustainable agriculture.
Defending a Precious Production System from the Capitalist’s Assault
Agricultural trade between the United States and Cuba, based mainly on sugar, was the bedrock of bilateral relations during the first half of the 20th century. The Castro revolution changed the situation with the interruption of trade relations between the two countries. Since then, U.S. interests have not influenced Cuba’s agriculture policy, even though the U.S. trade embargo considerably affected the island’s agricultural sector. Now, with the unfreezing of bilateral relations, U.S. agro-industry sector yearns for this new market. The question is whether the peculiar Cuban agrarian sector, small-scale and family-farmed agriculture, will survive a “capitalist assault”. Cuba is already importing food from the United States. In 2000, the Trade Sanctions Reform and Export Enhancement Act (TSRA) allowed sales of certain food and medicines to Cuba.[xxx] U.S. agricultural exports to Cuba averaged $365 million USD per year between 2012 and 2014.[xxxi] However, U.S. restrictions on extending credits to Cuban buyers have curtailed trade possibilities.[xxxii] The complete dismantling of the embargo, including the abrogation of the Helms-Burton Act, will open a wide range of trading opportunities. Already in November 2015, the United States Agricultural Coalition for Cuba (USACC) started to plan for the full expanding of the agricultural investments in the historically adversarial country.[xxxiii] There have been many U.S. agro-business groups lobbying for the end of the embargo; for instance the Arkansas Rice Growers Association is interested in expanding its market in Cuba, since the island’s per capita rice consumption is fivefold greater than that of the United States.[xxxiv] U.S. interests seem to be focused on technology transfer to Cuba and on consumer behavior detection in order to sell products to the island. Cubans could be potential major purchasers of U.S.-produced inputs, but also of meat, grain, or cooking oil.[xxxv] However, what could be the advantages of the significant opening to U.S. agricultural products for the Cuban economy? Cuban agricultural production cannot compete with industrial U.S. production, in terms of both output quantity and costs. Firstly, the introduction of U.S. imports in Cuba will destroy the nascent non-state system; local producers will be driven out of business. Secondly, the Cuban products that could be sold in the U.S. market are numerous, among these tobacco, rum, tropical fruit, and seafood.[xxxvi] They could compete on quality, through artisanal production, non-genetic modification or other niche merchandise. Thirdly, a tension between domestic market production, domestic prices, and agricultural export costs will arise. Until now, Cuban agriculture focused on producing for self-sufficiency and domestic consumption; there is the risk that turning to food-exports will subtract resources from this, with the subsequent worsening of the population’s living conditions. But what will suffer more is the sustainable model that Cuba was able to develop in the last twenty years, an agrarian model that is based on small-scale production, on traditional and ecological methods that are not efficient enough to compete with industrial ones, but in the long term will prove better for the environment and those producers who employ them. The exchanges between U.S. and Cuban agricultural systems seem to be unidirectional. Indeed, in the USDA press release, reporting on a bilateral agricultural accord signed during President Obama’s trip to Cuba, there was no mention of agroecology or organic agriculture, showing that there is little interest in bringing Cuban sustainable techniques in the States.[xxxvii] “We will not renounce our ideals of independence and social justice, or surrender even a single one of our principles, or concede a millimeter in the defense of our national sovereignty. We will not allow ourselves to be pressured in regards to our internal affairs. We have won this sovereign right with great sacrifices and at the cost of great risks,” affirmed Raul Castro commenting on Barack Obama’s visit to the island.[xxxviii] The two major events in the leadership of both countries, Fidel Castro’s death and Donald Trump’s election, sprinkle the future of U.S.-Cuba relations with deep uncertainty. Whether the normalization will continue or new setbacks will occur, the Cuban government does not want to give up its method of agricultural production and is ready to fight the “capitalists’ infiltration.”[xxxix]
Sustainable Agriculture to be Endorsed
Sustainable and urban agriculture was a logical response of Cubans to their resource constraints. Traditional low-input agricultural techniques, based on organic pests’ control and crop diversification, has been the backbone of the ecological food production in Cuba. This system is also resource conserving, environmentally sound, socially inclusive, and a model to be followed by other countries. Indeed, it furthers food security and sustainable development for megacities and large towns all over the world, and it is particularly important for developing countries. The Cuban model is not perfect and the system still has ongoing problems, but it has met significant challanges in public and environmental health, even if unintended. The new uncertainty on the future of U.S.-Cuban relations has put on hold the countless economic interests that U.S. businesses, specifically in the agrarian sector, have in the island. However, the Cuban sustainable agriculture model should certainly be promoted, protected, and spread abroad. The question would be: how can this be done in the context of the current opening to the U.S. economy? This food production may be the only alternative for many developing countries fighting hunger to be able to assure the necessary sustenance to their own population and an opportunity for everyone to live in a sustainable world.
By Debora Iozzi, Research Associates at the Council on Hemispheric Affairs
Original research on Latin America by COHA. Please accept this article as a free contribution from COHA, but if re-posting, please afford authorial and institutional attribution. Exclusive rights can be negotiated. For additional news and analysis on Latin America, please go to LatinNews. com and Rights Action.
Featured image: Crowd/Democracy. Flickr.
[i] Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO). The State of Food and Agriculture 2006. Accessed December 6, 2016. ftp://ftp.fao.org/docrep/fao/009/a0800e/a0800e.pdf
[ii] GARRETT GRADDY-LOVELACE. United States–Cuba Agricultural Relations and Agrarian Questions. Journal of Agrarian Change. 2016. Accessed November 10, 2016. http://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1111/joac.12190/epdf
[iii] Friedrich Leitgeb, Sarah Schneider, Christian R. Vogl. Increasing food sovereignty with urban agriculture in Cuba. Springer Science+Business Media Dordrecht 2015. Accessed November, 10 2016.
[iv] Sustainable Food and Agriculture. FAO. Accessed November 16, 2016. http://www.fao.org/sustainability/background/en/
[v] Carmen G. Gonzalez. Seasons of Resistance: Sustainable Agriculture and Food Security in Cuba. Tulane Environmental Law Journal. Vol 16. 2003. Accessed November 9, 2016. http://digitalcommons.law.seattleu.edu/cgi/viewcontent.cgi?article=1601&context=faculty
[vi] Friedrich Leitgeb, Sarah Schneider, Christian R. Vogl. Increasing food sovereignty with urban agriculture in Cuba. Springer Science+Business Media Dordrecht 2015. Accessed November, 10 2016.
[vii] Ibidem
[viii] Ibidem
[ix] Ibidem
[x] Friedrich Leitgeb, Sarah Schneider, Christian R. Vogl. Increasing food sovereignty with urban agriculture in Cuba. Springer Science+Business Media Dordrecht 2015. Accessed November, 10 2016.
[xi] Ibidem
[xii] Agroecology. Accessed November 18, 2016. http://www.agroecology.org/index.html
[xiii] The scaling up of agroecology: spreading the hope for food sovereignty and resiliency. SOCLA’s Rio+20 position paper. May, 2012. Accessed November 18, 2016. https://www.socla.co/wp-content/uploads/2014/Rio20.pdf
[xiv] As World Burns, Cuba Number 1 for Sustainable Development: WWF. Telesur. October, 27 2016. Accessed November 10, 2016. http://www.telesurtv.net/english/news/As-World-Burns-Cuba-Number-1-for-Sustainable-Development-WWF-20161027-0018.html
[xv] ibidem
[xvi] Hunger Statistics. WFP. Accessed November 18, 2016. https://www.wfp.org/hunger/stats
[xviii] World Health Organization. Obesity and overweight. 2016. Accessed December 7, 2016. http://www.who.int/mediacentre/factsheets/fs311/en/
[xix] FAOSTAT. Emissions by sector. Accessed December 7, 2016. http://www.fao.org/faostat/en/#data/GT/visualize
[xxi] Friedrich Leitgeb, Sarah Schneider, Christian R. Vogl. Increasing food sovereignty with urban agriculture in Cuba. Springer Science+Business Media Dordrecht 2015. Accessed November, 10 2016.
[xxii]Ibidem
[xxiii] Manuel Franco et al. Population-wide weight loss and regain in relation to diabetes burden and cardiovascular mortality in Cuba 1980-2010: repeated cross sectional surveys and ecological comparison of secular trends. BMJ. April 2013. Accessed December 7, 2016. http://www.bmj.com/content/bmj/346/bmj.f1515.full.pdf
[xxiv] Friedrich Leitgeb, Sarah Schneider, Christian R. Vogl. Increasing food sovereignty with urban agriculture in Cuba. Springer Science+Business Media Dordrecht 2015. Accessed November, 10 2016.
[xxv] The scaling up of agroecology: spreading the hope for food sovereignty and resiliency. SOCLA’s Rio+20 position paper. May, 2012. Accessed November 18, 2016. https://www.socla.co/wp-content/uploads/2014/Rio20.pdf
[xxvi] Ibidem
[xxvii] Cuba’s Sustainable Agro-Ecological Model Could Save the World. Telesur. October 16, 2016. Accessed November 16, 2016. http://www.telesurtv.net/english/opinion/Cubas-Sustainable-Agro-Ecological-Model-Could-Save-the-World-20161013-0023.html
[xxix] Friedrich Leitgeb, Sarah Schneider, Christian R. Vogl. Increasing food sovereignty with urban agriculture in Cuba. Springer Science+Business Media Dordrecht 2015. Accessed November, 10 2016.
[xxx] United States Department of Agriculture.  U.S.-Cuba Agricultural Trade: Past, Present, and Possible Future. June 2015. Accessed December 6, 2016. https://www.ers.usda.gov/webdocs/publications/aes87/53141_aes87.pdf
[xxxi] Ibidem
[xxxii] Ibidem
[xxxiii] Garrett Graddy-Lovelace, United States-Cuba agricultural relations and agrarian questions. Journal of Agrarian Change. 2016. Accessed November, 21 2016. http://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1111/joac.12190/epdf
[xxxiv] Ibidem
[xxxv] Garrett Graddy-Lovelace, United States-Cuba agricultural relations and agrarian questions. Journal of Agrarian Change. 2016. Accessed November, 21 2016. http://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1111/joac.12190/epdf
[xxxvi] Ibidem
[xxxvii] Could U.S. Trade Threaten Sustainable Agriculture in Cuba? Nacla. March 05, 2016. Accessed November 21, 2016. http://nacla.org/news/2016/05/02/could-us-trade-threaten-sustainable-agriculture-cuba
[xxxviii] President Barack Obama’s visit to Cuba. Granma. Accessed December 6, 2016. http://en.granma.cu/cuba/2016-03-09/president-barack-obamas-visit-to-cuba
[xxxix] Garrett Graddy-Lovelace, United States-Cuba agricultural relations and agrarian questions. Journal of Agrarian Change. 2016. Accessed November, 21 2016. http://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1111/joac.12190/epdf

2019/01/03

The World Without Us Alan Weisman



The World Without Us
Alan Weisman (Author), Adam Grupper (Narrator), & 1 more
4.2 out of 5 stars 507 customer reviews


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©2007 Alan Weisman (P)2007 Audio Renaissance, a division of Holtzbrinck Publishers LLC
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The World Without Us

Alan Weisman


Time #1 Nonfiction Book of 2007Entertainment Weekly #1 Nonfiction Book of 2007Finalist for the 2007 National Book Critics Circle AwardSalon Book Awards 2007Amazon Top 100 Editors’ Picks of 2007 (#4)Barnes and Noble 10 Best of 2007: Politics and Current AffairsKansas City Star’s Top 100 Books of the Year 2007Mother Jones’ Favorite Books of 2007South Florida Sun-Sentinel Best Books of the Year 2007Hudson’s Best Books of 2007St. Louis Post-Dispatch Best Books of 2007St. Paul Pioneer Press Best Books of 2007If human beings disappeared instantaneously from the Earth, what would happen? How would the planet reclaim its surface? What creatures would emerge from the dark and swarm? How would our treasured structures--our tunnels, our bridges, our homes, our monuments--survive the unmitigated impact of a planet without our intervention? In his revelatory, bestselling account, Alan Weisman draws on every field of science to present an environmental assessment like no other, the most affecting portrait yet of humankind's place on this planet. 
$6.77 (USD)
Publisher: Picador
Release date: 2008
Format: EPUB
Size: 1.42 MB
Language: English
Pages: 346



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Audible Audiobook
Listening Length: 12 hours and 4 minutes
Program Type: Audiobook
Version: Unabridged
Publisher: Macmillan Audio
Audible.com Release Date: June 25, 2007
Language: English, English
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Eric Maroney

4.0 out of 5 starsLife Finds a WayJune 21, 2017
Format: Kindle EditionVerified Purchase

Alan Weisman's The World Without Us is supposed to explore what would or could happen to our world if humans suddenly ceased to exist. Weisman does do this, but he must of necessity discuss how we have altered/destroyed much of our world, in order to illustrate what would happen if we were to disappear.

So, Weisman takes us on a tour from the mass extinction of the passenger pigeon in North American, to the Moa bird in New Zealand. We look at climate change, nuclear waste, and plastic islands in the oceans. It is a depressing catalog.

The only bright spot is that, to quote Jurassic Park, nature finds a way. Animals, plants and birds no longer found in Korea thrive in the depopulated DMZ. In the quarantine zone around Chernobyl, wolves have returned, along with moose, deer, badger, and horses.

The take away, the world will do fine without us. In fact, it might just thrive.

4 people found this helpful

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Andrew M.

2.0 out of 5 starsMisleading book.September 4, 2018
Format: PaperbackVerified Purchase

For a book that is supposed to discuss the future and what would happen to the world if humans were to suddenly disappear, you would think it would discuss what would happen in great detail. Instead, this book spends 80% of it's pages discussing history, pre-history, and how humans have ruined everything. The first two chapters hook you in by discribing how houses and cities will fall apart without humans to maintain them, but the next 4 chapters are about natural history and evolution of animals and plants throughout Europe, Africa, and the Americas, most of which are extinct (which the author goes into verbose detail about how humans are responsible). After 100 pages I couldn't take it anymore, I wanted to learn about infrastructure and how nature will take back the world, but this book goes off on so many unrelated tangents that I gave up. I feel like I got jipped.

3 people found this helpful

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Jonas

4.0 out of 5 starsAn Adventure in JournalismAugust 2, 2015
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The reason you came for this book is probably to find out what will happen to your home or New York City after people disappear. You want to learn if it will really be like "I Am Legend" or other Post-Apocalyptic stories where people are gone. At least, that's why I came.
And Weisman does explain just that. But he does so in the first few chapters. The remain 15 or so go into details about Earth without man you never would have expected. He examines places like Cyprus and the Korean DMZ, which people haven't touched in ages. He takes you places you never would have expected. Each chapter is a different story, a different location, a different analysis. Each could be it's own article.
This book ends up teaching a lot about human history as well. I certainly didn't expect that.
This book is an interesting read, a learning adventure across the globe. As cheesy as it sounds, its a great ride.

6 people found this helpful

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Pepper

3.0 out of 5 starsInteresting Facts Buried Amongst Boring-As-Hell FactsJune 13, 2013
Format: Kindle EditionVerified Purchase

I bought this book from the angle of a writer of post-apocalyptic stories. I wanted to understand exactly how the world would degrade (and how quickly) once humans were taken out of the picture. But most of this book is a history lesson.

I understand the need to look back in time in order to see where we might be in the future. But the time frames were so far-flung (and therefore so unrelatable) that I found much of this book so thoroughly boring that it was a real struggle to get through.

It's also obvious that the author did enormous amounts of research in putting this book together. Unfortunately, that left a lot of instances where the book went into painful detail about how this concept or that concept worked, and was just more writing for me to struggle through.

I really, really wanted to love this book. And while there are gems sprinkled throughout, I found the book as a whole to be utterly boring.

13 people found this helpful

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Todd J. Glosier

4.0 out of 5 starsNot a recap of the TV showJuly 7, 2015
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Quit different from the TV series. This book focuses mostly on the environmental consequences of our civilization if it were to vanish overnight.
The author uses examples of abandoned areas on earth now, such as the exclusion zone around Chernobyl and the DMZ on Cyprus to try and show what our planet used to look like before civilization came along.
He sites the work of researchers all over the world documenting the accumulation of waste and garbage that already clogs our oceans and beaches, such as the great Pacific gyre, and attempts to give an idea of how long it will take mother nature to clean up after us.
He also talks about the 400+ nuclear power plants and waste storage sites all over the world and gives an estimate of how long it would take to decay below lethal levels.
This is not light reading and the book assumes the reader has some basic scientific knowledge, but the style and prose are reader friendly.
Recommended for anyone with an environmental bent or those who just want to know what we might leave behind us.

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Gaviotas: A Village to Reinvent the World, 2nd Edition: Alan Weisman: 9781603580564: Amazon.com: Books



Gaviotas: A Village to Reinvent the World, 2nd Edition: Alan Weisman: 9781603580564: Amazon.com: Books









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Gaviotas: A Village to Reinvent the World, 2nd Edition Paperback – September 3, 2008
by Alan Weisman (Author)
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"...a book telling a tale too lovely for fiction, a lyrical, well-observed book that reports from the llanos of eastern Colombia, savannas tortured by guns and cows and cocaine, of an experiment in solar democracy in which 'appropriate technology' is anything but a sad product on the discount tables of broken, post-sixties idealism."--Tom Athanasiou, The Nation (This text refers to an out of print or unavailable edition of this title)


About the Author




Author of the critically acclaimed New York Times best seller The World Without Us, Alan Weisman is an award-winning journalist whose reports have appeared in Harper’s, the New York Times Magazine, Atlantic Monthly, Discover, and Orion, among others, and on National Public Radio. A former contributing editor to the Los Angeles Times Magazine, he is a senior radio producer for Homelands Productions and teaches international journalism at the University of Arizona. He lives in western Massachusetts.




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Paperback: 256 pages
Publisher: Chelsea Green Publishing; 10th anniversary edition (September 3, 2008)

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Biography
Author of the critically acclaimed New
York Times best seller The World
Without Us, Alan Weisman is an
award-winning journalist whose reports
have appeared in Harper Äôs, the New
York Times Magazine, Atlantic Monthly,
Discover, and Orion, among others,
and on National Public Radio. A former
contributing editor to the Los Angeles
Times Magazine, he is a senior radio
producer for Homelands Productions
and teaches international journalism at
the University of Arizona. He lives in
western Massachusetts.

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alan weisman paolo lugari read this book must readpast 100 years true story world how to live thank alan full of hopevillage to reinvent reinvent the world interested in sustainableweisman describes author alan world must amazing storycalled gaviotas book buy buy the book gaviotas the village


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John Skuja

5.0 out of 5 starsA must read!March 29, 2016
Format: Kindle EditionVerified Purchase

This is an extremely important book to read if we are to understand how the intelligent use of technology can help us survive the collapse of the oil driven economy/world we live in as we run out of that resource. Tech can be used to improve life with out a massive profit motive behind it and community can be formed and sustained with different models for our coming together into community. The story of Gaviotas is amazing and we need to know about it and what has been achieved in a place that was uninhabitable by modern standards, and yet is still supporting a thriving community in a country ravaged by violence and greed....


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Mary H.

5.0 out of 5 starsAmazing, read this if you want to know how to create a sustainable futureJune 15, 2011
Format: PaperbackVerified Purchase

Amazing.
Uplifting.
Inspiring.
Practical.
Read this is you want to know how we can create a sustainable future/less fossil fuel consumption.

*After reading this, about how people living in a "third world country" could create and implement energy efficient technologies, I became very frustrated that the United States did not have the foresight to utilize the same technologies in the 1980's when it would have helped to reduce the coming energy crisis of the next 200 years/end of the industrial age.

The technologies/lifestyle created by the people of Gaviotas serves as a beautiful example of ways to soften our fall from extravagant energy consumption ---> sustainable society.

People have the power, don't let consumer culture steal your creativity. We really do have the brain power (as individuals, don't rely on the federal government for too much) to create a world in which we can live comfortably and happily without relying on the rampant energy usage that we have only gotten accustomed to in the past 100 years.

If you enjoy this book (and I think you will), you may also enjoy:
The World Without Us
Small is Possible: Life in a Local Economy
The Long Descent: A User's Guide to the End of the Industrial Age
and maybe this one if you're interested in communes/community:
A Walden Two Experiment; The First Five Years of Twin Oaks Community.
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Cassie L Petersen

5.0 out of 5 starsGreat book!November 3, 2015
Format: PaperbackVerified Purchase

In the book Gaviotas the author, Alan Weisman paints a vivid picture of a desiccated savanna in Colombia being transformed into a beautiful and rich rain forest. Weisman documents the story of a young development worker named Paolo Lugari who was curious on whether or not an uninhabited and infertile land could be made into a livable place for his growing country. I was pleasantly surprised while reading Gaviotas on how interesting it was and enjoyed reading this book because the author did a great job taking all the information he had about the Gaviotas and making it into a story that was easy to read. Although the book was easy to read, it wasn’t always easy to follow. I had no prior knowledge about Columbia so when the author rattled off places in Columbia or famous people of Columbia I was lost. It would have been easier to follow if the author first gave the readers some back ground knowledge about these places and people.Over-all, this book was interesting and I would recommend others to read it.


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GENE GERUE

5.0 out of 5 starsUtopia? No. Topia? Yes.February 10, 2000
Format: HardcoverVerified Purchase

In 1966, when he was 22, Paolo Lugari and his brother drove over barely passable roads to a desolate area 200 miles east of Bogota, Columbia. The llanos area is a poor-soil barren that grows only a few nutrient-deficient grasses, a vast expanse of sun-baked plains in spite of over 100 inches of rain per year. A place of deadly water and hungry mosquitos. Conditions were so daunting that the Columbian government abandoned an attempt to build a road through the area. Lugari saw an opportunity to create something very special. And he did it. Today Gaviotas is a thriving, sustainable community of hundreds of joyous people studying, inventing, producing, singing and dancing amidst a huge forest that they planted. Residents from all walks of life have designed and built, planted and harvested, birthed, nurtured, taught, and entertained. There are teeter-totters that operate super-efficient pumps to bring water to the school, solar heat to cook meals, solar kettles to sterilize drinking water, ultra-light windmills to provide power. The hospital has been designated one of the 40 most important buildings in the world. Some have called Gaviotas a utopia. Lugari insists that, "Utopia literally means no place. We call Gaviotas a topia because it's real." Gaviotas the village is surprising, uplifting, extraordinary. Gaviotas the nonfiction book is as compelling as a novel, as educational as a textbook, as inspirational as the biography of a great person. If you need to rise early, do not take this book to bed with you.

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