Eaarth Chapter 4

As I finished Eaarth I realized that McKibben really wrapped this up neatly. During this last chapter he seems to bring up some ideas to get us started looking for ways to slow down our impact on climate change. The three things that he talks the most about are agriculture, alternate energy sources and the impact of the internet.

One of the things that McKibben said that really stuck out to me was:

"I'm not arguing for local food because it tastes better, or because it's better for you. (It does, and it is. There's really not much debate.) I'm arguing that we have no choice - that the new Eaarth has much less margin than the planet we grew up on, and hence we're going to need to take advantage of opportunities we've passed by before. In a world more prone to drought and flood, we need the resilience that comes with three dozen different crops in one field, not a vast ocean of corn or soybeans." (pg.179)

The farmer's market in Otsego

Local food is a very important thing. McKibben makes a good point when he talks about local food (and food grown in variety, not just one type of crop grown in a field going on for miles) being heartier and more resilient. The more important local food becomes the larger farmer's markets will become and the more they will be used.

In my town we have a small farmer's market, but it is only open once a week through the summer and fall. However, the town just down the road has a slightly larger one that is open a couple times a week and has an indoor option in case of bad weather.

"Taking advantage of opportunities we've passed by before," means that we need to start relying more on locally grown food. This means that there needs to be more food grown locally. We need to start doing things like planting town gardens that are there to benefit everyone in the surrounding areas. Another thing that could be done is people planting their own gardens in their yards and supplying their own produce.

After completing Eaarth I really enjoyed it. I think that McKibben does a really good job of getting all of the important information across in a way that catches everyone's attention. He presents the information in a way that no matter who reads it there will be something in there to catch their attention. There is no way that anyone can read it and not see that climate change is affecting everyone. They can't say "Oh, climate change is only affecting people in Australia or Africa," because they can clearly see that climate change is a global problem.