CityFarmerbanner
Published by City Farmer, Canada's Office of Urban Agriculture


donate

Urban Agriculture Online Magazine

NEWS RELEASE FOR CITY FARMER

"Urban Agriculture Online" magazine is launched to test new software

Further information:
PUBLISHER & EDITOR: Geoff Wilson
ADMINISTRATION: Mary Wilson.
E-mail: fawmpl@powerup.com.au
Website: http://www.urbanag.info/default.html

Page Update:

NEWS RELEASE June 7, 2002.
Urban agriculture now includes healthier living

"Urban agriculture" is much more than growing food in backyards and running food production businesses on urban rooftops.

"It also is creation of healthier lifestyles through a host of other back-to-nature activities in towns and cities."

This is what Geoff Wilson, president of Brisbane's Southside Chamber of Commerce reported after attending the ground-breaking Urban Agriculture Symposium organised by six American universities, in Dallas, Texas late in May. He returned to Australia last Thursday (June 6) after interviewing NASA space-food scientists at the Johnson Space Centre in Houston, and making further studies of agrotechnology parks in Singapore.

Mr Wilson was gathering editorial content for "Urban Agriculture Online" magazine, and information for Australian seminars on urban agriculture. The Southside Chamber's urban agriculture group is considering organising a seminar on urban agriculture business opportunities in the Mt Gravatt district.

"The Americans are widening the definition of urban agriculture," Mr Wilson said. "They see it as part of promotion of better human health in cities, and one of the important answers to protecting the global environment. I will not be surprised to see urban agriculture become part of the US response to Japan's signing last week of the Kyoto Treaty on environmental protection," he said.

The new online magazine's first content will be an in-depth report of the 34 papers presented at the Dallas symposium, plus the outcomes of its workshop and concluding sessions, and a landmark report of the Council for Agricultural Science and Technology (CAST), which was a sponsor.

"CAST is a particularly important leadership organisation in North America, and we in Australia can expect to be affected by its findings about urban agriculture development, " Mr Wilson said. The organisation represents some 173,000 American member scientists in 37 organisations, about 100 non-profit organisations and 72 companies". The 110-page CAST report is titled: "Urban and Agricultural Communities; Opportunities for Common Ground".

The report was prepared as a foundation document for the Dallas symposium, and it is now expected to have ripple-out effects on urban agriculture policy-making around the world, including in Australian cities.

"This is because the CAST report broadens urban agriculture from urban and peri-urban food production to the wider issues of community health, recreation and leisure, wildlife enhancement, water remediation, wastewater renovation, carbon sequestration, energy conservation, therapeutic, environmental and amenity horticulture, aquaculture, companion animal husbandry, and quality of life and energy conservation," Mr Wilson said.

About 200 leading American scientists, educationalists and government officials attended the symposium. It was hosted in Dallas by the Texas A&M University, with help from five other U.S universities in California, Iowa, Georgia, Oklahoma and Virginia. Other collaborating institutions and sponsors included the U.S Department of Agriculture, the Kellogg Foundation, the American Society for Horticultural Science, the National Urban Task Force, the Oklahoma Botanical Garden and Arboretum, and the U.S Golf Association.

Geoff Wilson said he chose to introduce his online magazine at the Dallas symposium because he saw it as the most important global event in urban agriculture in 2002. Many scientists attending were recruited to provide in-depth reports on their specialties.

"The symposium represents a significant point, I believe, of accelerating global interest in urban agriculture and the policy-making and science and technology supporting it," Mr Wilson said.

"Many countries have endorsed urban agriculture as most complementary food production that well meshes with rural agriculture. They are also seeing it as an important response to the massive, world-wide urbanization of rural areas close to cities, the likely adverse effects of global warming, soil erosion, soil salinity, soil acidification and soil sodicity, plus pollution of air and water, and the possible disastrous impact of bio-terrorism," Mr Wilson said.

"A discomforting fact to many Americans is that most of their supermarkets are heavily dependent on a national food distribution networks that, if disrupted by terrorists, means there is a mere 10 to 14 days food supply at a local level," he said.

Food security for three billion people in the world's towns and cities has been of concern to the United Nations since the early 1990s. This why the UN backed the formation of the Urban Agriculture Network Inc. as a global, non-government organisation of professionals. The network president, Mr Jac Smit, presented a paper at the symposium.

Mr Wilson is honorary executive officer of the network's western Pacific office, which covers Australia, New Zealand, Pacific Islands and SE Asia.

"I believe that heightening of formal interest in urban agriculture in the US at this time, will spur many other nations to take similar, positive action, " he said.

"Urban Agriculture Online" will be available on subscription from July 1. The new magazine will be the world's first user of innovative new, CashforcontentTM Internet publishing-for-payment software, which protects copyright material and intellectual property from unauthorised use. A unique back-end billing system pays royalties automatically.

Mr Wilson said a great deal of most valuable information was currently denied to Internet publishing-for-payment because of the copyright protection issue. But from July 1, journalists, writers, authors, academics, scientists, economists, technologists, consultants and commercial owners and managers could enjoy low-cost publishing that pays from 50% to 60% royalties on revenues for their valuable material.

Subscribers of "Urban Agriculture Online" will be able to either: (a) View the articles on PCs, TVs with set-top boxes, laptops, palmtops, tablets or even mobile phones and/or: (b) Buy hard copies of text and pictures via file transfer protocol programs that allow one-off downloading to quick-print businesses close to subscribers.

Geoff Wilson is soliciting a wide range of 2,500 to 5,000-word articles ready for the online magazine's global launch to the general public on July 1. Topics include:

Horticulture (especially hydroponics and aeroponics, and therapeutic horticulture).
Aquaculture (including aquaponics and mariculture).
Small animal husbandry (including companion animals).
Multipurpose tree crops for food, shade and shelter.
Vermiculture.
Food cell culture (plant and animal)..
Urban and periurban planning.
Local government regulation.
Management of organic, urban and periurban wastes.
Management of urban rooftop rainwater runoff and recycled water, and harvesting of air moisture.
Utilisation of urban rooftops, the sides of buildings, and sunlight diverted deep inside buildings.
Development of food decks for urban homes and city apartments.

Use of probiotics to suppress plant and animal diseases and to break down urban organic wastes.
The Urban Agriculture Network Inc and United Nations Development Programme activities around the world.
Permaculture and Community Supported Agriculture around homes, in city farms, and in urban allotments.
Urban agriculture people, science and technology, education. book and report reviews, consultancy services. new products and services and coming events.

Further information:: Geoff Wilson. E-mail: fawmpl@powerup.com.au Website: www.urbanag.info Phone: 07 3349 1422. Mobile: 0417 622 779. Fax: 07 3343 8287.



DALLAS, TEXAS, May 21: "Urban Agriculture Online" magazine was launched today at the ground-breaking Urban Agriculture Symposium organised by six American universities.

The magazine will be a test bed for CashforcontentTM software and billing system.

The magazine's first content will be an in-depth report of the 30 or so papers presented at the symposium, plus the outcomes of its workshop and concluding sessions, and a landmark report of the Council for Agricultural Science and Technology (CAST), which was a sponsor..

This 110-page report is titled: "Urban and Agricultural Communities; Opportunities for Common Ground". It was launched at the Dallas symposium, and is expected to initiate wider national and regional support for urban agriculture development. The CAST report is also expected to have ripple-out effects on urban agriculture policy-making around the world.



This is because the CAST report broadens urban agriculture from urban and peri-urban food production to the wider issues of community health, recreation and leisure, wildlife enhancement, water remediation and wastewater renovation, carbon sequestration, energy conservation, environmental and amenity horticulture, aquaculture, companion animal husbandry, and quality of life and energy conservation.

About 200 leading American authorities on urban agriculture attended the symposium. It was hosted in Dallas by the Texas A&M University (Dallas, El Paso, and College Station) with help from the University of California (Riverside), Iowa State University (Ames), University of California (Davis), University of Georgia (Griffin), Oklahoma State University (Stillwater), and Virginia Tech (Virginia Beach).

Other collaborating institutions and sponsors included the U.S Department of Agriculture, the Kellogg Foundation, the American Society for Horticultural Science, the National Urban Task Force, the Oklahoma Botanical Garden and Arboretum, and the U.S Golf Association.

The Dallas event had these objectives:

Geoff Wilson, editor and publisher of "Urban Agriculture Online" said he chose to launch the online magazine at the Dallas symposium because he saw it as the most important global event in urban agriculture in 2002.

"The symposium represents a significant point, I believe, in an accelerating global interest in urban agriculture and the policy-making and science and technology supporting it. Many countries have endorsed urban agriculture as most complementary food production that well meshes with rural agriculture. They are seeing it as an important response to the world's rapid urbanization of rural areas, desertification, pollution of air and water, and the possible impact of bio-terrorism.

"Food security for six billion people has been of concern to the United Nations since the early 1990s," he said.

"I believe that heightening of formal interest in urban agriculture in the US at this time, will spur many other nations to take similar, positive action, " Mr Wilson said.

"Urban Agriculture Online" will be available on subscription from July 1. Until then the HTML website is www.urbanag.info

Besides extensive coverage of the Dallas symposium and the CAST report, the online magazine will feature two principal streams of information:

  1. In-depth articles on proven, commercial urban agriculture (each around to 5,000 words and 20 or so pictures and diagrams).
  2. Articles on science and technology and policy-making in urban agriculture ( each around 2,500 words and 10 pictures.

City Farmer will carry 200-word summaries of these articles.

The new magazine will be the world's first user of innovative new, CashforcontentTM Internet publishing-for-payment software, which will be offered to some 80,000 publishers of about 146,000 serial publications after July 1. The software allows publishers to provide their authors with copyright security equivalent to print publishing, plus royalty payments for their copyright material and intellectual property.

A great deal of most valuable information is currently denied to Internet publishing because of the copyright protection issue.

Journalists, writers, authors, academics, scientists, economists, technologists and commercial owners and managers will now be able to secure royalty payments for both current and archival material.

Subscribers will be able to either:

(a) View the articles on PCs, TVs with set-top boxes, laptops, palmtops, tablets or even mobile phones and/or:

(b) Buy hard copies of the text and pictures via file transfer protocol programs that allow one-off downloading to quick-print businesses close to where they reside or work.

"Urban Agriculture Online" is currently soliciting a wide range of articles ready for its global launch on July 1. Topics include:

Further information:
PUBLISHER & EDITOR: Geoff Wilson
ADMINISTRATION: Mary Wilson.
E-mail: fawmpl@powerup.com.au
Website: http://www.urbanag.info/default.html






Search Our Site[new]


pointer Return to Contents' Page pointer


Revised June 12, 2002

Published by City Farmer
Canada's Office of Urban Agriculture
cityfarmer@gmail.com