Voices of Transition
"HIGHLY RECOMMENDED"
May/June 2015 Video Librarian magazine
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Voices of Transition presents innovative, inspirational – and concrete – solutions to the food security challenges we humans increasingly face. It explores agroforestry models in France, permaculture and TRANSITION TOWN initiatives in England and the organic farming revolution in Cuba.
By focusing on immediate profit and ignoring millennia of experience in agronomy, agroindustry is responsible for the unprecedented erosion of soils now occurring around the world. Add climate change and dwindling natural resources to the picture, and it would appear that even societies in the Global North are no longer safe from famines. Voices of Transition is a film which is optimistic but clear-sighted. It makes clear that these current and impending crises are, in fact, positive challenges!
CHAPTER I – REINTRODUCING LIFE INTO OUR FIELDS
In France, farmers and researchers demonstrate that agroforestry techniques, which imitate natural ecosystems, have enormous potential for our agriculture. It would appear to be just a matter of time before our monocultural fields are transformed (back) into abundant and biodiverse edible forests.
CHAPTER II – REINTRODUCING FIELDS INTO OUR CITIES
In England, the Transition Towns movement is developing at an astonishing pace. It illustrates that food production must not be solely in the hands of rural farmers (or faceless corporations), but that we can bring it into the very heart of cities. City-dwellers are no longer mere consumers, but instead play a vital part in the transformation of their communities towards local resilience.
CHAPTER III – LEARNING FROM AN EXISTING EXAMPLE OF “PEAK OIL”
In Cuba, the fall of the USSR in 1990 and the US embargo led to the country to experience “peak oil” long before it was expected. Shortages in resources led the Cubans to develop innovative solutions, with the result that they became vastly more self-sufficient in food production. In Cuba, food is now produced organically, in a decentralised, community-supporting way.
Subtitles on DVD: English, Spanish , French, and Japanese
BONUS: Interview with Rob Hopkins, founder and figurehead of the Transition Towns movement. 28 mins
Produced and Directed by Nils Aguilar
65 mins | 2013