Forget Facebook’s Farmville (and stop asking me to find a home for your lonely black sheep), the new online game Kersplat! is a fun alternative, and it also reminds us of the challenges that people in Africa face.

The hosting organization Send a Cow developed the game to educate people about the virtues of “Magic Muck,” the high-nutrient compost that they provide to African farmers. The game includes a button that allows visitors to send a donation. You can also click on another button to learn more about the other projects that Send a Cow sponsors. (And you can keep playing until you knock me off the leaderboard.)

The safest kind of burger?

If you ever wanted proof that corporations matter more than people in our society, you need not look further than the New York Times article on how 22-year-old Stephanie Smith was poisoned by the O157:H7 strain of coli that contaminated a “burger” from food giant Cargill. As we learn in the article, this isn’t a case where a diseased animal somehow found its way into the food chain. It is a harrowing account of how industrial food is killing and maiming us.

Stephanie, a children’s dance teacher who rarely ate meat, did consume a hamburger her mother cooked for Sunday dinner in 2007. Not long afterward, Stephanie suffered diarrhea, then bloody diarrhea and finally her kidneys shut down. Doctors put her into a nine-week coma (e coli poisoning reportedly hurts worse than childbirth), and now she may never walk again.

In the article, we learn that the burger she ate was created from so many gut-churning quasi-meat components that tracing the problem back to its source almost becomes meaningless:

“[T]he hamburgers were made from a mix of slaughterhouse trimmings and a mash-like product derived from scraps . . . ground together at a plant in Wisconsin. The ingredients came from slaughterhouses in Nebraska, Texas and Uruguay, and from a South Dakota company that processes fatty trimmings and treats them with ammonia to kill bacteria.”

“Mash-like product”? And people wonder why I am a vegetarian?

In addition to confirming that our food system is broken, the article illustrates how our political system fails us because corporate cash matters more than individual contributions. Yes, a talented politician such as President Obama succeeded in attracting millions of supporters, many of whom sent him relatively small campaign donations. But their collective voices do not deliver a unified message in the same way that food corporation lobbyists can capture the ears of the people who matter at the White House and in Congress.

If this were not the case, would we have a system where corporations can produce toxic mystery meat as long as doing so is 25% cheaper? In a true perversion of transparency, “Many big slaughterhouses will sell only to grinders who agree not to test their shipments for E. coli, according to officials at two large grinding companies. Slaughterhouses fear that one grinder’s discovery of E. coli will set off a recall of ingredients they sold to others.” Profits before people.

The article goes on to quote Dr. Jeffrey Bender from the University of Minnesota who warns, “Ground beef is not a completely safe product.” He also notes that instead of making us safer, our current meat inspection system is “going a bit in the opposite direction.”

Even that mild criticism means that Dr. Bender will likely face enormous pressure to retract his statement or say no more. In these cash-strapped times, the academic freedom to speak out often runs afoul of the pressure to remain silent, to keep the government and corporate grants flowing.

The rest of the unnerving article is a litany of sickening corporate abuse. The speedup of the line at slaughterhouses makes inspection meaningless as the animals whiz by. Slaughterhouse workers protest that they are not given time to clean their knives, even though the new strains of e coli are hideously virulent pathogens unlike any we have seen before. (Incubated in those Confined Animal Feeding Operations perhaps? And if you think ours are bad, just imagine what they must be like in Uruguay.)

The article also notes that hamburger today not only contains animal products but bread crumbs and spices that aren’t even listed on the label. Amazing indeed since there is growing evidence that imported spices are an increasingly worrisome source of food contamination.

One of my biggest surprises while covering agriculture in the Seventies and Eighties was how much money and time food corporations expend in fighting for specific language in regulations that allow them to do things that would literally make their customers sick, if they knew. What you eat is the product of intense lobbying in Washington, where loosening a regulation or adding a loophole blackens the corporate bottom line even though it would make most people see red.

Yet at a deeper level, it really doesn’t matter what the regulations say when food corporations consciously ignore complaints about basic sanitation. The article notes that Cargill’s own inspectors had complained that the plant that produced the burger that poisoned Stephanie suffered from cases where there were hamburger patties on the floor and “gnarly” old bits of meat in the grinders. Yet the company apparently did nothing to correct the problems, at least in time to save Stephanie.

But won’t the massive lawsuits the companies face pressure them to make our food safer? They help, but they are no panacea. Lawsuits typically drag on for years and years, and those that settle before trial often require that all records are sealed, so we never learn what the problem really was. Moreover, Cargill could end up off the hook if evidences proves that the contaminated meat came from a subsidiary, which is why corporations push back against any attempt at real transparency.

So what should a meat eater do? Find a local, sustainable farmer and buy direct. Or find an old-fashioned butcher shop where they will let you see how they produce their hamburger. Or you can reward those corporations that push back against abuses. Costco tests the trimmings for e coli before making its hamburger. And, though Tyson disputes the allegation, Costco says that their policy is why the slaughterhouse will not sell to them. On a larger scale, you can support politicians who vote for legislation that favors sustainable agriculture over short-term, bottom-line thinking.

We should also praise and support the New York Times for this article. It takes time and talent to investigate industries that spend a fortune to remain under the public radar. Every word must be bullet-proof or they could find themselves facing a lawsuit. Remember when Oprah was sued by the Texas cattlemen for “disparagement” of their product? It takes the deep pockets of news organizations such as the New York Times to produce, publicize and defend stories such as these.

Suttira quotes a local farmer saying, “Organic farming is the greatest idea for both consumers and farmers. We both have a clean and safe food for our health.” Farmers embracing this model are also finding a warm reception among local consumers. “They will pay a reasonable price for the good quality of fresh vegetables, while we can also provide them healthy food.”

It is heartening to read that the trust between farmers and consumers is prompting the invention of new, sustainable models worldwide.

NEWSFLASH: < ahref="http://in.reuters.com/article/specialEvents4/idINBKK14875720090623?sp=true">Reuters reports that the Thai government has rebuffed efforts by Arab investors to purchase Thai farmland directly. The country reportedly allows joint ownership if the Thai owner maintains a 51% stake in the farm enterprise but foreigners cannot own farmland outright. The articles goes on to say that Arab countries, faced with dramatic hikes in food prices, are increasingly concerned about their vulnerability and are therefore trying to buy farmland in developing countries.

At a time when so many people in this country are out of work, making it easier for beginning and minority growers to start farming seems a no-brainer. This is the kind of stimulus I can believe in.

The judge found that USDA ignored scientific evidence that pollen from the GMO could drift as much as 2-1/2 miles, far outside the required buffer zones, potentially contaminating other susceptible sugar beet and Swiss chard plantings. In addition to underestimating the scale of problems with drift, White also said USDA did not sufficiently research the environmental impact and must do so before any approval could be given.

The judge also ruled that USDA ignored the GMO crop’s significant impact on the environment, including “the potential elimination of a farmer’s choice to grow non-genetically engineered crops, or a consumer’s choice to eat non-genetically engineered food.”

In 2007, another federal judge halted the planting of GMO alfalfa.

One of the bigger challenges I have faced with the new hoophouse is organizing the fall planting. The first decision is what to plant. Then when to plant. And whether to plant seeds directly or start seedlings indoors for transplanting.

And what do you do with the summer plantings that are still producing? That patty pan squash plant is still reliably giving me a new squash or two every week, so do I rip it out? And what plants can follow other plants without increasing the risk of disease and insect problems?

When in doubt, I rely on two trustworthy sources. First is Eliot Coleman, whose book above on “The Winter Harvest” is my bible. The second is Michigan State University hoophouse specialist Adam Montri. Click here for his free handout on fall plantings for hoophouses in Michigan, adaptable to other cold Midwest states.

Unheated winter greenhouses can produce abundant harvests of root crops, various greens and onions. The trick is mastering the timing. Growth in winter slows dramatically, so Coleman says that you need to have most of your crops close to harvest stage by the time that the daytime sunlight drops to 10 hours a day. Wunderground tells me that we are down to 11 hours and 49 minutes of daytime today, and the day will be 2 minutes and 51 seconds shorter tomorrow. By my calculation, I have roughly one month more before the big slowdown.

I began starting seeds indoors in August, even though it seemed counter-intuitive to use electricity to start plants indoors when the sunshine outside is free. But the problem is that many of these cool- and cold-weather plants find August temperatures too hot for good germination and early growth.

The other problem, of course, is space. My hoophouse in August was filled to the bring with summer plants that were booming.

The picture above (taken yesterday) shows that the romaine, mache, various lettuces, spinach, chard, kale and beet seedlings started indoors and planted two or three weeks ago are doing great. (Mache, also known as corn salad, is a type of lettuce that Coleman recommends, along with minatura, for winter production. I rely on Johnny’s Seeds for these varieties.)

I also direct-seeded turnips, beets, carrots and lettuce at various times during the last six weeks, but I am worried that many were planted too late to grow big enough to fare well during the winter.

We have not yet had a frost this fall. Those milk jugs painted black are ready to be filled with water, so that they can absorb solar energy during the day and radiate it back at night as an additional temperature boost at night.

My hoophouse does not enjoy a frost-free water hydrant, so it will tricky deciding when to roll up the hoses before they freeze solid. I visited Adam’s hoophouse last January, and he said that he never had to water during the winter. Let’s hope I don’t have to yoke up the dogs like oxen to carry pails of water in January and February.

Once I begin to understand hoophouse dynamics better, I want to explore other possibilities for small-scale, home winter food production. Simple cold frames or “low tunnel” hoophouses two or three feet high offer tremendous promise as a much-lower price.

Coleman writes that the French placed glass cloches over fall plantings in their fields outdoors a century ago, as many as 3,000 on one farm. Like the hoophouse, the glass would allow the sun to come through and heat the plants during the day. Farmers would also cover them with a blanket of ryegrass to insulate them further. But imagine the hard work it took to prop up each of those cloches on days when the sun got so intense they needed to be vented - and then put them back down at night.

Our production dramatically reduced our summer grocery bills. Meijer for me is now the place to buy toilet paper and root beer (and I have a kit to start making my own root beer as well). Let’s hope my winter production feeds us well this winter.

The Christian Science Monitor recently ran a short article on a new breakthrough in using the natural pesticide jasmonic acid. Jasmonic acid is a natural pesticide that plants release when attacked, but spraying plants with the substance never caught on with farmers because doing so slowed plant growth. Research in England suggests that dipping the seeds in jasmonic acid produces plants that repel insects without the side effect of slow growth.

While it would seem that gardeners and farmers would be universally delighted at the possibility of an effective natural pesticide, reading the comments that readers left illustrates how contentious the issue of pesticides really is. So far, only one writer, who hopes that this means farmworkers will not face problems with pesticide poisoning, is unreservedly thrilled with the news.

Another notes that just because a substance is “natural” doesn’t mean it’s benign. That person also notes that chemical companies may begin looking for variations on jasmonic acid’s chemical structure to intensify its effects. Many cite research that shows workers who spray pesticides on lawns and crops suffer problems.

Perhaps the most intriguing comments raise the issue of whether the entire food system has gone off the rails. A number of posters question whether research on “natural” pesticides risks imposing an industrial agriculture model on alternative systems. One writes, “The real problem is the box we have trapped ourselves in. The answer doesn’t lie in natural pesticides, the answer lies in changing the way we produce food. Centralized agriculture will never, ever be sustainable. Producing food in accordance with, not against nature’s tendencies on a smaller, much broader scale is the only way we will ever be able to maintain any kind of productivity over the long term.”

I personally find it heartening that people across this country are becoming enlightened about food issues in a way that they never have before. People are beginning to question whether a corporate and industrial model makes the best sense in finding ways to feed ourselves.

Because of the short timetable between announcement of the program in August and the end of the federal fiscal year September 30, farmers who want to sign up for the program face a short turnaround time to apply. Eligible applicants who apply now can expect to receive the Conservation Measurement Tool to fill out sometime in October. That tool will be used to evaluate the final applicants.

Also problematic is that farmers chosen for the 2009 funds won’t know the rate at which they will be paid until or unless they are selected. (Farmers who are selected can always elect not to sign a contract if they don’t like the terms. First payments for both 2009 and 2010 recipients will not be paid until October 2010.)

At a farm marketing meeting in Michigan two years ago, a participant talked movingly about how his mother supported the family during the Depression by selling homemade pies to area restaurants. “If it hadn’t been for those pies, I don’t know how we would have made it,” he said.

Sadly, doing so today in Michigan and many other states is flatly illegal. Why? Concerns about food safety have prompted states to pass laws that require all food for sale must be prepared in a certified kitchen. In states such as Michigan, this not only prevents home cooks and bakers from marketing homemade wares, but it is why a producer at a farm market cannot slice up an apple or melon for you to taste - that, too, requires a certified kitchen, which is typically beyond the budget of many farmers’ markets and farmstands.

Shouldn’t states find a way to regulate Sara Lee effectively without preventing me from buying a slice of a real Mom’s homemade apple pie? So-called “cottage laws” address this conundrum by allowing people to offer consumers relatively small amounts of relatively safe homemade foods for sale without penalty. It doesn’t mean Mom can poison people with impunity, but she could sell homemade jams and jellies without facing a stiff fine if she’s caught. Without naming names, many of Michigan’s successful new food entrepreneurs knowingly or unknowingly broke the existing food safety law when they got started. For many small entrepreneurs, the cost of using a certified kitchen is simply prohibitive until their business grows large enough.

In Michigan, Rep. John Proos (R-St. Joseph) is sponsoring HR 5280 to ease Michigan’s tough food safety laws to allow for this small-scale food production. So if you have a great recipe from Grandma that you want to test market without investing a fortune, call your state representative to urge support for cottage laws.

The counter-argument is that we cannot know whether Mom’s kitchen is safe unless it is state inspected. And I have seen home kitchens that make me wince. But it seems to me that the real scandal is that there are so few food safety regulators keeping an eye on the big food makers. I’ll take my chances on Mom.

If you are thinking of a small food enterprise, take a moment to visit Cooking with Denay for some tips on getting started. (Her site also offers information on nutritional labeling.) Michigan State University’s Product Center also offers assistance. Mark your calendar for their food show at the Lansing Civic Center on November 11.