issuesComplex, interconnected issues must be dealt with rapidly and effectively if we are to achieve a resilient future.
explore the issues
support pci
The NEW Oil Age Poster (Dec 2010)
Wes Jackson is one of the foremost figures in the international sustainable agriculture movement. Founder and president of The Land Institute in Salina, Kansas, he has pioneered reserach in Natural Systems Agriculture — including perennial grains, perennial polycultures, and intercropping — for over 30 years. He was a professor of biology at Kansas Wesleyan and later established the Environmental Studies program at California State University, Sacramento, where he became a tenured full professor. He is the author of several books including Becoming Native to This Place (1994), Altars of Unhewn Stone (1987), and New Roots for Agriculture (1980).
The work of the Land Institute has been featured extensively in the popular media, including The Atlantic Monthly, Audubon, The MacNeil-Lehrer News Hour, and All Things Considered. Life magazine predicted Wes Jackson will be among the 100 "most important Americans of the 20th century." He is a recipient of the Pew Conservation Scholars award and a MacArthur Fellowship, and has been listed as one of Smithsonian's "35 Who Made a Difference". Wes has an M.A. in botany from University of Kansas, and a Ph.D. in genetics from North Carolina State University.
One in a series of oral history interviews created by AFSIC to capture the leaders in sustainable agriculture from the decades preceding the 1990s. Interview recorded in 1990.
Wes Jackson, Ph.D., as the co-founder with Dana Jackson of the Land Institute, has researched and influenced thought on the environment and agriculture in general and specifically perennial polyculture cropping systems based on the prairie ecosystem. He is a farmer, philosopher and author of several landmark books on the subject of sustainable agriculture.
The segments in the Questions section are drawn from the full interview. They duplicate video segments from the menu. These are not verbatim questions asked by the interviewer, but rather topics addressed by Dr. Jackson during the course of his interview. We hope that this will be an informative and interesting way to view the conversation.
Part 1 (Intro), Part, 3, Part 4, Part 5, Part 6, Part 7, Part 8, Part 9, Part 10, Part, 11, Part 12
We depend utterly on fossil fuels, especially to grow our food. From natural gas comes the millions of tons of fertilizers. Oil provides herbicides and pesticides. All is planted and harvested with oil power, driven, shipped or flown to your table.
For now. Until fossil fuels become too expensive, too rare, too polluting to use. We only have a short time to find other ways.
Wes Jackson offers some answers, for our food supply during peak oil and climate change. Raised on a Kansas farm, Jackson is a biologist, a geneticist, and botanist. In 1976 he left university life to found "The Land Institute", which he still heads. He's going to explain "natural systems agriculture", in a powerful speech given to the Association for the Study of Peak Oil USA. Recorded in Washington D.C. November 4th, 2011 by Gerri Williams for Radio Ecoshock (available nowhere else).
Then we'll hear a different assessment of the potential for sequestering carbon in the soil, and biochar, from the Australian carbon cycle expert Dr. Michael Raupach.
This Radio Ecoshock program is part of our "Big Picture" solutions series.
[Excerpt] THE extraordinary rainstorms last June caused catastrophic soil erosion in the grain lands of Iowa, where there were gullies 200 feet wide. But even worse damage is done over the long term under normal rainfall … >>
[Excerpt]: Since ripping open the prairie for modern monocultures, we're losing soil and fertility. Agricultural pioneer Wes Jackson says there's another way. The Grass was the Country as the Water is the Sea. —Willa … >>
EXCERPT: Now there's the reality of climate change. We've gone into overshoot and we are in economic trouble. We look to more economic growth, but once economics and population growth absorb all of the … >>
In Nature as Measure, a collection of Jackson’s essays from 'Altars of Unhewn Stone' and 'Becoming Native to This Place', these ideas of land conservation and education are written from the point of view of a man who has … >>
Post Carbon Fellow Wes Jackson was named as one of Yes! Magazine's Breakthrough 15. The 15 which also included Will Allen of Growing Power are considered to be people whose ideas and work are transforming the way we live. See … >>
Richard Heinberg explains why we've hit the end of economic growth as we've known it, and what life can be like after growth.
what is pci?Founded in 2003, Post Carbon Institute is leading the transition to a more resilient, equitable, and sustainable world. The Institute has gathered 29 of the world's leading experts on a wide range of interdependent social and scientific issues.
learn more post carbon reader
more pci people
press contact info