6/21/13

6/21/13, Daping Village

Today one of the women at the home stay we are at talked to us about the earth and how important organic farming is. She told us about how at first she was criticized by a lot of people for pushing organic people because a lot of them thought it would fail. The first two years were not good for the farms, but they are doing better now than they have before. Now that a group of the farmers only practice organic farming, it is also attracting tourists and people interested in organic farming. We learned about how if the land is split up between several crops, pesticides are not needed because there are a variety of bugs going for different plants. With this variety of bugs, there are natural predators and the bug populations are naturally moderated. This is why monocultures are unsustainable – because one species of bug is able to grow drastically in population. She explained that it is important to protect the planet from the heart. I valued everything she said immensely and really appreciated her words about protecting the planet.

After, Ping gave a lecture about soil and it’s properties. We then watched a movie called “Dirt!” which was about the importance of dirt. It is what sustains us all and we deplete the nutrients with our unsustainable practices and pollution. The documentary was actually extremely inspirational and I want to go save the world even more now! Tonight we are flying to Zhangjiajie.