"We do not condemn modern civilization but we don't like to get it at the cost of God Consciousness, that is suicide."
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The Beauty of Beans
"One acre of beans produces ten times more protein than an acre of pasture set aside for meat production." -Higher Taste
Moundsville, West Virginia
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ISKCON Gita Nagari Farm Community
Port Royal, Pennsylvania
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ISKCON New Goloka Farm Community
Hillsborough, North Carolina
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ISKCON New Talavan Farm Community
Carriere, Mississippi
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ISKCON Saranagati Eco-Village
British Columbia, Canada
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ISKCON Gaura Vrindaban
Paraty, Brazil
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ISKCON Krishna Valley Farm Community
Somogyvamos, Hungary
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Bhaktivedanta Eco-Village
Sagar Taluq, South India
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ISKCON Cow Protection
"There are so many facilities afforded by cow protection, but people have forgotten these arts. The importance of protecting cows is therefore stressed by Krsna in Bhagavad-gita (krsi-go-raksya-vanijyam vaisya-karma svabhavajam [Bg. 18.44]). Even now in the Indian villages surrounding Vrndavana, the villagers live happily simply by giving protection to the cow. They keep cow dung very carefully and dry it to use as fuel. They keep a sufficient stock of grains, and because of giving protection to the cows, they have sufficient milk and milk products to solve all economic problems. Simply by giving protection to the cow, the villagers live so peacefully. Even the urine and stool of cows have medicinal value."
-Srila Prabhupada
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Article found at Alliance of Religions & Conservation
Hindu groups and the Orissa government agreed to re-establish the state’s sacred forests to provide sustainably-managed wood for the annual festival of Lord Jagannath.
The centrepiece of the ancient festival is the building and parading of three huge chariots – after which the English word “juggernaut” is named. These are made with timber from 20 local tree species and after the ceremony, the wood is distributed to local villages and used to fuel temple kitchens.
But over the centuries inadequate forest management has gradually led to a significant loss of trees. The implication both for the festival and the natural environment is serious.
The forests are rich in resources, but their proper management requires the co-operation of the people who live in and around them.
The Sacred Gift builds on the people’s devotion to Lord Jagannath – a devotion that has been a key element of Orissan culture for at least 2000 years – and aims to set up three forest conservation zones, each incorporating about ten villages sited in state-owned forest lands.
Since 2000 each village has had a Forest Protection Committee to promote joint forest management based around practical incentives and employment schemes.
In 2001 the local communities developed a management plan in collaboration with ARC.
By mid-2007 2369 hectares were earmarked for plantation under the Shri Jagannath Vana Prakalpa Forest Project. See link to learn more about this project and the management of Jagannath Forest.
The project sets an important precedent for other Hindu groups to extend their involvement in environmental matters. It also encourages the Orissa State Government to incorporate traditional cultural and religious practices into their forest activities - which are vital to the state’s economy.
Śrīmad Bhāgavatam 1.17.1
TRANSLATION
by A.C. Bhaktivedanta Swami Prabhupada
Suta Gosvāmī said: After reaching that place, Maharaja Pariksit observed that a lower-caste sudra, dressed like a king, was beating a cow and a bull with a club, as if they had no owner.
PURPORT
The principal sign of the age of Kali Yuga is that lower-caste śūdras, i.e., men without brahminical culture and spiritual initiation, will be dressed like administrators or kings, and the principal business of such non-ksatriya rulers will be to kill the innocent animals, especially the cows and the bulls, who shall be unprotected by their masters, the bona fide vaiśyas, the mercantile community. In the Bhagavad-gita (18.44), it is said that the vaiśyas are meant to deal in agriculture, cow protection and trade. In the age of Kali, the degraded vaiśyas, the mercantile men, are engaged in supplying cows to slaughterhouses. The kṣatriyas are meant to protect the citizens of the state, whereas the vaiśyas are meant to protect the cows and bulls and utilize them to produce grains and milk. The cow is meant to deliver milk, and the bull is meant to produce grains. But in the age of Kali, the sudra class of men are in the posts of administrators, and the cows and bulls, or the mothers and the fathers, unprotected by the vaiśyas, are subjected to the slaughterhouses organized by the sudra administrators.
“A picturesque scene of green paddy fields enlivens the heart of the poor agriculturalist, but it brings gloom to the face of the capitalist who lives by exploiting the poor farmers.”-Light of the Bhagavata, Verse Nine
By Rebecca Paveley, The Diocese of Oxford Reporter
Churches across the Diocese of Oxford have pledged to buy in local food and services in a bid to support struggling farmers and rural communities.
In a groundbreaking pledge the diocesan synod - the decision making body for the diocese - agreed unanimously to back a call for all churches to use local food at meetings and social gatherings wherever possible.
It is hoped that congregations will continue to keep the pledge when it comes to filling their own shopping baskets at home.
The Church of England nationally has launched a “Shrinking the Footprint” campaign which aims to try and tackle climate change in ‘faith, practice and mission’.
The pledge by churches in our area aims to support local rural communities and businesses, and to cut down on unnecessary food mileage, so reducing carbon emissions.
The Revd Richard Hancock, area dean for the Vale of the White Horse in Oxfordshire, said: “What makes no sense is that food produced locally which does end up in local shops has first had to travel some 60-100 miles to a distribution centre before being driven back in another lorry so I can put it in my shopping basket.
“The hard reality is that our farmers are in crisis. 70% have no one to hand on their business to, and more importantly their knowledge to future generations.
“What will become of our nation is we are unable to feed ourselves?”
Livestock farmer Dickie Green, who is also a churchwarden at Ashbury St Mary on the Wiltshire border, said: “It is good that churches support the fairtrade movement but we have to think about what is happening in this country. It is a tough life for farmers today.”
The pledge commits churches to using local produce wherever possible alongside fairtrade goods, such as tea and coffee.
The Diocese backed a call for churches to use fairtrade products a few years ago, but Diocesan rural officer Glyn Evans said the two pledges would not clash.
This motion - brought by the Vale of the White Horse deanery - won unanimous support from synod members, who are appointed from churches across Oxfordshire, Berkshire and Buckinghamshire.
One a more local level, several deaneries have already passed local resolutions in support of the pledge, including Henley, Newbury, Deddington and Chipping Norton and Claydon.
Oxfordshire is the most rural county in the South East and though the Diocese as a whole is classed as wealthy, there are real pockets of deprivation, many in rural areas, said the Revd Glyn Evans.
Some 25% of rural dwellers have no access to a car and there has been a rise in depression, drug abuse and alcohol related incidents among youngsters in rural areas.
Farmers are also three times more likely to commit suicide than any other profession, he said.
The Diocese of Oxford has a team of rural officers, clergy and lay people, who work to support those struggling to maintain a living in the countryside and synod heard from several of them about the work they do.
Filed under: Environmental Politics
Concern for the environment is considered by many to be very high, even spiritual, consciousnes.
The citizens will suffer greatly from cold, wind, heat, rain and snow. They will be further tormented by quarrels, hunger, thirst, disease and severe anxiety.
SB 12.2.10
As devotees we may not realize our responsibility for the current problems nor understand what we can do about it. Are we peforming the sankirtan yajna enough?
When the Hare Krsna mantra is chanted by many men to-gether, the chanting is called sankirtana, and as a result of such a yajna there will be clouds in the sky (yajnad bhavati parjanyah [Bg. 3.14]).
In these days of drought, people can gain relief from scarcity of rain and food by the simple method of the Hare Krsna yajna. Indeed, this can relieve all of human society. At present there are droughts throughout Europe and America, and people are suffering, but if people take this Krsna consciousness movement seriously, if they stop their sinful activities and chant the Hare Krsna maha-mantra, all their problems will be solved without difficulty (SB 9.1.17).
Headlines like the following are becoming more prominent. Many are admitting the problem, but no one has a solution. Water is Krsna’s energy and devotees have the potential to really do something.
Many states seen facing water shortages
By BRIAN SKOLOFF, Associated Press Writer
Fri Oct 26
WEST PALM BEACH, Fla. - An epic drought in Georgia threatens the water supply for millions. Florida doesn’t have nearly enough water for its expected population boom. The Great Lakes are shrinking. Upstate New York’s reservoirs have dropped to record lows. And in the West, the Sierra Nevada snowpack is melting faster each year. Across America, the picture is critically clear — the nation’s freshwater supplies can no longer quench its thirst.
• The government projects that at least 36 states will face water shortages within five years because of a combination of rising temperatures, drought, population growth, urban sprawl, waste and excess.
• “Is it a crisis? If we don’t do some decent water planning, it could be,” said Jack Hoffbuhr, executive director of the Denver-based American Water Works Association.
• Water managers will need to take bold steps to keep taps flowing, including conservation, recycling, desalination and stricter controls on development.
Srila Prabhupada spoke boldly and confidently on this subject
“Prabhupada: …sankirtana, then water will come. You haven’t got to do anything. Otherwise the words of Gita will be false. Yajnaih… Yajnad bhavanti parjanyah. The formula is there. You perform yajna and the water will be supplied. They are not performing yajna.
Dhananjaya: So then it’s very important to perform twenty-four-hour kirtana here.
Prabhupada: Oh, yes.
Devotee (2): From that, then, the rains will be produced. (more…)
Article found at Frontline World
Suicide by pesticide: It’s an epidemic in India, where farmers try to keep up with the latest pest-resistant seeds only to find themselves trapped in a vicious cycle of pesticides that don’t work, drought and debt. Since 1997, more than 25,000 farmers have committed suicide, many drinking the chemical that was supposed to make their crops more, not less, productive.
In verdant Andhra Pradesh, an agricultural state in eastern India where last summer an average of seven farmers killed themselves every day, machinery, chemical fertilizers and pesticides, and hybrid seeds — all of which originated in the West — often spell disaster rather than prosperity. “This is the other side of globalization,” says Heeter, a student at U.C. Berkeley Graduate School of Journalism.
The tragedy unfolds from crop failure. Drought, pests, and spurious pesticides are expensive problems that small farmers don’t have the means to rectify. In recent years, as Heeter finds in the fields of Andhra Pradesh, crop failure can often be traced to Bt cotton, a genetically modified breed that contains a pesticide that naturally occurs in soil rather than plants. Bt technology should, in theory, repel bollworm — cotton’s worst enemy — but some farmers who plant more expensive Bt seeds often wind up worse off than those who don’t. One farmer, Pariki, confides that after he fell into debt, his wife killed herself, leaving him to care for their three small children.
In the last seven years, bad seeds, costly pesticide and drought have triggered debt, then suicide for 4,500 farmers in Andhra Pradesh alone, but no one is taking responsibility — not the government, whose policies encouraged cash crops like cotton; not the developers of genetically modified crops; and not the dealers, who insist that farmers don’t follow instructions for their seed. Amazingly, Pariki harbors no grudges. “I’m not angry with anyone because the moneylender has the right to ask for repayment,” he says.
Heeter discovers that less expensive, lower-risk organic farming methods might offer a solution for the cotton-growing crisis in India. But without a sea change in agriculture policy and practices, thousands more Indian farmers are likely to take their own lives.
October 15 - 21 will mark the annual observance of Feed the World Week (FWW). During this week, Food for Life volunteers and concerned people in over 60 countries will serve out millions of karma-free vegetarian meals to the world!The inspiration behind Food for Life, Srila Prabhupada, once wrote: ““By the liberal distribution of prasad (pure vegetarian food) and sankirtan (pure sound), the whole world can become peaceful and prosperous.” He also said, “…one earns happiness by making the cows and bulls happy.”
Food for Life Global’s mission is to UNITE THE WORLD THROUGH FOOD, and so we invite anyone and everyone to join us during this week! Contact your local Food for Life representative to volunteer some time, or become an advocate or donate now!
Feed the World Week is based on the following principles:
1. Feed the World Week is based on a simple principle: For one week, the world should experience a wholesome, nonviolent diet, and thus pave the way for a peaceful and prosperous world.
2. Feed the World Week is an open community event to show how food when prepared and distributed with love, has the power to unite and heal the world.
3. Feed the World Week is a call for action: for the world to move away from animal agriculture—the greatest cause of environmental destruction and the principle reason why there is so much hunger in the world today.
Filed under: Cow Protection, Environmental Politics, Health, Morality, Uncategorized
TRANSLATION
by Srila Prabhupada
During the reign of Maharaja Yudhisthira, the clouds showered all the water that people needed, and the earth produced all the necessities of man in profusion. Due to its fatty milk bag and cheerful attitude, the cow used to moisten the grazing ground with milk.
PURPORT
The basic principle of economic development is centered on land and cows. The necessities of human society are food grains, fruits, milk, minerals, clothing, wood, etc. One requires all these items to fulfill the material needs of the body. Certainly one does not require flesh and fish or iron tools and machinery. During the regime of Maharaja Yudhisthira all over the world there were regulated rainfalls. Rainfalls are not in the control of the human being. The heavenly King Indradeva is the controller of rains, and he is the servant of the Lord. When the Lord is obeyed by the king and the people under the king’s administration, there are regulated rains from the horizon, and these rains are the causes of all varieties of production on the land. Not only do regulated rains help ample production of grains and fruits, but when they combine with astronomical influences there is ample production of valuable stones and pearls. Grains and vegetables can sumptuously feed a man and animals, and a fatty cow delivers enough milk to supply a man sumptuously with vigor and vitality. If there is enough milk, enough grains, enough fruit, enough cotton, enough silk and enough jewels, then why do the people need cinemas, houses of prostitution, slaughterhouses, etc.? What is the need of an artificial luxurious life of cinema, cars, radio, flesh and hotels? Has this civilization produced anything but quarreling individually and nationally? Has this civilization enhanced the cause of equality and fraternity by sending thousands of men into a hellish factory and the war fields at the whims of a particular man?
It is said here that the cows used to moisten the pasturing land with milk because their milk bags were fatty and the animals were joyful. Do they not require, therefore, proper protection for a joyful life by being fed with a sufficient quantity of grass in the field? Why should men kill cows for their selfish purposes? Why should man not be satisfied with grains, fruits and milk, which, combined together, can produce hundreds and thousands of palatable dishes. Why are there slaughterhouses all over the world to kill innocent animals? Maharaja Pariksit grandson of Maharaja Yudhisthira while touring his vast kingdom, saw a black man attempting to kill a cow. The King at once arrested the butcher and chastised him sufficiently. Should not a king or executive head protect the lives of the poor animals who are unable to defend themselves? Is this humanity? Are not the animals of a country citizens also? Then why are they allowed to be butchered in organized slaughterhouses? Are these the signs of equality, fraternity and nonviolence?
Therefore, in contrast with the modern, advanced, civilized form of government, an autocracy like Maharaja Yudhisthira’s is by far superior to a so-called democracy in which animals are killed and a man less than an animal is allowed to cast votes for another less-than-animal man.
We are all creatures of material nature. In the Bhagavad-gita is said that the Lord Himself is the seed-giving father and material nature is the mother of all living beings in all shapes. Thus mother material nature has enough foodstuff both for animals and for men, by the grace of the Father Almighty, Sri Krsna. The human being is the elder brother of all other living beings. He is endowed with intelligence more powerful than animals for realizing the course of nature and the indications of the Almighty Father. Human civilizations should depend on the production of material nature without artificially attempting economic development to turn the world into a chaos of artificial greed and power only for the purpose of artificial luxuries and sense gratification. This is but the life of dogs and hogs.
Śrīmad Bhāgavatam 1.10.5
nadyah samudrā girayah
savanaspati-vīrudhah
phalanty osadhayah sarvāh
kāmam anvrtu tasya vai
SYNONYMS
nadyah — rivers; samudrāh — oceans; girayah — hills and mountains; savanaspati — vegetables; vīrudhah — creepers; phalanti — active; osadhayah — drugs; sarvāh— all; kāmam — necessities; anvrtu — seasonal; tasya — for the King; vai— certainly.
TRANSLATION
The rivers, oceans, hills, mountains, forests, creepers and active drugs, in every season, paid their tax quota to the King in profusion.
PURPORT
Since Maharaja Yudhisthira was under the protection of the ajita, the infallible Lord, as above mentioned, the properties of the Lord, namely the rivers, oceans, hills, forests, etc., were all pleased, and they used to supply their respective quota of taxes to the King. The secret to success is to take refuge under the protection of the Supreme Lord. Without His sanction, nothing can be possible. To make economic development by our own endeavors on the strength of tools and machinery is not all. The sanction of the Supreme Lord must be there, otherwise despite all instrumental arrangements everything will be unsuccessful. The ultimate cause of success is the daiva, the Supreme. Kings like Mahārāja Yudhisthira knew perfectly well that the king is the agent of the Supreme Lord to look after the welfare of the mass of people. Actually the state belongs to the Supreme Lord. The rivers, oceans, forests, hills, drugs, etc., are not creations of man. They are all creations of the Supreme Lord, and the living being is allowed to make use of the property of the Lord for the service of the Lord. Today’s slogan is that everything is for the people, and therefore the government is for the people and by the people. But to produce a new species of humanity at the present moment on the basis of God consciousness and perfection of human life, the ideology of godly communism, the world has to again follow in the footsteps of kings like Mahārāja Yudhisthira or Parīksit. There is enough of everything by the will of the Lord, and we can make proper use of things to live comfortably without enmity between men, or animal and man or nature. The control of the Lord is everywhere, and if the Lord is pleased, every part of nature will be pleased. The river will flow profusely to fertilize the land; the oceans will supply sufficient quantities of minerals, pearls and jewels; the forest will supply sufficient wood, drugs and vegetables, and the seasonal changes will effectively help produce fruits and flowers in profuse quantity. The artificial way of living depending on factories and tools can render so-called happiness only to a limited number at the cost of millions. Since the energy of the mass of people is engaged in factory production, the natural products are being hampered, and for this the mass is unhappy. Without being educated properly, the mass of people are following in the footsteps of the vested interests by exploiting natural reserves, and therefore there is acute competition between individual and individual and nation and nation. There is no control by the trained agent of the Lord. We must look into the defects of modern civilization by comparison here, and should follow in the footsteps of Mahārāja Yudhisthira to cleanse man and wipe out anachronisms.
“The human being is the elder brother of all other living beings. He is endowed with intelligence more powerful than animals for realizing the course of nature and the indications of the Almighty Father. Human civilization should depend on the production of mother nature without artificially attempting economic development to turn the world into a chaos of greed and power only for the purpose of artificial luxuries and sense gratification.”
-Srila Prabhupada (excerpt from commentary on Srimad Bhagavatam 1.10.4)
