::Beton + Garten via ::Next Nature

Japan's Imperial Household is the institution that takes care of the Emperor and his responsibilities as head of state; they also run seven organic farms around Japan. Young Japanese organic farmers are blogging about the Imperial farms, and participating in organic conferences together with his royal highness' very down-to-earth, mud-under-your-fingernails farmers.

In a similar vein, it makes sense to mention Prince Charles' two decades of supporting the no-pesticide, no-GMO way of farming in the United Kingdom. So I was encouraged to learn about the White House Organic Farm Project: a good idea always sounds silly first, and then it suddenly becomes reality. Why should the president of the United States not be encouraging sustainable food production? Do have a look at TheWhoFarm website and blog, and why not sign their petition!

Good news for anyone restricted to the difficult-to-navigate waters of the gluten-free diet: there's an all-natural food company, Glutenfreeda Foods, who as you may have guessed from their name, specialize food right up your alley.

Image from NASA

updated: As many noted, I (idiotically) cited the Montreal Protocol's success here, which has nothing to do with reducing tropospheric ozone -- rather, it has to do with fixing the ozone layer. Thank you commenters, and my apologies for the gross mistake

Despite significant international progress made in reducing global ozone levels, they are still too high, exposing the environment and humans to their dangerous effects, and could worsen because of climate change, a new Royal Society report finds. Background concentrations of ozone have surged by 6 percent, or 2 parts per billion (ppb) in the atmosphere, per decade since the 1980s in several parts of the world, including many regions of the Northern Hemisphere.

According to the report, even background ozone levels, roughly 35 - 40 ppb, are now believed to have impacts on human health, environment and food crops (by reducing their yield and nutritional quality) in most developed nations. In some cases, when ozone levels reach a peak in these regions during hot, sunny weather conditions, they can exceed 100 ppb.

The type of water conditions these programs are attempting to address, photo: McKay Savage.

Last week a new water and sanitation program was announced at the Clinton Global Initiative that’s so large it got dubbed a 'mega-commitment'. One of the groups participating in the initiative is Global Water Challenge; and after one long day of plenary sessions, working groups and ‘round the coffee cart chatting I had a chance to sit down with GWC Executive Director Paul Faeth to ask him about some of the innovative entrepreneurial water projects being funded through the Changemakers competition, with which GWC has been involved. I asked him to pick three out of all the worthy projects in development to highlight for TreeHugger readers:

Photo Via Melinda Shelton

Coffee is grown in two main ways: in the sun or in the shade. But three University of Michigan researchers show that if we want to look forward to a nice hot cup of coffee a few years from now, shade-grown coffee is where its at.

The Bush administration found $700 billion to bail out the banks and $25 billion to bail out the automakers, but can't find $8 million to monitor the pesticide levels in our fruits, vegetables and field crops. It has cut the program that tests them.

According to the Chicago Tribune, "Data from the 18-year-old Agricultural Chemical Usage Program administered by the U.S. Department of Agriculture (USDA) were collected until this year, and the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) used the data to set safe levels of pesticides in food.

The information was also widely used by university and food-industry researchers, including a University of Illinois program to help farmers reduce the amount of pesticides they use."

Recent Comment by BabyDad : "I must say that this (approach) is very much the norm in the UK too...." [read]

Traditional Medicinal's tea facility; photo via Traditional Medicinal

In a very cool continuation of using the sun to create the world's most consumed beverage, Traditional Medicinals took a giant leap forward and has completed an installation that makes it the world's largest solar powered tea factory.

Traditional Medicinals has always tried to be green – and we don’t just mean in their tea selection. For quite awhile now, they’ve used wind credits to offset their electricity use. But they wanted to do something a little more direct. So, they undertook a massive solar power installation project.

The sun grows tea, then the sun is used to process it. Very cool. But just how much sun power is needed to run an operation like this?