AJ Fairman's Page

Having Researched Food security issues in my state of California, the results are startling.



California is a major agricultural producer for the country, yet we are dealing with a tremendous amount of hunger within our own borders. A recent study by UCLA revealed that about 2.2 million adults with low income cannot always afford to put food on the table. If this is occuring in California, how much more dire must the situation be in other parts of the world?



Current policy… Continue

The year is 2020. I am sitting down to a meal of bok choy, cabbage, eggplant and rice. I am in rural China, with my organization of spiritual warrior monks. The water sources in the areas area all badly polluted, so we have had to purchase an advanced reverse osmosis system to clean our water. The system is the only one of its kind for miles, so many nearby villages send people to us to gather water. We are doing the best we can to provide for everyone while also charging a modest fee for the… Continue

Shadowing a hero doing big things: Eben Bayer and his company Ecovative.



As we are all becoming aware, landfill space is running out and this requires major changes in the way we do packaging as a society. Eben has created an innovative replacement to styrofoam, based on the biological properties of fungi. His product is an excellent packaging device with the same basic properties of stryofoam, yet it uses 90 percent less energy to create AND is biodegradable.



I checked… Continue

"Problems are not always obvious from afar."



As we look at our world, as we analyze the challenges faced by certain regions, its very important that we refrain from assuming cookie cutter solutions will actually work on the ground. That is why living among the people is a critical component of problem solving in unfamiliar areas.



Consider the example of an attempt to solve a food shortage by sending seeds and basic sustainence to a foreign nation. Seems like a clear… Continue