WHY PEOPLE DO NOT PLANT

AND RELATED ISSUES

IN PUERTO RICO,  one of the emerging political parties is preaching goodness of agriculture, mantra like, with  a nice mystical poster of a couple of hands with soil falling down, a classical.

Here is my stance, as usual, my way or the highway. Planting requires tools, a good back, thighs, legs, stamina, tolerance to heat and sun, water for irrigation, a botanical inventory (what the hell is going to be planted), solid notions of soil and eco-region, temperature and weather conditions.

If you plant on a table some of the above are not mandatory, however, stamina is. Notions about diseases caused by bacteria in soil or by insects will surely help.

Besides any philosophical, environmental, holistic, theoretical framework is developed--anyjuan can write/create one--particularly in this neck of the concrete/asphalt, by people not planting anything. Kindly keep this in focus, planting anything demands committment and discipline on your part, not the soil or the plants.

What and why are you planting the chosen ones?  Over here it seems that agriculture is just what is edible. Nojuan has ever proposed planting trees as they do in Costa Rica, sold as stock as in Wall St, to get dividends at the end of the year and when the trees become wood for this or that.

It seems that five out of every ten people in the urban context, has  a tree of this or that in  their backyards. Oranges, lemons, plaintains, bananas, breadfruit, you name it.  Why not start an inventory house by house to find out what is there to begin swapping this for that or selling! They do it in California, it is not rocket science.

Nurseries.  Every foolish nursery in Puerto Rico has the same crap: bromeliads, ferns, acaliphas, orchids, poinsettias to name a few. Why not start doing what I do?  Propagae natives, endemics as in vines, ground covers, vascular plants, not just trees as the biggest fool, Alberto Areces Mallea did/does in Parque Donha Ines as if in nature ONLY those trees them botanists esteem in danger of exinction are kidnpped and planted where they arbitrarily see fit, without a previous serious soil analysis, rain patterns, inventory of flora and fauna is considered.

Even better, if you really want to go finicky, do what I do, find out what birds and insects prefer for pollination purposes, propagate/ plant that,

again you need no doctorate to proceed.  This is trascendental  in any urban context, to preserve the little flora and fauna surviving precariously.  That is unless, you, like most narrow minded people think agriculture can take place ONLY in farms by the country side.

Another consideration is money, pragmatics.  If you are to plant plantains, for example,  to be sold, or any other produce also planted from contries

with fifty cents an hour salaries, how will you protect yours, with a cost of 3/4 dollars and hour?

Finally, people do not plant for the same reasons there are morbid obese, pregnant adolescents, stray dogs/cats, alcoholics and junkies.

There is no sense of responsibility.   Any excuse not to solve this or that problem is justified with flimsy arguments. It is somejuan else fault.

I got one response from one of those people in the political party mentioned. Technology is the pet symbol solution.  Keep in mind that chemicals are one of the reasons the globe/soil/flora/fauna are being destroyed by agrobusiness.  Any intelligent agriculture can not rely in old ways based in just profits.  Creativeness is pertinent. 

that is that