Electronic literature

From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Electronic_literature 

 

Electronic literature or digital literature is a genre of literature encompassing works created exclusively on and for digital devices, such as computers, tablets, and mobile phones. A work of electronic literature can be defined as "a construction whose literary aesthetics emerge from computation", "work that could only exist in the space for which it was developed/written/coded—the digital space". This means that these writings cannot be easily printed, or cannot be printed at all, because elements crucial to the text are unable to be carried over onto a printed version. The digital literature world continues to innovate print's conventions all the while challenging the boundaries between digitized literature and electronic literature. Some novels are exclusive to tablets and smartphones for the simple fact that they require a touchscreen. Digital literature tends to require a user to traverse through the literature through the digital setting, making the use of the medium part of the literary exchange. Espen J. Aarseth wrote in his book Cybertext: Perspectives on Ergodic Literature that "it is possible to explore, get lost, and discover secret paths in these texts, not metaphorically, but through the topological structures of the textual machinery".

Definitions

It is difficult to accurately define electronic literature. The phrase itself consists of two words, each with their own specific meanings. Arthur Krystal in What Is Literature explains that "lit(t)eratura referred to any writing formed with letters". However, Krystal goes on to explore what literature has transformed into: "a record of one human being's sojourn on earth, proffered in verse or prose that artfully weaves together knowledge of the past with a heightened awareness of the present in ever new verbal configurations". Electronic denotes anything "of, relating to, or being a medium...by which information is transmitted electronically". Thus electronic literature can be considered a branch from the main tree of literature. Katherine Hayles discusses the topic in the online article Electronic Literature: What Is It. She argues "electronic literature, generally considered to exclude print literature that has been digitized, is by contrast 'digital born', and (usually) meant to be read on a computer". A definition offered by the Electronic Literature Organization (ELO) states electronic literature "refers to works with an important literary aspect that takes advantage of the capabilities and contexts provided by the stand-alone or networked computer".

On its official website, the ELO offers this additional definition of electronic literature as consisting of works which are:

• E-books, hypertext and poetry, on and off of the Web
• Animated poetry presented in graphical forms, for example Flash and other platforms
• Computer art installations, which ask viewers to read them or otherwise have literary aspects
• Conversational characters, also known as chatterbots
• Interactive
• Novels that take the form of emails, SMS messages, or blogs
• Poems and stories that are generated by computers, either interactively or based on parameters given at the beginning
• Collaborative writing projects that allow readers to contribute to the text of a work
• Literary performances online that develop new ways of writing

While the ELO definition incorporates many aspects that are applied in digital literature, the definition lacks any solid guidelines and also fails to recognize literature created on social media platforms including Twitterature. With the apparent vagueness, many debate on what truly qualifies as a piece of e-literature. A large number of works fall through the cracks of the imprecise characteristics that generally make up electronic literature.

History

A gradual transition into the digital world began with new advancements in technology to makes things more efficient and accessible. This is comparable to the release of the printing press in the 15th century, as people did not consider it a major contributor to literature at first. In the 1960s and 1970s, the creation of the personal computer allowed people to begin expanding literature into the electronic realm.

Predecessors

In 1877, spoken word recordings began with the invention of the phonograph. In the 1930s, the first "talking book" recordings were made to hold short stories and book chapters. The 1970s were when the term "audiobook" became part of the vernacular as cassette tapes entered the public. 1971 was the year officially accepted as the year of the first e-book. Although there were several contenders to the invention of an "electronic book" prior to this, Michael Hart, the founder of the Gutenberg Project, has been accepted as the official inventor of the e-book after creating a digital copy of the Declaration of Independence.

Early history

In 1975–76, Will Crowther programmed a text game named Colossal Cave Adventure (also known as Adventure). Considered one of the earlier computer adventure games, it possessed a story that had the reader make choices on which way to go. These choices could lead the reader to the end, or to his or her untimely death. This non-linear format was later mimicked by the text adventure game, Zork, created by a group of MIT students in 1977–79. These two games are considered to be the first examples of interactive fiction as well as some of the earliest video games. The earliest pieces of electronic literature as presently defined were created using Storyspace, software developed by Jay David Bolter and Michael Joyce in the 1980s. They sold the software in 1990 to Eastgate Systems, a small software company that has maintained and updated the code in Storyspace up to the present. Storyspace and other similar programs use hypertext to create links within text. Literature using hypertext is frequently referred to as hypertext fiction. Originally, these stories were often disseminated on discs and later on CD. Hypertext fiction is still being created today using not only Storyspace, but other programs such as Twine.

Modern

While hypertext fiction is still being made and interactive fiction created with text stories and images, there is a discussion over the term, "literature" being used to describe video games. Though Adventure and Zork are considered video games, advancements in technology have evolved video gaming mediums from text to action and back to text. More often than not, video games are told as interactive literature where the player makes choices and alters the outcome of the story. The video game Mass Effect's story is entirely based around these choices, and Mass Effect 3 is an even better example, changing character interactions with the player character and how the game ends is based on the player's actions.

In other instances the games are a story and the player exists to move the plot along. Journey, a game by Thatgamecompany released in 2012 for the PlayStation 3, is more story than game. The titular "journey" is the trek the player takes from start to finish as a character with limited mobility and world interaction. While the player can play with one other player at a time on the network, they cannot communicate through traditional means. With no actual words, this game takes the player through a world from prologue to epilogue.

In Espen Aarseth's Cybertext: Perspectives on Ergodic Literature, he defines "ergodic literature" as literature where "nontrivial effort is required to allow the reader to traverse the text". An example from Aarseth states, "Since writing always has been a spatial activity, it is reasonable to assume that ergodic textuality has been practiced as long as linear writing. For instance, the wall inscriptions of the temples in ancient Egypt were often connected two-dimensionally (on one wall) or three-dimensionally (from wall to wall and from room to room), and this layout allowed a nonlinear arrangement of the religious text in accordance with the symbolic architectural layout of the temple." Using these examples hypertext fiction and interactive fiction can be considered ergodic literature, and under the umbrella of interactive fiction, so can video games. Electronic literature continues to evolve.

Preservation and archiving

Electronic literature, according to Hayles, becomes unplayable after a decade or less due to the "fluid nature of media". Therefore, electronic literature risks losing the opportunity to build the "traditions associated with print literature". On the other hand, classics such as Michael Joyce's afternoon, a story (1987) are still read and have been republished on CD, while simple HTML hypertext fictions from the 1990s are still accessible online and can be read in modern browsers.

Several organizations are dedicated to preserving works of electronic literature. The UK-based Digital Preservation Coalition aims to preserve digital resources in general, while the Electronic Literature Organization's PAD (Preservation / Archiving / Dissemination) initiative gave recommendations on how to think ahead when writing and publishing electronic literature, as well as how to migrate works running on defunct platforms to current technologies.

The Electronic Literature Collection is a series of anthologies of electronic literature published by the Electronic Literature Organization, both on CD/DVD and online, and this is another strategy in working to make sure that electronic literature is available for future generations.

The Maryland Institute for Technologies in the Humanities and the Electronic Literature Lab at Washington State University - Vancouver also work towards the documentation and preservation of electronic literature and hypermedia.

Notable people and works

Noteworthy authors, critics, and works associated with electronic literature include: 

Robert Coover, a professor of creative writing at Brown University, helped bring Talan Memmott to the university as its first graduate fellow of electronic writing.

Pry, a novella, a collaboration between Danny Cannizzaro and Samantha Gorman (also known as Tender Claws). It is an electronic literature application for phones and tablets. By utilizing the touch-based gestures used on tablets, Pry proves to be a very dynamic approach to the emerging e-lit genre. The use of these gestures allow the reader to dig beneath the story at the surface of Pry. 

Game, game, game and again game (2008), Nothing you have done deserves such praise (2013), I made this. you play this. we are enemies (2009), and Scrape Scraperteeth (2011) are important examples of the intersection of games and poetry. They are created by digital poet and net-artist Jason Nelson whose career has been devoting to exploring interface, interactivity, and surrealism within electronic literature.

Hypertext

From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hypertext 

Engineer Vannevar Bush wrote "As We May Think" in 1945 in which he described the Memex, a theoretical proto-hypertext device which in turn helped inspire the subsequent invention of hypertext.

 

Douglas Engelbart in 2009, at the 40th anniversary celebrations of "The Mother of All Demos" in San Francisco, a 90-minute 1968 presentation of the NLS computer system which was a combination of hardware and software that demonstrated many hypertext ideas.

 

Hypertext is text displayed on a computer display or other electronic devices with references (hyperlinks) to other text that the reader can immediately access. Hypertext documents are interconnected by hyperlinks, which are typically activated by a mouse click, keypress set or by touching the screen. Apart from text, the term "hypertext" is also sometimes used to describe tables, images, and other presentational content formats with integrated hyperlinks. Hypertext is one of the key underlying concepts of the World Wide Web, where Web pages are often written in the Hypertext Markup Language (HTML). As implemented on the Web, hypertext enables the easy-to-use publication of information over the Internet.

Etymology

"(...)'Hypertext' is a recent coinage. 'Hyper-' is used in the mathematical sense of extension and generality (as in 'hyperspace,' 'hypercube') rather than the medical sense of 'excessive' ('hyperactivity'). There is no implication about size— a hypertext could contain only 500 words or so. 'Hyper-' refers to structure and not size."

— Theodor H. Nelson, Brief Words on the Hypertext, 23 January 1967

The English prefix "hyper-" comes from the Greek prefix "ὑπερ-" and means "over" or "beyond"; it has a common origin with the prefix "super-" which comes from Latin. It signifies the overcoming of the previous linear constraints of written text.

The term "hypertext" is often used where the term "hypermedia" might seem appropriate. In 1992, author Ted Nelson – who coined both terms in 1963 – wrote:

By now the word "hypertext" has become generally accepted for branching and responding text, but the corresponding word "hypermedia", meaning complexes of branching and responding graphics, movies and sound – as well as text – is much less used. Instead they use the strange term "interactive multimedia": this is four syllables longer, and does not express the idea of extending hypertext.

— Nelson, Literary Machines, 1992

Types and uses of hypertext

Hypertext documents can either be static (prepared and stored in advance) or dynamic (continually changing in response to user input, such as dynamic web pages). Static hypertext can be used to cross-reference collections of data in documents, software applications, or books on CDs. A well-constructed system can also incorporate other user-interface conventions, such as menus and command lines. Links used in a hypertext document usually replace the current piece of hypertext with the destination document. A lesser known feature is StretchText, which expands or contracts the content in place, thereby giving more control to the reader in determining the level of detail of the displayed document. Some implementations support transclusion, where text or other content is included by reference and automatically rendered in place.

Hypertext can be used to support very complex and dynamic systems of linking and cross-referencing. The most famous implementation of hypertext is the World Wide Web, written in the final months of 1990 and released on the Internet in 1991.

History

In 1941, Jorge Luis Borges published "The Garden of Forking Paths", a short story that is often considered an inspiration for the concept of hypertext.

In 1945, Vannevar Bush wrote an article in The Atlantic Monthly called "As We May Think", about a futuristic proto-hypertext device he called a Memex. A Memex would hypothetically store - and record - content on reels of microfilm, using electric photocells to read coded symbols recorded next to individual microfilm frames while the reels spun at high speed, stopping on command. The coded symbols would enable the Memex to index, search, and link content to create and follow associative trails. Because the Memex was never implemented and could only link content in a relatively crude fashion — by creating chains of entire microfilm frames — the Memex is now regarded not only as a proto-hypertext device, but it is fundamental to the history of hypertext because it directly inspired the invention of hypertext by Ted Nelson and Douglas Engelbart. 

Ted Nelson gives a presentation on Project Xanadu, a theoretical hypertext model conceived in the 1960s whose first and incomplete implementation was first published in 1998.

 

In 1963, Ted Nelson coined the terms 'hypertext' and 'hypermedia' as part of a model he developed for creating and using linked content (first published reference 1965). He later worked with Andries van Dam to develop the Hypertext Editing System (text editing) in 1967 at Brown University. It was implemented using the terminal IBM 2250 with a light pen which was provided as a pointing device. By 1976, its successor FRESS was used in a poetry class in which students could browse a hyperlinked set of poems and discussion by experts, faculty and other students, in what was arguably the world’s first online scholarly community which van Dam says "foreshadowed wikis, blogs and communal documents of all kinds". Ted Nelson said in the 1960s that he began implementation of a hypertext system he theorized, which was named Project Xanadu, but his first and incomplete public release was finished much later, in 1998.

Douglas Engelbart independently began working on his NLS system in 1962 at Stanford Research Institute, although delays in obtaining funding, personnel, and equipment meant that its key features were not completed until 1968. In December of that year, Engelbart demonstrated a 'hypertext' (meaning editing) interface to the public for the first time, in what has come to be known as "The Mother of All Demos". 

ZOG_(hypertext), an early hypertext system, was developed at Carnegie Mellon University during the 1970s, used for documents on Nimitz class aircraft carriers, and later evolving as KMS_(hypertext) (Knowledge Management System). 

The first hypermedia application is generally considered to be the Aspen Movie Map, implemented in 1978. The Movie Map allowed users to arbitrarily choose which way they wished to drive in a virtual cityscape, in two seasons (from actual photographs) as well as 3-D polygons. 

In 1980, Tim Berners-Lee created ENQUIRE, an early hypertext database system somewhat like a wiki but without hypertext punctuation, which was not invented until 1987. The early 1980s also saw a number of experimental "hyperediting" functions in word processors and hypermedia programs, many of whose features and terminology were later analogous to the World Wide Web. Guide, the first significant hypertext system for personal computers, was developed by Peter J. Brown at UKC in 1982. 

In 1980 Roberto Busa, an Italian Jesuit priest and one of the pioneers in the usage of computers for linguistic and literary analysis, published the Index Thomisticus, as a tool for performing text searches within the massive corpus of Aquinas's works. Sponsored by the founder of IBM, Thomas J. Watson, the project lasted about 30 years (1949-1980), and eventually produced the 56 printed volumes of the Index Thomisticus the first important hypertext work about Saint Thomas Aquinas books and of a few related authors.

In 1983, Ben Shneiderman at the University of Maryland Human - Computer Interaction Lab led a group that developed the HyperTies system that was commercialized by Cognetics Corporation. Hyperties was used to create the July 1988 issue of the Communications of the ACM as a hypertext document and then the first commercial electronic book Hypertext Hands-On! 

In August 1987, Apple Computer released HyperCard for the Macintosh line at the MacWorld convention. Its impact, combined with interest in Peter J. Brown's GUIDE (marketed by OWL and released earlier that year) and Brown University's Intermedia, led to broad interest in and enthusiasm for hypertext, hypermedia, databases, and new media in general. The first ACM Hypertext (hyperediting and databases) academic conference took place in November 1987, in Chapel Hill NC, where many other applications, including the branched literature writing software Storyspace, were also demonstrated.

Meanwhile, Nelson (who had been working on and advocating his Xanadu system for over two decades) convinced Autodesk to invest in his revolutionary ideas. The project continued at Autodesk for four years, but no product was released.

In 1989, Tim Berners-Lee, then a scientist at CERN, proposed and later prototyped a new hypertext project in response to a request for a simple, immediate, information-sharing facility, to be used among physicists working at CERN and other academic institutions. He called the project "WorldWideWeb".

HyperText is a way to link and access information of various kinds as a web of nodes in which the user can browse at will. Potentially, HyperText provides a single user-interface to many large classes of stored information, such as reports, notes, data-bases, computer documentation and on-line systems help. We propose the implementation of a simple scheme to incorporate several different servers of machine-stored information already available at CERN, including an analysis of the requirements for information access needs by experiments... A program which provides access to the hypertext world we call a browser. ― T. Berners-Lee, R. Cailliau, 12 November 1990, CERN

In 1992, Lynx was born as an early Internet web browser. Its ability to provide hypertext links within documents that could reach into documents anywhere on the Internet began the creation of the Web on the Internet.

As new web browsers were released, traffic on the World Wide Web quickly exploded from only 500 known web servers in 1993 to over 10,000 in 1994. As a result, all previous hypertext systems were overshadowed by the success of the Web, even though it lacked many features of those earlier systems, such as integrated browsers/editors (a feature of the original WorldWideWeb browser, which was not carried over into most of the other early Web browsers).

Implementations

Besides the already mentioned Project Xanadu, Hypertext Editing System, NLS, HyperCard, and World Wide Web, there are other noteworthy early implementations of hypertext, with different feature sets: 

Hypertext Editing System (HES) IBM 2250 Display console – Brown University 1969

• FRESS – a 1970s multi-user successor to the Hypertext Editing System.
• ZOG – a 1970s hypertext system developed at Carnegie Mellon University.
• Electronic Document System – an early 1980s text and graphic editor for interactive hypertexts such as equipment repair manuals and computer-aided instruction.
• Information Presentation Facility – used to display online help in IBM operating systems.
• Intermedia – a mid-1980s program for group web-authoring and information sharing.
• HyperTies - a mid-1980s program commercially applied to hundreds of projects, including July 1988 Communications of the ACM and Hypertext Hands-On! book.
• Texinfo – the GNU help system.
• KMS – a 1980s successor to ZOG developed as a commercial product.
• Storyspace – a mid-1980s program for hypertext narrative.
• Adobe's Portable Document Format – a widely used publication format for electronic documents.
• Amigaguide – released on the Commodore Amiga Workbench 1990.
• Windows Help – released with Windows 3.0 in 1990.
• Wikis – aim to compensate for the lack of integrated editors in most Web browsers. Various wiki software have slightly different conventions for formatting, usually simpler than HTML.
• PaperKiller – a document editor specifically designed for hypertext. Started in 1996 as IPer (educational project for ED-Media 1997).
• XML with the XLink extension – a newer hypertext markup language that extends and expands capabilities introduced by HTML.

Academic conferences

Among the top academic conferences for new research in hypertext is the annual ACM Conference on Hypertext and Hypermedia. Although not exclusively about hypertext, the World Wide Web series of conferences, organized by IW3C2, include many papers of interest. There is a list on the Web with links to all conferences in the series.

Hypertext fiction

Hypertext writing has developed its own style of fiction, coinciding with the growth and proliferation of hypertext development software and the emergence of electronic networks. Two software programs specifically designed for literary hypertext, Storyspace and Intermedia became available in the 1990s.

On the other hand, concerning the Italian production, the hypertext s000t000d by Filippo Rosso (2002), was intended to lead the reader (with the help of a three-dimensional map) in a web page interface, and was written in HTML and PHP.

An advantage of writing a narrative using hypertext technology is that the meaning of the story can be conveyed through a sense of spatiality and perspective that is arguably unique to digitally networked environments. An author's creative use of nodes, the self-contained units of meaning in a hypertextual narrative, can play with the reader's orientation and add meaning to the text. 

One of the most successful computer games, Myst, was first written in Hypercard. The game was constructed as a series of Ages, each Age consisting of a separate Hypercard stack. The full stack of the game consists of over 2500 cards. In some ways Myst redefined interactive fiction, using puzzles and exploration as a replacement for hypertextual narrative.

Critics of hypertext claim that it inhibits the old, linear, reader experience by creating several different tracks to read on, and that this in turn contributes to a postmodernist fragmentation of worlds. In some cases, hypertext may be detrimental to the development of appealing stories (in the case of hypertext Gamebooks), where ease of linking fragments may lead to non-cohesive or incomprehensible narratives. However, they do see value in its ability to present several different views on the same subject in a simple way. This echoes the arguments of 'medium theorists' like Marshall McLuhan who look at the social and psychological impacts of the media. New media can become so dominant in public culture that they effectively create a "paradigm shift" as people have shifted their perceptions, understanding of the world, and ways of interacting with the world and each other in relation to new technologies and media. So hypertext signifies a change from linear, structured and hierarchical forms of representing and understanding the world into fractured, decentralized and changeable media based on the technological concept of hypertext links.

In the 1990s, women and feminist artists took advantage of hypertext and produced dozens of works. Linda Dement’s Cyberflesh Girlmonster a hypertext CD-ROM that incorporates images of women’s body parts and remixes them to create new monstrous yet beautiful shapes. Dr. Caitlin Fisher’s award-winning online hypertext novella “‘These Waves of Girls“ is set in three time periods of the protagonist exploring polymorphous perversity enacted in her queer identity through memory. The story is written as a reflection diary of the interconnected memories of childhood, adolescence, and adulthood. It consists of an associated multi-modal collection of nodes includes linked text, still and moving images, manipulable images, animations, and sound clips.

Forms of hypertext

There are various forms of hypertext, each of which are structured differently. Below are four of the existing forms of hypertext:

• Axial hypertexts are the most simple in structure. They are situated along an axis in a linear style. These hypertexts have a straight path from beginning to end and are fairly easy for the reader to follow. An example of an axial hypertext is The Virtual Disappearance of Miriam.
• Arborescent hypertexts are more complex than the axial form. They have a branching structure which resembles a tree. These hypertexts have one beginning but many possible endings. The ending that the reader finishes on depends on their decisions whilst reading the text. This is much like gamebook novels that allow readers to choose their own ending.
• Networked hypertexts are more complex still than the two previous forms of hypertext. They consist of an interconnected system of nodes with no dominant axis of orientation. Unlike the arborescent form, networked hypertexts do not have any designated beginning or any designated endings. An example of a networked hypertext is Shelley Jackson's Patchwork Girl.
• Layered hypertext consist of two layers of linked pages. Each layer is doubly linked sequentially and a page in the top layer is doubly linked with a corresponding page in the bottom layer. The top layer contains plain text, the bottom multimedia layer provides photos, sounds and video. In the Dutch historical novel De man met de hoed designed as layered hypertext in 2006 by Eisjen Schaaf, Pauline van de Ven, and Paul Vitányi, the structure is proposed to enhance the atmosphere of the time, to enrich the text with research and family archive material and to enable readers to insert memories of their own while preserving tension and storyline.

IFOAM - Organics International

From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/IFOAM_-_Organics_International 

 

International Federation of Organic Agriculture Movements (IFOAM) - Organics International

Formation	1972
Type	NGO
Headquarters	Bonn, Germany
Region served	Global
Membership	710 members
Official language	English
Main organ	General Assembly
Website	www.ifoam.bio

The International Federation of Organic Agriculture Movements (IFOAM - Organics International) is the worldwide umbrella organization for the organic agriculture movement, which represents close to 800 affiliates in 117 countries.

It declares its mission is to, "Lead, unite and assist the organic movement in its full diversity." and vision is the "worldwide adoption of ecologically, socially and economically sound systems, based on the Principles of Organic Agriculture".

Among its wide range of activities, the federation maintains an organic farming standard, and an organic accreditation and certification service.

History

Rașit Pertev, Secretary of the International Fund for Agricultural Development, was a keynote speaker at the 2014 Organic World Congress in Istanbul, Turkey.

 

IFOAM - Organics International began in Versailles, France, on November 5, 1972, during an international congress on organic agriculture organized by the French farmer organization Nature et Progrès. The late Roland Chevriot, President of Nature et Progrès, took the initiative. There were 5 founding members representing different organizations: Lady Eve Balfour representing the Soil Association of Great Britain, Kjell Arman representing the Swedish Biodynamic Association, Pauline Raphaely representing the Soil Association of South Africa, Jerome Goldstein representing Rodale Press of the United States, and Roland Chevriot representing Nature et Progrès of France.

The aim of the new organization was reflected in the name: International Federation of Organic Agriculture Movements. The founders hoped that the federation would meet what they saw as a major need: a unified, organized voice for organic food, and the diffusion and exchange of information on the principles and practices of organic agriculture across national and linguistic boundaries. In 2015 the name of changed to IFOAM - Organics International.

Structure

Linda Bullard, former President of IFOAM - Organics International), Dr. Vandana Shiva, winner of the Right Livelihood Award, and Magda Aelvoet, Belgian Minister of State and former Health and Environment Minister, celebrate the landmark decision of the European Patent Office to uphold a decision to revoke in its entirety a patent on a fungicidal product derived from seeds of the Neem, a tree indigenous to the Indian subcontinent.

 

The General Assembly of IFOAM - Organics International serves as the foundation of the organization. It elects the World Board of IFOAM - Organics International for a three-year term. The World Board is a diverse group of individuals working voluntarily to lead IFOAM - Organics International. The current World Board was elected at the General Assembly of IFOAM in Istanbul which took place in October 2014. The World Board appoints members to official committees, working groups and task forces based upon the recommendation of the membership of IFOAM - Organics International. Member organizations also establish regional groups and sector specific interest groups.

International standing

IFOAM - Organics International actively participates in international agricultural and environmental negotiations with the United Nations and multilateral institutions to further the interests of the organic agricultural movement worldwide, and has observer status or is otherwise accredited by the following international institutions:

• ECOSOC Status with the United Nations General Assembly
• The Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations (FAO)
• United Nations Conference on Trade and Development (UNCTAD)
• Codex Alimentarius Commission (FAO and World Health Organization)
• United Nations Environment Program (UNEP)
• The Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD)
• International Labour Organization of the United Nations (ILO)
• International Organization for Standardization (ISO)

According to the One World Trust's Global Accountability Report 2008 which assessed a range of organisations in areas such as transparency, stakeholder participation and evaluation capacity, "IFOAM is the highest scoring international NGO, and at the top of the 30 organisations this year with a score of 71 percent".

Members

Member Organizations of IFOAM - Organics International on Wikipedia[show]

Activities

IFOAM - Organics International and Standards and Certification

The Organic Guarantee System (OGS) of IFOAM - Organics International is designed to a) facilitate the development of organic standards and third-party certification worldwide and to b) provide an international guarantee of these standards and organic certification.

In recent years the OGS approach of IFOAM - Organics International underwent some significant changes. With the establishment and spreading of organic standards and certification around the world a number of new challenges appeared. Especially smallholder farmers in developing countries struggle with a) the multitude of standards they are expected to farm conform with and b) with high certification costs and considerable administrative expenditures.

IFOAM - Organics International had a breakthrough in the development and adoption of approaches to address these certification problems. The organization now directs special focus on the promotion of two new concepts:

IFOAM Family of Standards

In the framework of a multi-year collaboration IFOAM - Organics International developed together with his UN partners: the Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO) and the United Nations Conference on Trade and Development (UNCTAD), a set of standard requirements that functions as an international reference to assess the quality and equivalency of organic standards and regulations. It is known as the COROS (Common Objectives and Requirements of Organic Standards) The vision is that the Family of Standards will contain all organic standards and regulations equivalent to the COROS. Instead of assessing each standard against each other the Family of Standards can be used as a tool to simplify equivalence assessment procedures while ensuring a high level of integrity and transparency. The Family of Standard Program started in January 2011. One year later about 50 standards worldwide are approved.

Participatory Guarantee Systems PGS

Participatory Guarantee Systems are locally focused quality assurance systems. They certify producers based on active participation of stakeholders and are built on a foundation of trust, social networks and knowledge exchange” (Definition of IFOAM - Organics International, 2008). 

Participatory Guarantee Systems represent an alternative to third party certification, especially adapted to local markets and short supply chains. They can also complement third party certification with a private label that brings additional guarantees and transparency. PGS enable the direct participation of producers, consumers and other stakeholders in:

• the choice and definition of the standards
• the development and implementation of certification procedures
• the certification decisions

For many organic farmers, particularly in developing countries and emerging organic markets, third party certification is often difficult to access. PGS provides an alternative option that takes some burden from the farmers and is crucially linked to local products and local markets.

Accreditation and IOAS

IFOAM - Organics International also offers organic accreditation to certification bodies. Certifiers can have their processes audited against the IFOAM Accreditation Requirements. IOAS, an IFOAM - Organics International daughter company set up in 1997, offers the IFOAM Accreditation (analyses of standards and verification process) or the Global Organic System Accreditation (analyses of verification process only) and grants special recognition of credibility. The document ISO/IEC 17011: ‘Conformity assessment – General requirements for accreditation bodies accrediting conformity assessment bodies’ lays down internationally agreed rules for how accreditation should be performed. Various national bodies verify this accreditation including the US Department of Commerce National Institute of Standards & Technology.

IFOAM - Organics International and GMOs

On October 19, 1998, participants at the 12th Scientific Conference of IFOAM - Organics International issued the Mar del Plata Declaration, where more than 600 delegates from over 60 countries voted unanimously to exclude the use of genetically modified organisms (GMOs) in food production and agriculture. From that point GMOs have been categorically excluded from organic farming.

Text of the declaration:

We, the undersigned participants at the 12th Scientific Conference of the International Federation of Organic Agriculture Movements (IFOAM) at Mar del Plata, Argentina, call on governments and regulatory agencies throughout the world to immediately ban the use of genetic engineering in agriculture and food production since it involves:

• Unacceptable threats to human health
• Negative and irreversible environmental impacts
• Release of organisms of an un-recallable nature
• Removal of the right of choice, both for farmers and consumers
• Violation of farmers' fundamental property rights and endangerment of their economic independence
• Practices, which are incompatible with the principles of sustainable agriculture as defined by IFOAM

Signed by: Dr. Vandana Shiva (India), Hervé La Prairie (Outgoing IFOAM - Organics International president, France), Linda Bullard (Incoming IFOAM - Organics International president, USA/Belgium), Gunnar Rundgren (Incoming IFOAM - Organics International vice-president, Sweden), Gerald Hermann (IFOAM - Organics International Treasurer, Germany), Pipo Lernoud (Conference Coordinator, Argentina), Guillermo Schnitman (MAPO President, Argentina)

IFOAM - Organics International and training

Organic agriculture can contribute to meaningful socio-economic and ecologically sustainable development, especially in poorer countries. On one hand, this is due to the application of organic principles, which means efficient management of local resources (e.g., local seed varieties, manure, etc.) and therefore cost-effectiveness. On the other hand, the market for organic products – at local and international level – has tremendous growth prospects and offers creative producers and exporters in the South excellent opportunities to improve their income and living conditions. IFOAM - Organics International is therefore active to give special support to the development of the Organic Agriculture Sector in Developing Countries through several means. Organic Agriculture is a very knowledge intensive production system. Therefore, capacity building efforts play a central role in this regard. There are many efforts all around the world regarding the development of training material and the organization of training courses related to Organic Agriculture. Existing knowledge is still scattered and not easy accessible. Especially in Developing Countries this situation remains an important constraint for the growth of the organic sector.

Carbon farming

From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Carbon_farming 

 

Carbon farming is a name for a variety of agricultural methods aimed at sequestering atmospheric carbon into the soil and in crop roots, wood and leaves. Increasing soil's carbon content can aid plant growth, increase soil organic matter (improving agricultural yield), improve soil water retention capacity and reduce fertilizer use (and the accompanying emissions of greenhouse gas nitrous oxide (N
₂O). As of 2016, variants of carbon farming reached hundreds of millions of hectares globally, of the nearly 5 billion hectares (1.2×10¹⁰ acres) of world farmland. Soils can contain up to five per cent carbon by weight, including decomposing plant and animal matter and biochar.

Potential sequestration alternatives to carbon farming include scrubbing CO2 from the air with machines (direct air capture); fertilizing the oceans to prompt algal blooms that after death carry carbon to the sea bottom;storing the carbon dioxide emitted by electricity generation; and crushing and spreading types of rock such as basalt that absorb atmospheric carbon. Land management techniques that can be combined with farming include planting/restoring forests, burying biochar produced by anaerobically converted biomass and restoring wetlands. (Coal beds are the remains of marshes and peatlands.)

History

In 2011 Australia started a cap-and-trade program. Farmers who sequester carbon can sell carbon credits to companies in need of carbon offsets. The country's Direct Action Plan states "The single largest opportunity for CO
₂ emissions reduction in Australia is through bio-sequestration in general, and in particular, the replenishment of our soil carbons." In studies of test plots over 20 years showed increased microbial activity when farmers incorporated organic matter or reduced tillage. Soil carbon levels from 1990–2006 declined by 30% on average under continuous cropping. Incorporating organic matter alone was not enough to build soil carbon. Nitrogen, phosphorus and sulphur had to be added as well to do so. By 2014 more than 75% of Canadian Prairies' cropland had adopted "conservation tillage" and more than 50% had adopted no till. Twenty-five countries pledged to adopt the practice at the December 2015 Paris climate talks. In California multiple Resource Conservation Districts (RCDs) support local partnerships to develop and implement carbon farming, In 2015 the agency that administers California's carbon-credit exchange began granting credits to farmers who compost grazing lands. In 2016 Chevrolet partnered with the US Department of Agriculture (USDA) to purchase 40,000 carbon credits from ranchers on 11,000 no-till acres. The transaction equates to removing 5,000 cars from the road and was the largest to date in the US. In 2017 multiple US states passed legislation in support of carbon farming and soil health.

• California appropriated $7.5 million as part of its Healthy Soils Program. The objective is to demonstrate that "specific management practices sequester carbon, improve soil health and reduce atmospheric greenhouse gases." The program includes mulching, cover crops, composting, hedgerows and buffer strips. Nearly half of California counties have farmers who are working on carbon-farming.
• Maryland's Healthy Soils Program supports research, education and technical assistance.
• Massachusetts funds education and training to support agriculture that regenerates soil health.
• Hawaii created the Carbon Farming Task Force to develop incentives to increase soil carbon content. A 250-acre demonstration project attempted to produce biofuels from the pongamia tree. Pongamia adds nitrogen to the soil. Similarly, one ranch husbands 2,000 head of cattle on 4,000 acres, using rotational grazing to build soil, store carbon, restore hydrologic function and reduce runoff.

Other states are considering similar programs.

Four per 1,000

The largest international effort to promote carbon farming is “four per 1,000”, led by France. Its goal is to increase soil carbon by 0.4 percent per year through agricultural and forestry changes.

Techniques

Soil carbon

Traditionally, soil carbon was thought to accumulate when decaying organic matter was physically mixed with soil. More recently, the role of living plants has been emphasized. Small roots die and decay while the plant is alive, depositing carbon below the surface. Further, as plants grow, their roots inject carbon into the soil, feeding mycorrhiza. An estimated 12,000 miles of their hyphae live in every square meter of healthy soil.

Bamboo

Although a bamboo forest stores less total carbon than a mature forest of trees, a bamboo plantation sequesters carbon at a much faster rate than a mature forest or a tree plantation. Therefore the farming of bamboo timber may have significant carbon sequestration potential.

Seaweed farming

Large-scale seaweed farming (called "ocean afforestation") could sequester huge amounts of carbon. Afforesting just 9% of the ocean could sequester 53 billion tons of carbon dioxide annually. The IPCC Special Report on the Ocean and Cryosphere in a Changing Climate recommends "further research attention" as a mitigation tactic.

Wetland restoration

An example of a healthy wetland ecosystem.

 

Wetlands are created when water overflows into heavily vegetated soil causing plants to adapt to a flooded ecosystem. Wetlands can occur in three different regions. Marine wetlands are found in shallow coastal areas, tidal wetlands are also coastal but are found farther inland, and non-tidal wetlands are found inland and have no affects from tides. Wetland soil is an important carbon sink; 14.5% of the world's soil carbon is found in wetlands, while only 5.5% of the world's land is composed of wetlands. Not only are wetlands a great carbon sink, they have many other benefits like collecting floodwater, filtering air and water pollutants, and creating a home for numerous birds, fish, insects, and plants.

Climate change could alter soil carbon storage changing it from a sink to a source. With rising temperatures comes an increase in greenhouse gasses from wetlands especially locations with permafrost. When this permafrost melts in increases the available oxygen and water in the soil. Because of this, bacteria in the soil would create large amounts of carbon dioxide and methane to be released into the atmosphere.

Peatlands hold approximately 30 percent of the carbon in our ecosystem. When wetlands are drained for agriculture and urbanization, because peatlands are so vast, large quantities of carbon decompose and emit CO2 into the atmosphere. The loss of one peatland could potentially produce more carbon than 175–500 years of methane emissions.

While the link between climate change and wetlands is still not fully known, it will be soon determined through future removal of wetlands. It is also not clear how restored wetlands manage carbon while still being a contributing source of methane. However, preserving these areas would help prevent further release of carbon into the atmosphere.

Agriculture

Compared to natural vegetation, cropland soils are depleted in soil organic carbon (SOC). When a soil is converted from natural land or semi natural land, such as forests, woodlands, grasslands, steppes and savannas, the SOC content in the soil reduces by about 30–40%. This loss is due to the removal of plant material containing carbon, via harvesting. When land use changes, soil carbon either increases or decreases. This change continues until the soil reaches a new equilibrium. Deviations from this equilibrium can also be affected by varying climate. The decrease can be counteracted by increasing carbon input. This can be done via several strategies, e.g. leaving harvest residues on the field, using manure or rotating perennial crops. Perennial crops have a larger below ground biomass fraction, which increases the SOC content. Globally, soils are estimated to contain >8,580 gigatons of organic carbon, about ten times the amount in the atmosphere and much more than in vegetation.

Modification of agricultural practices is a recognized method of carbon sequestration as soil can act as an effective carbon sink offsetting as much as 20% of 2010 carbon dioxide emissions annually. Organic farming and earthworms may be able to more than offset the annual carbon excess of 4 Gt/year.

Carbon emission reduction methods in agriculture can be grouped into two categories: reducing and/or displacing emissions and enhancing carbon sequestration. Reductions include increasing the efficiency of farm operations (e.g. more fuel-efficient equipment) and interrupting the natural carbon cycle. Effective techniques (such as the elimination of stubble burning) can negatively impact other environmental concerns (increased herbicide use to control weeds not destroyed by burning).

Deep soil

About half of soil carbon is found within deep soils. About 90% of this is stabilized by mineral-organic associations.

At least thirty-two Natural Resource Conservation Service (NRCS) practices improve soil health and sequester carbon, along with important co-benefits: increased water retention, hydrological function, biodiversity and resilience. Approved practices may make farmers eligible for federal funds. Not all carbon farming techniques have been recommended. Carbon farming may consider related issues such as groundwater and surface water degradation.

Biochar/terra preta

Mixing anaerobically burned biochar into soil sequesters approximately 50% of the carbon in the biomass. Globally up to 12% of the anthropogenic carbon emissions from land use change (0.21 gigatonnes) can be off-set annually in soil, if slash-and-burn is replaced by slash-and-char. Agriculture and forestry wastes could add some 0.16 gigatonnes/year. Biofuel production using modern biomass can produce a bio-char by-product through pyrolysis sequestering 30.6 kg for each gigajoule of energy produced. Soil-sequestered carbon is easily and verifiably measured.

Tilling

Carbon farming minimizes disruption to soils over the planting/growing/harvest cycle. Tillage is avoided using seed drills or similar techniques. Livestock can trample and/or eat the remains of a harvested field.

Livestock grazing

Livestock sequester carbon when the animal eats the grass, causing its roots to release carbon into the soil. However, these animals typically produce significant methane, potentially offsetting the carbon impact. By regularly rotating the herd through multiple paddocks (as often as daily) the paddocks can rest/recover between grazing periods. This pattern produces stable grasslands with significant fodder. Annual grasses have shallower roots and die once they’re grazed. Rotational grazing leads to the replacement of annuals by perennials with deeper roots, which can recover after grazing. By contrast, allowing animals to range over a large area for an extended period can destroy the grassland.

Silvopasture

Silvopasture involves grazing livestock under tree cover, with trees separated enough to allow adequate sunlight to nourish the grass. For example, a farm in Mexico planted native trees on a paddock spanning 22 hectares (54 acres). This evolved into a successful organic dairy. The operation became a subsistence farm, earning income from consulting/training others rather than from crop production.

Organic mulch

Mulching covers the soil around plants with a mulch of wood chips or straw. Alternatively, crop residue can be left in place to enter the soil as it decomposes.

Compost

Compost sequesters carbon in a stable (not easily accessed) form. Carbon farmers spread it over the soil surface without tilling. A 2013 study found that a single compost application significantly and durably increased grassland carbon storage by 25–70%. The continuation sequestration likely came from increased water-holding and “fertilization” by compost decomposition. Both factors support increased productivity. Both tested sites showed large increases in grassland productivity: a forage increase of 78% in a drier valley site, while a wetter coastal site averaged an increase of 42%. CH
₄ and N
₂O and emissions did not increase significantly. Methane fluxes were negligible. Soil N
₂O emissions from temperate grasslands amended with chemical fertilizers and manures were orders of magnitude higher. Another study found that grasslands treated with .5" of commercial compost began absorbing carbon at an annual rate of nearly 1.5 tons/acre and continued to do so in subsequent years. As of 2018, this study had not been replicated.

Cover crops

With row crops such as corn and wheat, fast-growing ground cover can be grown between the stalks (e.g., clover or vetch). They protect the soil from carbon loss through the winter and may be planted together with cash crops to compensate for carbon lost when those crops are harvested. Forage crops such as grasses, clovers and alfalfa develop extensive root systems that can become soil organic matter. Crops with limited root systems (corn, soybeans) do not increase organic matter in the soil.

Hybrids

Perennial crops offer potential to sequester carbon when grown in multilayered systems. One system uses perennial staple crops that grow on trees that are analogs to maize and beans, or vines, palms and herbaceous perennials.

Conventional agriculture

Plowing splits soil aggregates and allows microorganisms to consume their organic compounds. The increased microbial activity releases nutrients, initially boosting yield. Thereafter the loss of structure reduces soil’s ability to hold water and resist erosion, thereby reducing yield.

Criticisms

Critics say that the related regenerative agriculture cannot be adopted enough to matter or that it could lower commodity prices. The impact of increased soil carbon on yield has yet to be settled.

Another criticism says that no-till practices may increase herbicide use, diminishing or eliminating carbon benefits.

Composting is not an NRCS-approved technique and its impacts on native species and greenhouse emissions during production have not been fully resolved. Further, commercial compost supplies are too limited to cover large amounts of land.

Resources

USDA offers a tool called COMET-Farm that estimates a farm's carbon footprint. Farmers can evaluate various land management scenarios to learn which is the best fit.