A change from the many policy and economics oriented articles on the environment that make their way to NewsTrust, this opinion piece is a nice read about personal accountability.

I like the way Michael Pollan puts his finger on several crucial problems with our responses to environmental issues. We must cultivate a culture of doing what is good for us both individually and collectively. Our fragmented society creates a sense of helplessness, of wanting to call in "an expert", when gratification with our own efforts is what's missing. As to the efficacy of growing our own food, look to the Victory Gardens of WW II that produced millions of pounds of produce. Gardening supply businesses are expanding at a rapid rate, so the message may be spurring a rebirth of that spirit.

Michael Pollan makes a strong moral and environmental case for individual responsibility in addressing global climate change. His recommended start: home grown food. My favorite passage: "to look to leaders and experts, to laws and money and grand schemes, to save us from our predicament represents precisely the sort of thinking — passive, delegated, dependent for solutions on specialists — that helped get us into this mess in the first place."