But did you know the full story? They are really owned by a massive conglomerate: The Wonderful Company. Who also own: • Fiji Water • Pistachios • Mandarins • Landmark Vineyards wine But the consolidation isn’t even the story, it’s how they produce these products. The latest data shows Wonderful Company was California's second-largest sprayer of paraquat, accounting for over 13% of the entire state's paraquat use. Paraquat is so acutely dangerous that the EPA itself warns "one sip can kill.” Just this week, a truck spilled Paraquat in Dorris, California. That led to a shelter-in-place of the ENTIRE city. All this to say, when it is produced on our food and drinks people don’t bat an eye. It’s not just ingredient labels for the Wonderful Company, this problem is a product of the entire industrial system. There is no fixing the grocery store. Everyone will be convinced of that the more we continue to uncover. Shopping from small farmers like you can do with the Localize - Farmers Market app will be the future of food. ~ Zephyr Zoidis

Bill Zylmans said it plainly: diversification is key. Different markets. Different varieties. Different ways of doing business. That kind of flexibility is no longer a nice-to-have for growers. It is what resilience looks like. If a farm, business, or supply chain is too dependent on one buyer, one channel, or one export market, it leaves itself exposed. The tough years have a way of revealing where the weak points are. That is exactly why Grow matters. Grow is not just another tool. It is a different way of doing business. We have built infrastructure that helps create: more market opportunities more flexibility stronger domestic and supply chain relationships new ways to capture, verify, and monetise value From traceability to commerce to ecological assets and real-world tokenisation, Grow opens the door to diversification in a way traditional systems simply do not. Resilience will not come from doing more of the same. It will come from building optionality into the system. That is what we are building. Come explore what we have built. #Grow #Agriculture #AgTech #FoodSystems #Traceability #Diversification #Resilience #Web3 #RWA #Farmers https://spudsmart.com/5-questions-with-cpc-chair-bill-zylmans/?utm_campaign=Spud%20Smart%20Spudcast&utm_medium=email&_hsenc=p2ANqtz-_6RPuQNC6SlPcoZBU6FHZn3YXJg1ZRINZeac0FxCi_z4OmNeVkIuAFCPO5JYjpAsf9HUpZui0qS9xjwyBWuuzbCv_eF-LSxf-58BYeXGjZeSfRIAs&_hsmi=410400060&utm_content=410399629&utm_source=hs_email

When a baby grows in the womb, it doesn’t grow alone. It grows inside a placenta. A living support system. Delivering nutrients. Balancing water. Filtering toxins. Supporting development. Without the placenta, the baby cannot survive. Life depends on relationships. And trees are no different. A fruit tree planted alone in the middle of a lawn is like a baby without a placenta. Technically alive. But missing the living system designed to support it. And what do we do when that happens? We replace relationships with chemicals. Fertilizers for nutrients. Pesticides for pests. Herbicides for competition. Because the natural support network is gone. In nature, trees never grow alone. They grow inside communities. Plants that mine minerals from deep soil. Plants that fix nitrogen. Plants that attract pollinators. Plants that confuse pests. Plants that protect and cover the soil. In permaculture we call this a tree guild. A living support network. For example: Comfrey mines minerals. White clover fixes nitrogen. Yarrow accumulates nutrients. Chives and marigolds deter pests. Borage attracts pollinators. Nasturtium acts as a trap crop. Each plant has a role. Not competing with the tree. Supporting it. And honestly… Who wants to live alone anyway? Nature thrives in communities. So do we. Maybe the real question when planting a fruit tree is not: “How do I care for this tree?” But: Who belongs in its community? 🌳

We know our health depends on the diversity of microflora in our gut. Having healthy populations positively influences our immunity, our digestion, and even our hormone regulation. But did you know the gut can also affect our mood and even our emotional states? It's true. Many of our neurotransmitters are manufactured in the gut through the action of our healthy flora. And those neurotransmitters obviously go straight to our brain and influence our mood and emotions. That is the reason why our gut is commonly called our second brain.

I got asked a question recently that stuck with me: How did humans survive before modern supplementation? My answer: because food used to actually nourish us. We ate whole foods grown in living soil. Food was closer to the land, less processed, less stripped down, and less manipulated. Now we live in a world where food is engineered for shelf life, convenience, and margin. Oils are refined, heated, deodorized, and pushed into everything. Cropping systems have mined the soil for yield, while pesticides, herbicides, and chemical dependency have hollowed out the biology that makes nutrients available in the first place. And then we act surprised that people are exhausted, inflamed, undernourished, and reaching for supplements. To me, that is not irrational. That is adaptation. If the soil is depleted, the plants are depleted. If the plants are depleted, the animals are depleted. And if everything downstream is depleted, why would humans be any different? Healthy soil is not just dirt. It is a living intelligence system. A single tablespoon of healthy soil contains more microorganisms than there are people on Earth. That biology is not a side note. It is the foundation of nutrient density, resilience, and health. So no, I do not think the rise of supplementation is the real problem. I think the real problem is that we have normalized a food system that produces calories brilliantly and nourishment poorly. Supplementation is not a substitute for real food. It is often a workaround for a broken system. The better question is not: Why is everyone taking supplements? The better question is: What have we done to the soil, the food, and the system that made them necessary? #SoilHealth #RegenerativeAgriculture #FoodSystems #Nutrition #Health #WholeFoods #MineralDensity #Regeneration