Hammer of Darkness cubed

I don't know whether the effects of Seasonal Affective Disorder get more pronounced as one grows older, or whether it's just that I'm better at describing what I feel as I get older. The sun setting in the late afternoon, the loss of daylight affects me in a negative way. The clocks going back on the last weekend of October is the time when SAD kicks in, although I suffer only mild to moderate symptoms (subsyndromal SAD). 

Symptoms I get each year are increased appetite for carbohydrates (comfort foods vs say, salads); difficulties with concentration, and lower levels of cheerfulness and sociability. "Loss of interest in activities" is another one. I tend to sleep longer - an atavistic nod towards mammalian hibernation. Without pre-lockdown alarm calls to wake me, my body clock tells me when to sleep and when to rise. In summer this tends to be around seven and a half hours, while in the dark months it lengthens towards nine (last night I slept from 23:10 to 08:15 this morning).

Yes, I can get over these by self-administering Cognitive Behavioural Therapy - writing this post is part of that - and of course, exercise is very effective at lifting mood. But the craving for sunshine is powerful. 

Thinking back to the beginning of lockdown, the sun set at 17:43, nearly TWO HOURS(!) after it set today (15:47); within two weeks of lockdown, the clocks went forward, and so the sun set at five past seven. Suddenly, three whole hours of afternoon and evening daylight more than today...

This would happen anyway; but there's an epidemic going on, and the most powerful man on the planet has been deprived of his power but does not intend to let go. US secretary of state Mike Pompeo's tweet two nights ago saying that the White House was busy working on a second Trump administration chilled me to the bone. I woke up at quarter to three and could not go back to sleep for worry. The prospect for the world of Trump forcing Republican members of the electoral college to go against their state's preferred candidate is terrifying - American will go down the plughole of fallen empires faster than any in history.

Then there's Covid. As I wrote before, we don't know where we really are. OK, fewer cases reported today. But yesterday was a public holiday, so today's figures should be treated as a Monday (lowest of the week). Will they return to a frightening growth trend or start to plateau? Who knows. How many cases go unreported? Half as many again, or two, three, five, ten times as many? Who knows. Antibodies, herd immunity, vaccine availability - who knows. What I know instinctively is that if you suffer from SAD, your immune system is weaker than in summer, and you are more prone to picking up viral infections. This is one reason why we have seen the current dramatic increase in cases in the Northern Hemisphere (meanwhile Chile's new cases hit a peak in mid-July and are now a fifth of that level).

On top of this, Poland's neighbour Belarus faces serious unrest as another jumped-up despot refuses to accept the results of an election that overturned his rule, and people are being kidnapped or beaten to death.

So in the meantime, I hunker down, avoiding people as far as possible. The asymptomatic carrier could be entirely innocently super-spreading Covid among the more vulnerable.

It's just under four weeks until 7 December, the first of ten (!) days during which the sun sets at its earliest, that is 15:23 (in Warsaw). It continues to do so until 17 December, by which time a rapidly approaching Xmas (or Christ's Mass) tends to lift spirits. The pagan feast of Sol Invictus, the invincible sun, that by 26 December is noticeably setting later (by four minutes) had been a celebration of this turning point. Then we get to Blue Monday, claimed to be the most depressing day of the year. Next year, this falls on 18 January... This may lead to another uptick and rising number of Covid cases, and a third wave.

And two days later, we will see Trump being ejected from the White House, by force if needs be (the US armed forces swear allegiance to the Constitution, not to the president). The only one-term president of modern times to lose two consecutive popular votes.

Once we pass that moment, in 68 days' time, my guess is that the pandemic will be well and truly on the wane. By then, spring will still be a way off, but there will be more daylight. A third wave will not be as deadly nor as rapidly spreading as the second one here in Poland.

Hope and Healing - the catchwords for 2021. I hope. There will be a spring, but first the healing powers of Lent.

This time two years ago:
Magic day, in and around Jakubowizna

This time three years ago:
Warsaw-London-Ealing

This time five years ago:
With my father and brother in Derbyshire

This time seven years ago:
In praise of Warsaw's trams

This time ten years ago:
Setting sun in the mountains

This time 11 years ago:
That learning moment

Zamienie is changing

It's been a while since I last visited Zamienie, much has changed. The threat of a new distribution centre that would have seen hundreds of trucks rolling through has lifted - in its place will be something called 'KampusPlus', which will emerge behind the chipboard fencing to the left in the photo below. A Żabka convenience store offers some retail opportunities to shoppers that have newly moved in. Skips are full of cardboard boxes that once contained fridges, cookers and flat-pack furniture.

In the fields full of poppies that gave their name to Osiedle Polnych Maków ('estate of the poppies of the fields'), the campus, a mixed-purpose development led by the Politechnika Warszawska, will appear. The street leading up to it is named after Thomas Alva Edison. This is no longer Warsaw; this is part of the gmina (municipality) of Lesznowola. So Warsaw's city authorities don't have to give a stuff about how many new estates get built here, or how the people living here should get into and out of the city centre.

Below: cryptographer Jerzy Różycki, one of the Polish team that cracked the original Enigma code is commemorated in the name of this new street, running off ul. Arakowa.

The new bits of Zamienie are architectually more attractive and more functional than the earlier blocks, like this one below on ul Waniliowa ('Vanilla Street' - metaphorically too). Estate agents outnumber food shops. Note the cars. Zamienie is served by just two bus routes, the 715 and 809, the bus stop being almost a kilometre from this point. And W-wa Jeziorki railway station is over 2km from here (a whole kilometre further than my house across on the other side of the railway line in Warsaw, in Jeziorki).

And so most households have to be two-car families. This, below, is ul. Arakowa and the Osiedle Polnych Maków, completed in 2009. Some of the houses have been occupied for over a decade. Note: there's no pavement. The drives outside these terraced houses lead to garages big enough for a VW Polo circa 2004, but way too small for a modern SUV. So one car's parked on the drive, the other outside. Nowhere for pedestrians to walk. So pedestrians have to brave the street. Mums with baby buggies. Shit planning. All the shittier when the extra traffic associated with the KampusPlus - first the construction plant, then the thousands of workers - start driving down this way.

You can see the problem in this photo, below. Too big car. Teensy-weensy garages. Now, I don't know the individual circumstances of these folk, but I guess that owning two cars means you can't afford a house in Warsaw proper. How about dumping the big car and buying a house closer to public transport and to the amenities? Arguments about "it's nice to live among fields" cut no ice as the fields around here will soon be developed. Far from shops, far from schools, far from the city centre, wholly dependent on the car. There are just two junctions connecting the ever-growing Zamienie to the main road; early-morning rush hours must be hell for drivers trying to get out of here.

Things will improve once the S7 extension is complete. Below: looking down from a temporary hill of soil onto the new bridge that will link Jeziorki (on this side) with Dawidy Bankowe and Zamienie (on the other). The bridge should be wider than the viaduct over the railway line at W-wa Jeziorki station. So even if the traffic if flowing easier here, it will jam up once it gets around the corner.

How will Covid-19 affect where we chose to live? Will people trade the convenience, amenities and attractions of urban life for the lower population density of the far suburbs and exurbs? To early to say.

This time two years ago:
Thoughts on the 100th anniversary of Poland regaining its independence

This time three years ago:
Globalisation in retreat

This time seven years ago:
Leeds, a city made uglier by crooked developers

This time eight years ag0:
Węzeł Lotnisko (now Węzeł W-wa Południe) - works continue

This time 13 years ago:
Its Independence Day

Intelligence and counter-intelligence

I am delighted that Trump will be leaving the White House on 20 January - the only one-term president to be impeached and to lose two consecutive popular votes. My outright disgust for him is unmatched by my dislike for any other current political leader. His appeal to the basest instincts of the poorly-educated is of huge concern to people of good will everywhere. 

The world breathed a sigh of relief that petty demagogues and populist shit-stirrers no longer have a green light from the White House. Decency and character return.

The first task of President Biden will be to defuse the instruments that allowed Trump's base to form and grow. The manipulation of lame, poorly educated minds, lacking in curiosity or powers of observation.

The task over the longer term will be to deal with the root causes of ignorance and hatred. But in the short term, the social media that allowed that ignorant to vent their hatred needs to be tackled. The CIA and FBI, once they have their leadership restored, needs to take a long look at how the social media, and the algorithms that drive their feeds, function. As it is, the social media allow vulnerable minds to be exploited for political ends.

As I write, Trump has tweeted about some alleged voting irregularity in Georgia, that he found on right-wing Breitbart News, one of the few media outlets that has not acknowledged Biden's victory. Below were some 31,000 comments (mostly, it must be said, from gloating Democrats and Republican Never Trumpers), but with a sprinkling from disgruntled Trump supporters. Here's one:

There were 440 comments below, mocking this chap whose Googling skills did not go beyond scrolling past the first result.

Now, when I was doing my internship on the Ealing Gazette back in 1980, I was given the task one day of selecting the letters to the editor. Rants written in green or purple ink in capital letters about 'darkies', 'Jews', 'Freemasons' or 'poofs' went on the spike without any second thoughts - the only letters that did get through, and got printed, were well-written, well-considered, without spelling mistakes - ones from respectable citizens, ones that added merit to the contents of the newspaper.

Forty years on, the social media have given the ranters a space, a way to avoid the spike of civically minded editors with the good of their community on their conscience.

The angry ignorant section of society is larger than most of us realise; they have been finally given a voice - and this has created a chance for the unscrupulous, the Bannons and Farages of this world - to harvest that anger and ignorance for political ends. 

I have written several times about Russia's interference in Western domestic affairs. Putin cannot get Russia on the road to progress while he and his buddies are fleecing the country. Rather than build Russia up, he wants to tear the West down to Russia's level. This Russia does through the military doctrine of Dezinformatsya - maskirovka - and the West's weak-point is an open social media, where anyone can post stuff regardless of where in the world they are. There is no Facebook in Russia, there's Vkontakte. China has its own internet, closed off from the world. Yet the world's internet is open to Russia and to China, to manipulate the opinion of those unable to think critically.

Closing down Russian, Chinese and indeed Iranian and Saudi troll farms' access to the West's social media should be a priority for an incoming Biden administration. Failure to do so will result in Biden being another one-term president. May he live long and in good health.

UPDATE: This article in Foreign Policy makes the same point.

This time three years ago:
Trumpkins, Brexiteers and the missing middle

This time nine years ago:
Bad news for Jeziorki's rat runners

This time ten years ago:
Death on the tracks

This time 11 years ago:
From Łady to Falenty

Covid-19: Poland's now experiencing its first wave

The graphs (from worldometers.info) say it all. In March, Poland took the right measures at the right time - and stopped the first wave short. Compared to the UK, where the government dithered. Look at that first mountain of death that Poland never had. But then over the summer, complacency set in. "There is no danger, no disease." Schools reopened, children infected their grandparents, and now Poland is outstripping the UK both in terms of new cases and deaths. The UK has locked down. But Lockdown 2.0 is nowhere near as total as the belated 1.0. Meanwhile, it's Poland's turn to have a dithering government. A second lockdown is likely to be announced if the new cases figure stays between 27,000 and 29,000 for the next few days - and given that Sunday and Monday figures are always the lowest of the week, it means a lockdown may be announced on Wednesday or Thursday. Look at the graph, and the time-lag between cases and deaths. It suggests overflowing hospitals and human tragedy on a vast, national scale kicking in by the middle of next week.

Nothing more to add than spend as little time as possible in the proximity of other homo sapiens. Keep your distance, wear a mask outside and wash your hands as often as you can. 

This time last year:
Professional advice

This time three years ago:
Gliwice's new station

This time five years ago:
Reanimated - my father's car 

This time six years ago:
Defending Poland against hybrid warfare 

This time seven years ago:
Another office move

This time nine years ago:
PiS splits again - Solidarna Polska formed 

This time ten years ago:
Tesco vs. Auchan

This time 13 years ago:
My father's house

Still waiting, so...

I had to go to the post office today to post some documents relating to my father's estate (everything's taking so much longer because of lockdowns in the UK and Poland). Being over 60, Poczta Polska will serve me between 10 and 12 without younger folk breathing their viruses everywhere, so a brisk walk there to get that done was needed. The sky was blue as I set off, but would cloud over.

Below: ul. Jeziorki, that time of year when leaves turn orangey-red and yet are still on the trees.
 

I passed through the cemetery; closed at the weekend, it was quite full this morning of people leaving flowers and candles on the graves of their family members. Below: the most recent three graves at the western edge; ages at death: 71 (F), 96 (F), 91 (M).

On the way home, I walked up the unasphalted ul. Sporna up to where it joins the similarly unasphalted ul. Hołubcowa. Along the way, I explored some tracks around here, between ul. Jeziorki and the railway line. Countryside, less than seven miles (11.2 km) from the Palace of Culture

I emerged by W-wa Dawidy station, and crossed ul. Baletowa, stopping to snap the new tunnel that will take the S7 over the street. Same view as I got yesterday evening., but with added daylight.

Below: the line from W-wa Dawidy to W-wa Jeziorki (in the far distance). Two Koleje Mazowieckie trains are passing, a modernised EN71 heading south towards Czachówek Południowy and a modernised EN57 heading north towards W-wa Wschodnia. Note how the land dips between the two stations, and the trackside drainage and signalling infrastructure.

Below: more from the S7 extension. Here we seen the new bridge that will connect Jeziorki to the east with Dawidy to the west. You can see the same dip in the land as in the photo above. Once the earth ramps are built up at both ends, the new bridge will become crossable on foot - I hope to visit on Christmas Day when there'll be no one around on the site.

This time last year:

Recycling a life's possessions

This time two years ago:
You can always go downtown

This time four years ago:
Opinions vs facts - our media today

This time five years ago:
Judging PO's eight years in power

This time six years ago
Cloudless, 18C - the beauty of Polish autumn

This time seven years ago: 
Call 19115: Warsaw Fix-my-Street

This time nine years ago:
Vapour trails at sunset

This time nine years ago:
Autumnal blues

Nail-biting walk

Waiting for the results to come in. Trump's declared victory. Time for a walk, catch the sunset, detach myself from the news. An hour's daylight before, an hour's walk home in the dark - two hours, 12,000 paces. Below: W-wa Jeziorki station, southbound ('down') platform. The northbound ('up') platform is directly behind me. On the horizon, the Warsaw skyline; it's been over a month since I last ventured into town.

The main part of today's journey is along ul. Dawidowska/ul. Starynkiewicza; the first part is in Zamienie and after crossing into Dawidy Bankowe continues on to Dawidy. Over 2km long, the road runs dead straight. To the right, the fields which are now being carved up by the S7 extension. To the left, a whole lot of new and uncoordinated housing developments running off Starynkiewicza at right angles, generally of between ten and 20 new houses. Below: at the moment a rutted, muddy track with wasteland to one side, within two years another such estate. But what a sunset!

Below: ul. Jana Miklaszewskiego, the road from Dawidy Bankowe to Łady (pron. 'Wuddy'). On the horizon the church of St Matthew the Evangelist, Łady.

Below: The time is right for racing in the streets. The recently-rerouted 715 connects Ursynów with Aleja Krakowska via numerous suburban villages; now it runs down ul. Karczunkowska. However, it's nowhere near as convenient as the old 209 (now rerouted to terminate on ul. Baletowa). The old 209 began its route one stop from our house and was therefore extremely punctual. The 715 and 727 which now run down Karczunkowska have a long route from their respective termini, and punctuality is questionable. If a bus can be 10-12 minutes late, but it only takes eight minutes to walk to Puławska, why bother waiting?

Below: ul. Polnych Kwiatów (lit. 'Flowers of the Field Street') is another poorly-planned estate that runs off Starynkiewicza at right angles. No asphalt further down; five new streets to the right of Polnych Kwiatów bearing such poetic names as 'Forget-me-not Street' (ul. Niezapominajki) and 'Green Meadow Street' (ul. Zielonej Łąki). This is what happens when developers decide street names ('Tulip Corner Street' (ul. Tulipanowy Zakątek) and Water Lily Street (ul Lilii Wodnych) are in the same vicinity.

Below: the new tunnel, through which ul. Baletowa will pass under the S7 extension, which will be built over this steel structure. In the meanwhile, Baletowa does a little semicircular detour around the site. I'm very impressed at the speed with which work on the S7 has been carried out; it is due to open to traffic in the spring of 2022. For once, I think this is feasible - if Section B of the contract (this is Section A, Section C connects with the existing S7 near Grójec) is ready on time (it's running late).

Below: home via the Jeziorki ponds; recent rains have raised the water levels so it's no longer a muddy lake bed here. The backs of the houses that face ul. Trombity are beautifully illuminated, adding a touch of glamour to lakeside living, Jeziorki-style. I once talked to a couple who were looking to buy property along here - their biggest worry was flooding. It's drought they should have concerned them. I hope there will be proper snow and frost this winter.

And who's here to greet me when I get home? It's Felusia (now nearly three months). Below: a bit unsure about the camera... (I'm shooting with it at chest-level, using the screen on the back to compose and focus, so she's staring into the lens.)

Now she's feeling happier. A very lively, intelligent, inquisitive and affectionate cat. 

This time two years ago:

Insights in the search for consciousness

This time two years ago:
Loving Vincent - review

This time seven years ago:
UFO credibility test

This time eight years ago:
Junction ready for road to unbuilt sports centre

This time nine years ago:
Park nad Książecem - Vistula escarpment, beautiful autumn

This time 11 years ago:
Obama wins US presidential election

Rural rights of way revisited

Rambling across the fields and forests around Jakubowizna, I'm often walking on farm tracks. The assumption is that they are public rights of way, until one meets a fence, a gate or a wall. But such signs? 'Droga prywatna zakaz wjazdu'. Can I continue along this way? I'm walking, not riding, so the word 'wjazd' here isn't relevant to me (if walking through here were to be prohibited, it would be zakaz wstępu). Is this sign legitimate, or an attempt by a nearby landowner to curtail through traffic by claiming ownership of the road? If this were my land, I'd simply fence it off at either end. Having said that, I've been waiting since August for a builder to fence off the land I bought last year and delineated by a geodeta in June. 

Back home, I check on the e-mapy service (which is excellent - it covers the whole of Poland and shows every separate plot). This shows an ambiguous situation, where according to data from the gmina (third-order administrative division) that this is a road (shown below with the two 'no entry' signs at either end of it). But the fine light-blue lines show that this road does actually run along and through plots that are privately owned. Can anyone tell me what the legal status really is?

Below: the same, but on the Google Earth satellite view.

Below: this sign (on the road running left-right along the bottom left of both maps, below the lower 'no entry' sign) is on the road from Jakubowizna to Machcin. I'm now making sense of why it was sprayed. The left turn into an unasphalted track is the way from the road to the first 'no entry' sign. Turning left is the short route to Adamów Rososki. It seems the householders owning the property rights to the road are unhappy about it being used - mainly by local farmers, I would guess. The long way from Jakubowizna to Adamów Rososki is at least properly asphalted, so a less bumpy ride for cars.

I am still puzzled by the naming of settlements around here. According to chynow.e-mapa.net, the area to the immediate east of Jakubowizna is called Nowe Winiary, but I cannot find any houses bearing a number assigned to such a settlement - nor does Nowe Winiary appear on Google Maps. On the ground, the local signage refers to the area as Machcin II (and indeed Winiary on the the e-mapa is signed as Machcin I). 

UPDATE 31 OCTOBER 2021: Situation unchanged, unresolved, signs still there.

This time last year:

Cause of death

This time two years ago:
Opole in the late-October sunshine

This time three years ago:
Work begins in earnest on the Karczunkowska viaduct

This time five years ago:
Sublime autumn day in Jeziorki

This time six years ago:
CitytoCity, MalltoMall

This time seven years ago:
(Internet) Radio Days

This time eight years ago:
Another office move

This time nine years ago:
Manufacturing a City of Culture

This time ten years ago:
My thousandth post

This time 11 years ago:
Closure of ul. Poloneza

This time 12 years ago:
Scenes from a suburban petrol station

A sustainable food system for Poland

A follow-up post to a recent one in which I puzzled over why I can't buy local village produce in my local village shop.

What will it take to change that?

The model that Poland is heading towards looks like this: big, successful farmers buy up ever more land from those who can't make a decent living from it. Then they invest in machinery and logistics, and strike ever-bigger deals with the buyers from the large supermarket chains (and from the cash-and-carries that supply most independent rural grocers). The trend toward disintermediation in the food system has been removing middlemen and their margins, giving consumers lower prices in a competitive market. Farmers understand very well that they have no leverage if they are small. 

The result of this process is that village shops are selling products bought wholesale from distant distribution centres, rather than from farms close to the villages they serve. 

Strolling around Chynów, I see this. Large trucks, with trailers, are taking the apples away from the local punkty skupu, the purchase points where farmers get cash for their harvest. These trucks will take the apples to chilled warehouses, where in controlled conditions, apples last longer. Economies of scale kick in; consumers can look forward to buying perfect apples next August from this year's crop. This makes economic sense, but the process of scaling up agriculture is not wholly beneficial to society.

And yet there are around one million small Polish farms (down from 2.7 million in 1987), many of which are struggling financially. Only now are they beginning to be recognised as a national resource and an opportunity, rather than a burden and hangover from a defunct and inefficient system. In part, this is because consumers are on the lookout for fresh, tasty food that's chemical-free and affordable. And from their own neck of the woods, rather than trucked in from some distant province. Buying from your neighbours is good for your community. The pandemic is fuelling demand, but small farmers haven't yet been able to take advantage, focusing on their own immediate needs.

Unlike the UK, where unemployment is highest in inner cities, well over half of Poland's long-term unemployed are rural (not even small-town). If you're an energetic, able farmer, understanding market trends, investing wisely and growing your business, you have an asset that your children may well be interested in taking on. If your abilities to manage are less good, chances are your children will leave for the city or emigrate in search of a better life and  consider your hectares as a millstone rather than as an investment asset.

And so the spiral accelerates; elderly farmers sell their land to ever-greater consolidated holdings, and big agribusiness changes the rural landscape and rural society. This process has, however, slowed down as a result of the Polish government making it harder for foreigners - and non-farmers - to buy agricultural land. This has led an increasing areas of farmland not being farmed at all. But it's also giving birth to a new interest in shortening food supply-chains. Herein lie the seeds for a different vision. And not just here in Poland, but across the EU.

But here's another vision of a more sustainable food system.

Small farmers get together online to share equipment. A tractor not in use for a week or two need not sit idle - it can be earning its owner money working another field. A barn not in use to store one crop between harvests can be rented out to a neighbouring farm as its crops are gathered. This may smack of collectivisation and equipment-sharing schemes from communist times - but it isn't. 

This is because tech is helping us decentralise, bringing autonomy to the individual, enabling joint action. It's not top-down diktat from the party. Consumers increasingly want to know who produced each product and how they did so. We are no longer happy with anonymous, centralised industrial-scale food production and distribution. Generating new value that seeks to make better use of existing resources through networks where no one is in charge. That’s what local markets for locally-produced food are all about.

New software solutions will drive this decentralisation revolution. This is because software solutions, once developed, are infinitely scaleable, with zero marginal costs. Distributed-ledger technology, for example, offers consumers the ability to trace the provenance of the products they are buying. This is important; many local butchers in the UK, for example, have blackboards on which the names of the farms from which this week's meats come from are written down. This has a strong effect of bringing consumer and producer closer together. Apps can to the job of such blackboards, with far greater reach.

The technology exists - it's tech that drives the sharing economy (like Bla Bla Car, AirB&B or Uber). 

I know, I know - it's difficult in rural Poland, where distrust of neighbours is the default. But innovations catch on and when proven to be beneficial, tend to be habit forming. Learning that win-win and not zero-sum thinking leads to progress, which in turn hard-wires win-win thinking into people's mentality.

New technology can generate new streams of income, as well as new value, to those participating in a decentralised prosumer (producer/consumer) food system. Online such prosumer initiatives that already bring together farmers and consumers, such as Koszyk lisiecki ('Liszki Basket') near Krakow are booming, proving the concept. But these are still outside the mainstream, often operating informally.

The new value comes with consumers accessing fresh, tasty food products that they simply cannot buy in supermarkets, and farmers gaining regular clients who value what they produce. Cost effectiveness and streams of income come from shortening the social, economic and geographical distance between food producer and food consumer by replacing intermediaries with software solutions. Logistics will no longer require an expensive, centralised distribution system, but a way of making use of the barns, vehicles and storage facilities of the producers and consumers involved, by tracking and trading what is available. Producers and consumers with a vehicle or storage space can provide a service, and so generate additional income. The same is true for settling purchases and extending loans. Banks will no longer be needed to act as trusted intermediaries, if transactions can be settled directly. 

If rural livelihoods come to depend on participation in a sharing economy, rather than on government subsidies, then our food system will transform to accommodate the small-scale, geographically dispersed, food producer. In such a world, trust is built by a software solution that can settle many-to-many transactions. Producers and consumers will come to trust that solution, if it generates the value and income upon which their livelihoods depend.

And so local markets could be built and serviced using apps. Sitting here on my działka, I would be able to order a box of seasonal organic potatoes, leeks, tomatoes, spinach, broad beans, corn-on-the-cob, peas and carrots, all sourced from local farms, which I could pick up from a dispensing machine at my local petrol station forecourt or the local school, which could also act as a collection point for produce.

Cloud-based, and using machine learning to optimise collection and delivery, such apps could create new networks that bring communities closer together. Making unused resources usable is the way forward (as I wrote here, and here). Apps would not only allow me to order my weekly shop of fresh, tasty vegetables and fruit on-line, but also offer storage space and pick-up services for neighbours, earning me a few extra zlotys.

'Community' and 'market' were once upon a time entirely congruous; economies of scale have pulled the two apart, making them adversaries. Technology has the potential to bring them back together at the local level. The goal - to make small-holdings profitable by connecting them to consumers who seek quality, value and authenticity from the products they eat.

New communities that generate new value and new income for all involved is within our grasp, if we can bring together the potential of small farms and tech. It’s happening with energy, with transport and with finances. Food is next. For those who are concerned about sustaining access to healthy, tasty food that is chemical free and affordable, this tech-driven, decentralised food economy is no longer a ‘nice-to-have’ but a must-have.

If you wish to help realise this vision, you may wish to help Rafał Serafin, my old friend from West London,  make a documentary film about the opportunities of Poland’s small farms and part-time farms. The project requires the raising of €55,000 through crowdfunding; 5,000 people each donating €10 could make it happen (link to Zrzutka.pl here and below).

Here are three of Rafał's films that set out the vision:

Short food chains in Poland explained:

Some best practice from Austria and Slovakia:

How collaborative logistics could function:

To contribute to Rafał's project to make this vision a reality, click here.

This time last year:
Sifting through a life

This time three years ago:
Throwing It All Away

This time four| years ago:
Hammer of Darkness falls on us again

This time five years ago:
The working week with the clocks gone back

This time seven years:
Slowly on the mend after calf injury

This time eight years ago:
Thorunium the Gothick

This time nine years ago:
Łódź Widzew or Widź Łódzew 

This time 11 years ago:
A touch of frost in the garden