EcoJustice Radio

We sat down this week with Jay Levin, President of EQuip Our Kids, to explore the transformative power of emotional intelligence training. As society grapples with rising stress, anxiety, and a digital landscape that both connects and isolates, he discusses how Equip Our Kids is paving a path to mental wellness for children and teens. This conversation is a must-listen for anyone invested in shapi...

According to Dr Kristine Nichols, a soil microbiologist and regenerative agriculture expert, of the 900 million arable acres in the U.S., only about 1.5% is being farmed regeneratively. Yet, this continues to change, despite consolidation of farms, the majority of foods on this continent are still grown by small farmers. Regenerative is our future and also our past, as Indigenous peoples have long...

Two hundred years ago, before the Industrial Revolution, the rivers across North America ran clear and blue. Beginning in the 1800s, the growth of manufacturing and agriculture brought prosperity, but at the great cost of unmitigated pollution. While the food industry has been focused on profitability, their agricultural practices have resulted in rainstorms washing pesticides, fertilizers, feedlo...

Pastoralism. New (and Old Agrarians). Prescribed grazing. Adapting to our changing climate. Returning to ancient traditions for modern times. Throughout history, humanity has engaged pastoralism and grazing animals as a way of life, from Africa, to the Tibetan Plateau, the Eurasian steppes, to the Andes and Australia. As of 2019, 75% of all countries still maintain pastoral communities who graze a...

What is now known as Alabama and the environs of the Deep South, boast exceptional biodiversity and capture the imagination with its rich cultural and historical significance. It is the ancestral home of Cherokees, Choctaws, Muscogee or Creeks, and numerous lesser known Native nations and also the place where civil rights activist Stokely Carmichael planted the seeds of Black Power. Moreover, Dr....

We have an epidemic of chronic illness and degenerative disease on this continent. According to the NonGMO Project, the U.S. is by far the largest producer in the world of GMOs, 37.6% of all land globally dedicated to genetically modified crops is in the U.S. And until relatively recently, there were no mandatory labeling laws. Zen Honeycutt, Founder of Moms Across America & author of the book, Un...

First we share a report from Yurok country, in the Pacific Northwest. The largest dam removal in U.S. history has entered a critical phase, with the lowering of dammed reservoirs on the Klamath River, with members of the Yurok Tribe leading the effort. We use this as an example of why Indigenous people must be leading the efforts of conservation, which is the basis of the Land Back movement discus...

In this industrialized country, we have had a war on wild what we call "predators," helicopter gunners shooting wolves to “protect” caribou herds in Alaska. Every day is open season on mountain lions in Nevada. Between 2000 and 2021, at least 4,229 mountain lions were killed in Nevada by hunters, trappers, and the state’s lethal removal effort, according to data from the Nevada Department of Wildl...

Whisper Camel-Means shares her expertise on the pressing need to protect US wildlife ecosystems, now imperiled at an alarming rate. She offers an Indigenous perspective on the human-induced threats to our living relatives, from habitat loss to climate change. Tune in to learn how we can restore habitats, ensure the survival of endangered species, and honor the profound connection between Indigenou...

Check out our special encore presentation of our interview with Human Rights Attorney Steven Donziger recorded in December 2020. We investigate the story of Chevron’s crimes in Ecuador with Mr. Donziger who represented Ecuadorian communities demanding justice in a $9.5 billion decision against them for one of the largest-ever oil disasters. In this episode, we investigate the story of New York bas...

The Maasai are Indigenous people from southern Kenya, renowned and revered for their pastoral, nomadic heritage. They inhabit and range across the African Great Lakes region, and have traditionally subsisted almost entirely on the meat, blood and milk of their cattle herds. While many may romanticize the traditional ways of the Maasai, their Earth-based wisdom and connection to the land, Maasai li...

On this show, Solstice Celebration Story: Nutcracker and the Shape Shifter. Co-host and Producer Jack Eidt, in his role as a Literary Fiction writer, reads an excerpt of his short story based on The Nutcracker, a two-act ballet, with an 1892 score by Pyotr Ilyich Tchaikovsky. The ballet libretto was adapted from E.T.A. Hoffmann’s 1816 story The Nutcracker and the Mouse King. Here we present Jack’s...

Wherever land meets sea, global warming is wreaking havoc. As the ocean absorbs heat generated by the burning of fossil fuels and its attendant climate breakdown, its waters swell into overwhelming tides and city-engulfing storms. Glaciers melt, Pacific Islands shrink, Indonesians flee their seaside capital, and North Carolina’s beaches disappear with each passing supercharged hurricane. On this s...

Nature is not fixed, but ever changing. Some of the world’s best known deserts were once fertile grasslands and forests, including the Sahara, the Mojave, the Kalahari, and Gobi deserts. Is it accurate to think of deserts as permanent? Ecosystem succession shows us that Nature can evolve from rock to forest as well as reverse itself back to dust or a barren state. According to National Geographic,...

Well, we all know we have a problem with waste, trash, single-use plastics, wrappers, plastic bags. Plastic has become ubiquitous in our daily lives thanks to its convenience and artificially low prices. But it comes with many costs, upstream and downstream, so to speak. Fossil fuels fracked and pipelined to produce it, petrochemical facilities polluting communities, ecosystems, and the climate. M...

Native people inhabited the Connecticut River Valley of western Massachusetts for more than 10,000 years. It is the homeland of many First People, all related to one another. They are called the Sokoki, Pocumtuck, Nonotuck, Woronoco, and Agawam. Many other tribes visited and still visit this Native homeland. Among them are the Abenaki, Nipmuck, Wampanoag, Narragansett, Mohegan, Pequot, Mohican, an...

Humanity has a primordial connection to water. For Indigenous peoples, such as the Māori, Water is an Ancestor, a living entity to be communed with, revered and treated with sacred reciprocity. We owe our lives to the oceans, rivers, lakes and streams of the world. And although marine ecosystems have often been viewed and studied through the abstract lens of economics or science, today, traditiona...

The Right to Repair our electronics and other materials sounds like a no brainer. But historically manufacturers have said otherwise and fought, with millions of dollars, to stop legislation that allows consumers access to the resources to repair items like cell phones, toasters, and even tractor trucks. On this show Right to Repair takes center stage with guests Liv Butler, Policy Associate for C...

Many of us who are settlers now living on Turtle Island or anywhere in the world where colonization has taken place, recognize that ours is a time of truth and reconciliation. Forced assimilation and boarding schools established by the Indian Civilization Act of 1819 deliberately suppressed the use of Indigenous language and culture. We are haunted by histories where government policies, colonizer...

Breathing clean air and drinking clean water are fundamental rights. However, these have been denied to many low-income communities and communities of color, who often live next to massive industrial facilities that pollute the air and water. Our guest from an encore presentation from early in 2023 is Dr. Mustafa Santiago Ali {https://www.mustafasantiagoali.com/] former EPA official and now Execut...

Most would agree it is a farmer’s right to save, replant, share, breed, and sell seed. This fundamental right is rapidly eroding globally as multinational seed companies push for the worldwide expansion of restrictive seed laws, patents, and intellectual property rights. Multinationals–like Monsanto/Bayer, DuPont, and Syngenta--account for about half of all commercial food crop seed sales (also th...

Margaret Elysia Garcia, author and poet published by El Martillo Press, has spent a couple of decades living in Greenville, a Gold Rush-era Northern California town, that no longer exists as it did in 2021. That’s because it was devoured by the Dixie Fire, one of the largest blazes in California history. Margaret began writing her poetry collection “Burn Scars” while waiting at traffic stops drivi...

In the bestselling book, Drawdown, edited by Paul Hawken, enumerates solutions to our climate crisis in great detail. Of these, composting remains a top priority as it can reduce carbon emissions, as well as improve soil health and fertility, reduce air pollution, restore connection among communities and to Mother Nature. Composting is an essential way we can assist in the restoration and balancin...

On this show, we discuss how we can revolutionize architecture and landscape design by emulating Nature’s genius. Our guest, Ecological Architect Carl Welty [https://carlweltyarchitects.com/], paints a picture of ancient cities oriented to the sun’s movements, capturing its energy without machines. Modern city design often ignores the natural context, the flow of water, sensitive ecological habita...

On this show, we discuss ancestral foodways and the continuance as well as the reclaiming of authentic, Indigenous cuisine. Indigenous peoples often remind us: we are still here. Their lifeways and food creation have not "left," but are still present through the fierce devotion and commitment of intergenerational knowledge keepers. Food is a way of knowing, a cultural identity and a way to be conn...