State Laws/Kauai County Ordinances
- Comprehensive Stormwater Quality Protection,
- Only recyclable materials can be imported into state,
- Recycling bins at all “big box stores” and supermarkets,
- Will support only sustainable agriculture (as defined by US Code/USDA) pursuits and increase local food production
Basic Agricultural Concepts/NEEDS
- Food security – need to become food secure in 10-15 years or sooner
- Need to re-establish or restore traditional taro production
- Need to restore natural instream flows to promote both taro and fisheries production-in both streams and ocean; and to protect water quality
- Cannot have resilient communities without food security and cannot have food security without planting the most resilient crop-TARO!! Kaua’i once had 38,000 of taro, and now only 150 acres exist.
- We, as a community, need to decrease consumption of imported food (90%), increase consumption of locally grown and sourced food, such as taro, fruits, vegetables, fish, meat and dairy.
- More integrated agroforestry systems that include both plants and animals with high biodiversity (see UN—“Agriculture at a Crossroads: an assessment of existing technology, science and systems)
- 140 agronomists from 50 countries have stated that we can only feed the burgeoning global population by re-establishing traditional integrated agroforestry food and fiber production systems commonly practiced by indigenous people.
Climate Facts
- Increased storms and more intense; more severe hurricanes
- Increased flooding along coasts, exacerbated by increasing sea level rise
- Increased flooding along streams exacerbated by increased hardening (increased impermeable surfaces) due to unsustainable development of watersheds , e.g. urban houses, roadways, driveways, parking lots, shopping centers that discharge their pollutant contaminated stormwater runoff directly into streams, rivers and into coral reefs
”If you do not get directly involved with government actions you will be governed by fools.”
— Plato, Greek philosopher