Eco business directory site of 2,000 green business links.
In Business , the magazine for sustainable businesses and communities, “where sustainable goals and small business team up.” Can order a free copy online, has online tables of contents, and some of the articles are available for free on line. The makings of a renewable energy revolution.
Appalachia Science in the Public Interest , Fr. Fritsch, who’s interview is linked in Crossroads, works here. A rural sustainable living program, has two appropriate technology demonstration projects with low cost buildings, composting toilets, alternative “home grown” energy research. Publishes excellent technical reports on how to build a solar cooker, compost heap, do recycling, farm forests, some of which are on the website (click on technical reports ). Looks like they’re doing excellent, practical work.
On-line seminars in sustainable economics , at the Communications for a Sustainable Future site.
Farmer Direct Marketing , from the US Department of Agriculture.
Farmer Direct Marketing Publications .
Farmer Direct Marketing Newsletter , June-July 1999,
How to build a wood fired oven and start a home bakery. Being a tried and true method of getting together our daily bread and having some loaves to sell.
Adobe Oven Page , how one family built an abode oven, step by step.
Alternative Technology Association , Australian site. Publishes booklets on how to build your own wind generator, low voltage appliances, and other subjects.
Institute for Local Self Reliance , from raising fish in a basement to organizing a community cooperative.
Appropriate Technology Transfer for Rural Areas , sustainable farming information center from the National Center for Appropriate Technology. Sustainable agriculture organizations and publications.
Farmer Direct Marketing online newsletter , from the US Department of Agriculture.
Country Home Magazine simple living and homesteading.
How to start a food buying club , from Natural Life magazine.
Virtual Library on Micro-credit . Find out the latest news on micro-enterprise and micro-credit activities that enable people to help themselves.
Justpeace Front Page about Co-ops many links, Catholic connections.
Co-op Month Home Page , from the National Cooperative Month Planning Committee, activities, history, and links.
Wedge Community Co-op , a Minnesota cooperation.
Frontier Natural Products Co-op , a co-op supplying co-ops
Breedlove Dehydrated Foods , a nonprofit organization in Lubbock, Texas that provides low cost food to charities for use in hunger relief projects (US and international). It owns its own state-of-the-art processing facility, that has provided over 28 million pounds of dehydrated vegetables (mostly potatoes and carrots) since 1994. It is the first full-scale, non-profit facility of its kind in the world. It processes 100,000 pounds of food per day, or enough dehydrated product for about 450,000 one cup servings. They can package 850,000 servings per day, and provide several blends including rice, TVP, onions, potatoes, carrots. One million servings can be provided at a cost of about 3.1 cents per one cup serving. This is a MUST SEE and TELL all your friends. Funds to operate the plant come from donations, processing fees for non-profit agencies, and some retail sales to the public. No government funds are involved.
Lehman’s Non-electric Catalog , from the Kidron, Ohio company that supplies the Amish, everything you need to live without electricity.
Working at home , page of links about starting your own business, including how to avoid the various scams in this microenterprise area.
Ecomall , a gateway for businesses offering eco-friendly products via the internet.
Pike Place Market . What has 9 acres, 9 million annual visitors, 100 farmers, 150 craftspeople, 300 commercial businesspeople, and 50 performers? Pike Place Market in Seattle. It’s also home to a number of senior citizens. Read this beautiful and informative site and find out about this important public market, and then ask yourself if your city doesn’t need such a place of economic opportunity.
American Farmland Trust is working to stop the loss of productive farmland and to promote farming practices that lead to a healthier environment. In particular, see the Farmland Information Library , big piles of information, very big piles. Excellent online resource.
Farmland Fund of PCC Natural Markets, an 8 store chain of markets in the Puget Sound, Washington area. Their Farmland Fund is a non-profit organization that raises money to buy threatened land and put it into organic food production.
A Guide to North American Fairs , dates, links, vendors
Solar baking under the Sonoran Sun , a group of women in Sonora, Mexico, start a bakery using a solar oven.
The Mondragon Cooperatives of Spain , English home page. The Mondragon cooperatives consist of 120 different enterprises, more than 40,000 worker owners. See Mondragon: A better way to go to work? in the June 2000 Oklahoma City Catholic Worker.
Ithaca Hours Online , access to information on starting up a local currency system to support your local economy. Yes, it’s legal, no it’s not counterfeiting (you aren’t issuing US dollars, you are creating a local alternative currency).
San Diego Women’s Bean Project , a small business providing homeless and low-income women with economic opportunity.
Community Supported Agriculture Business Management Series , from Appropriate Technology Transfer for Rural Areas, extensive on-line manual.
TenThousand Villages , providing income to people in Third World villages by marketing their products, a Fair Trade project.
Commercial applications of mini-farming , microenterprises and market gardens. Applications and target enterprises.
WWW Virtual Library on Microcredit , high quality access, links, data, via the Global Development Research Center
Small Farms and their economic and social importance. Plus piles of access to resources, info, and links.
Growing for Market , online presence of a hardcopy publication from Kansas, not much online info, but some interesting print publications and it looks like the publication itself is a keeper. Virtual Farm Tours , interesting link page to site offering tours of successful small farms. Followup has links relating to stories in the publication.
Economics of Transition from State-Capitalist to Cooperative Enterprises , academic paper considering the cooperative as a model for newly liberating economies.
National Cooperative Bank . Has information about coops, including a start-up guide to cooperative business enterprise.
Sustainable Business News , weekly email newsletter for environmentally conscious businesses.
Would you like ground spinal cord with that? Salon.com expose of the fast food industry. You might be surprised what goes into a corporate franchise fast food burger.
Green Money , online access to socially and environmentally responsible investment opportunities, businesses, and services.
Cleaner Production , on-line access to environmental resources for manufacturers and industry folks.
Local Exchange Trading Systems , invent your own local monetary system back by local goods and services.