BBC Radio 4's Food Programme recently broadcasted an excellent programme called Can Britain become self-sufficient? The programme explores the changing global food environment, and the role of the supermarket economy, verses the prospect of a healthy, local food economy. It asked the questions, "Should Britain Feed Itself?", and Can Britain Feed Itself?" As if in answer to the BBC's inquiry, Unicorn Grocery in Chorlton has recently purchased 21 acres of horticulture land near Warrington, on which to grow its own fruit and vegetables.

A short video clip from when East Salford project Grow Cook Eat visited Glebelands market garden in Sale, to pick up tips for their 'urban guerilla' gardening plans to transform the alleyways of Salford. According to the Soil Association, Glebelands is the UK's only peri-urban (on the edge of the city) organic market garden, which is a very worrying statistic. The video features Lesley Bryson, who co-ordinates Glebelands, and Kevin Coakley from St. Sebastians Community Centre in Salford.

Cuban visionary Roberto Perez will be doing a public talk in Manchester on September 24th, about how Cuba made their rapid transition to a low energy, sustainable society. During what became known as their 'Special Period', the people of Cuba transformed their urban neighbourhoods into green, food producing environments. With oil supplies peaking, UK citizens are being forced to pay increasingly higher food and energy bills. As part of his UK tour, Perez will be sharing his experiences with Manchester people, about how communities can work together, to be more self-reliant, and develop solutions to global food insecurity by growing our own food around the City.         

Contained herein are links to a number of news articles, that appeared in national newspapers, concerning the  threat to global food security, caused by the interrelated problems of peaking oil supplies, biofuel production, climate change, the meat industy and human population growth. 

Guardian, December 02 2003, George Monbiot
Bottom of the barrel: The world is running out of oil - so why do politicians refuse to talk about it?
This is an old article but I have added a link to it here because it contains an excellent quote from Monbiot, which is very relevant to permaculture design: