009 / Amigo Bob

Amigo Bob Cantisano who passed away December 26, 2020, was and remains a mountain of influence on the Organic Farming world, both in California and worldwide. He was one of the founders of the organic movement in the early 70's and made his life’s work about chemical free soil and farming. See the LA Times Obituary to get the full history of this remarkable man. The loss of Amigo is huge. I'm so glad he gave me the time he did and as we touched on very difficult topics for this podcast.

This interview with Amigo was about Robert Van De Bosch who was killed for writing 'The Pesticide Conspiracy' in 1978 by the ‘Pesticide Mafia’ as he coined them. This is relevant information for today because Van was a highly respected and influential entomologist who'd had enough of the games University of California was playing with agriculture in allowing the pesticide industry carte blanche in our food system. To understand where we are, we have to look at the past. Van paid the price for speaking out and his pivotal book stands alone as a siren call to the dangers of allowing chemical interests to control our food and farming.