As my hubby and I sit here late at night after getting our baby to sleep, he shared with me his cousins recent Facebook post. “Paved paradise, put up a parking lot.” one of my favourite songs I remember it was always on the radio when my Dad would have his alarm go off early to start the day, I’d listen to it, enjoy it, think about the words… and go back to sleep. The song resonates with me more and more as the years go & we develop as a society.

Stewarts post immediately made me go - “Oh my goodness, he did the research to the question, I have to ask him if I can share this!” And he said yes. The end of his post mentions we all need to eat…. we need to ensure our sustainability for ourselves, individual households & community. What do you think?

“I was listening to Joni Mitchell's 1970 hit, the ubiquitous " Big Yellow Taxi" with the lyrics, "Paved paradise, put up a parking lot".
I wondered statistically, just how many paved parking lots or (developed land) have occurred since 1970.
In that year, there was 62.2 million hectares of farm land. In the preceding 60 years, 2.8 million hectares have been developed.
This is a 4.5% decrease in farm land. At a linear decrease, theoretically it would take 1273 years to "pave" all the farm land in Canada! The loss of farmland will probably occur exponentially so my best guess is 800 years to lose all existing farmland.
But we all need to eat so future generations will have to find a balance and plan carefully  to avoid famines and parking lots!”

_ by Stewart McKechnie

Thanks Stewart for letting me share! 🙏