Reading in progress
Wednesday 11 November 2026
What is working, where, and who made it work. Read the whole turn of the earth in two minutes, then go as deep as you like.
Put the paper shopping bag you keep meaning to recycle by the door, ready to carry your next shop home.
315 of 365Della Duncan’s starting point is a familiar tension: people may want their work to support a more just and regenerative economy while earning a living in a system that rewards extraction, competition and profit. Duncan is a Right Livelihood Coach, co-host of the Upstream Podcast, and co-designer and co-facilitator of a course on regenerative livelihoods. Her article treats work not only as a set of tasks, but as a place where values meet ownership, decision-making and everyday workplace habits.
One useful distinction is between the purpose of an organisation and the way it is run. A nonprofit may pursue a social mission yet keep decisions opaque and management top-down; a conventional business may concentrate ownership and profits. Duncan points to worker cooperatives and worker self-directed nonprofits as forms that can distribute power more equitably, while warning that democratic structures do not automatically remove the contradictions of capitalism.
That distinction changes the scale of the question. A person does not necessarily have to abandon their current work to redirect their skills, Duncan writes, but individual purpose is only part of the picture. Workplace norms such as overwork, urgency and competition can persist even in organisations seeking social change. She also places livelihoods within wider movements and communities, rather than treating meaningful work as a private achievement.
Map who owns your workplace, who makes decisions and who benefits. Then identify one practical change—such as making a decision-making process more transparent—that could distribute voice more equitably.
Gaia Education · Read the source
A computer science researcher has built a system to reroute surplus food from truckloads headed for landfill to food pantries. The report gives the problem in plain terms: food exists, but getting it to the people who need it is a matter of logistics. The useful question is not whether a model can sort the problem, but whether a pantry can receive a delivery in time, with the staff and storage to handle it.
The harvest summary does not say what the system predicts, how it matches donors and pantries, or how often its recommendations fail. Those details matter. A wrong match can mean spoiled food and another unpaid hour for someone already doing the receiving and sorting. The work of maintaining accurate inventories and making deliveries possible belongs to people and organisations; software does not remove that labour.
There is also a cost ledger beyond the avoided landfill: computing, servers, and the people who enter and maintain the data. Without figures, it is hard to know whether this particular system saves more than it asks of the network. It may still be a useful bit of coordination, provided a person can override it and the pantry's needs count as much as the donor's surplus.
Today's reading is about who holds power at work. That is a fitting test for this tool: does it give local food workers more say over what arrives and when, or merely make their labour easier to schedule from elsewhere? The readings above this column were drafted with a machine too; that fact is worth naming, not dressing up as a claim of authority.
Regeneration International, “Computer Science Researcher Reroutes Truckloads of Excess Food From Landfills to Food Pantries” · source
A quick one-pot supper for a cold evening, with carrots from the store and lentils from the cupboard.
Finely chop the onion and carrots; chop any clean carrot tops too, keeping them aside. Warm the oil in a saucepan, add the onion and cumin, and cook until the onion turns translucent, then stir in the carrots and lentils. Pour in the stock, bring to a simmer and cook uncovered for 18–22 minutes, stirring now and then, until the lentils have collapsed and the carrots yield to a knife. Stir in the vinegar and carrot tops, if using, and season; add a splash of water if the pot has thickened more than you like.
Nothing drops off. Today's readings move here tomorrow morning and stay, filed under the entrypoint they came in on. Below is the back-spool already gathered from the network.
The institutions whose public output feeds this reading. Each is watched every morning for what it publishes openly. Individuals are not listed here.
Permaculture Association · Permaculture Magazine · Regeneration International · Seed Savers Exchange · Garden Organic · Navdanya · Biodynamic Association UK · Biodynamic Demeter Alliance · Rodale Institute · Kiss the Ground · Savory Institute · Landworkers Alliance · Sustainable Food Trust · Real Farming Trust · Agroforestry Research Trust · Soil Association · A Growing Culture · Pasture for Life · Farmerama Radio
Ecosystem Restoration Communities · Rewilding Britain · Rewilding Europe · Trees for Life · Knepp Estate · Beaver Trust
The Restart Project · Low-tech Magazine · Makery · Repair Cafe International · Precious Plastic · Library of Things · Wuyong (Ma Ke)
Centre for Alternative Technology · AECB · Passivhaus Trust · Community Energy England
Julie's Bicycle · Dark Mountain Project · Emergence Magazine · Orion Magazine · Resurgence & Ecologist
Shareable · Transition Network · Global Ecovillage Network · Capital Institute
Bioneers · Gaia Education · Schumacher College · Center for Humans and Nature · Findhorn Foundation