New VGFP Staff: Janét Moore

Janét (pronounced Jeanette) Moore, VGFP's newest Farmer-Teacher Trainer, grew-up in Snohomish County, WA, north of Seattle, and is passionate about the environment and sustainable agriculture. As a teen she helped found the Sno-Isle Natural Food Co-op in Everett and started an organic market garden with her mom, selling produce to the co-op and local restaurants; they prepared the soil by hand, using How to Grow More Vegetables to guide their farm design. Growing up on an organically rich, sponge-like peat bog in the ancient flood plain of the Snohomish River, Janét developed an appreciation for the world’s dearth of fertile soil. Her love for nature developed as she and her siblings played in the woods, gravel pits, and any open area they could find. Janét still seeks out natural places, hiking and camping often, and finds it brings her peace, and has been key to recovering from the consequences of a tumultuous childhood.

Janét spent time traveling the country, making and selling jewelry, then settled down as a single mother, working as a nursing assistant. While attending community college, she joined an environmental group, advocating for environmental reforms on campus and in her community. In 1999, she helped plan and participated in the World Trade Organization (WTO) protests in Seattle, heightening her understanding of issues such as workers' rights, sustainable economies, and the environmental/human rights failures of globalization. Also in 1999, Janét heard Dr. Elaine Ingham, a leading soil microbiologist, speak at a Washington Tilth Conference, sparking enduring respect for the vital role of soil microbes in our world. In 2006, Janét graduated from Utah State University with honors and a B.S. in Soil & Water Science, but was disappointed that the chemical farming perspective pervaded the department, largely ignoring the role of soil biology. After graduating, she worked for the USDA Natural Resource Conservation Service and US Forest Service, mapping soils in remote locations in Wyoming and Minnesota for several years.

In 2014, Janét and her son moved to Coos Bay, Oregon where she worked as produce manager at the local natural food co-op while serving as co-director of an all-volunteer environmental NPO, Coast Range Forest Watch. Using community science to survey for Marbled Murrelets (an endangered seabird), Janét helped halt old-growth logging in a state forest, advocating for timber policy reform, and increasing awareness of the importance of forest ecology. She gave presentations on the dangers of aerial herbicide spraying, a common timber industry practice in Oregon, and advocated for victims of spray drift. She also worked to organize community opposition to the largest potential source of pollution in Oregon, the failed Jordan Cove LNG export facility, as well as the proposed Coos Bay cargo-shipping terminals (another potential polluter), and other local environmental issues.

Currently, Janét is renewing her interest in sustainable agriculture and studying micro-morphology (using microscopy to monitor soil health) in her spare time, through the Soil Food Web School founded by Dr. Ingham. She is happy to join Ecology Action and focus on understanding the closed-loop sustainable mini-farming GROW BIOINTENSIVE method, to grow healthy food while growing soil, and to be part of long-term research into truly sustainable practices. She is excited to work at VGFP with a network of bioregional seed savers, working together to preserve genetic diversity for our future security. She appreciates the opportunity to learn to design and grow a complete vegan diet in the smallest space possible, and believes that it is increasingly important that more people avail themselves of this critical skill-set developed by Ecology Action, in light of resource scarcity. She says that GB is beautiful because, “...it's a tried-and-true way for people almost anywhere to meet most, if not all, of their dietary needs, while building soil organic matter and saving water, using only simple hand tools.”!

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