The Healthy Planet Radio Show.
The Healthy Planet Radio Show has been airing on WUSB, 90.1 FM since January of 2007. It immediately follows Democracy Now! during “drive time,” from 6 to 7 PM. Now airing on the first and third Fridays of each month, HealthyPlanet’s Bob DiBenedetto brings you twice as much empowering, life-and-world-changing information as before.
We’re proud to announce that The Healthy Planet Radio Show has won 2nd Place at the 2023 Press Club of Long Island (PCLI) Media Awards for Environment Radio. PCLI is one of the largest pro chapters of the Society of Professional Journalists. They’re devoted to protecting and advocating for First Amendment rights, furthering ethical standards and providing ongoing training for their members. Thank you PCLI for that recognition!
WUSB is LI’s largest non-commercial, free-form radio station. The signal can be heard at 90.1 FM on most of Long Island, and in Southern Connecticut, parts of NYC (Brooklyn and Queens), and Westchester County. It also simulcasts on 107.3 FM to reach Stony Brook University campus. It can be heard over the Internet 24/7, on www.WUSB.FM.
Suburban Composting:
Turning Your Waste
Into Black Gold
With Dylan Licopoli of Home Organic Gardening Service
LISTEN HERE: Suburban Composting: From Waste to Black Gold
Show Description:
Join HealthyPlanet’s Bob DiBenedetto for an interview with organic gardening and composting expert Dylan Licopoli of Home Organic Gardening Service. They discuss the whys and hows of successful composting of food and yard waste in a suburban setting. Home composting will turn your uncooked plant food wastes into a nutrient-rich black gold that can be used in your outdoor and indoor gardens. Dylan outlines what’s needed to build and maintain what he has found to be the most effective composting method. They also discuss practices and resources to help you get your compost up and running, while avoiding common mistakes.
According to Feeding America, shockingly, nearly 40% of all food in America is wasted. That’s 119 billion pounds of food—or the equivalent of 130 billion meals and more than $408 billion in food thrown away yearly. While there is waste at every stage of our food production and distribution system, food waste in our homes makes up about 39% of all food waste – about 42 billion pounds per year.
Federal and local government policies are now focused on reducing food waste in this country. In September 2015, the US Department of Agriculture and EPA announced the US 2030 Food Loss and Waste Reduction goal, the first-ever domestic goal to reduce food loss and waste. The objective is to cut food loss and waste in half by 2030.
And closer to home, in June of this year, the NY City Council passed the Zero Waste Act to make New York a more sustainable, greener city. And part of that plan by Mayor Eric Adams’ administration calls for the mandatory composting and separating of organic waste for all households and businesses by next year. That will become the largest composting program on the planet!
But currently, most Long Islanders still don’t have access to any widescale, coordinated efforts at composting food wastes. That leaves each of us responsible for keeping our food waste out of the waste stream, where it is a significant contributor to global warming via methane emissions.
Home composting is not for everyone. But if you’re excited by the possibility of cutting down your waste stream significantly, while improving your garden and contributing to a stable climate, composting may be just right for you.
Join us to get informed–which is the first step to becoming part of the solution!
Thank you for sharing this show with your friends and family!
If you’ve learned from, enjoyed, or grown from listening to this and other HealthyPlanet radio shows over the past 17 years, please show your support for our 501c3 nonprofit health and environmental work by making a tax-deductible contribution and becoming a HealthyPlanet member. This is a team effort, and you are part of our team!
Related Links and Resources:
- Home Organic Gardening ServiceOpens in a new tab
- Feeding America: Food Waste and Food RescueOpens in a new tab
- The Guardian: Avoiding meat and dairy is ‘single biggest way’ to reduce your impact on EarthOpens in a new tab
- Cornell Cooperative Extension: Composting ResourcesOpens in a new tab
- FACT SHEET: Biden-Harris Administration Commit to End Hunger and Malnutrition and Build Sustainable Resilient Food SystemsOpens in a new tab
- How much of the world’s land would we need in order to feed the global population with the average diet of a given country?Opens in a new tab
- Mayor Adams Announces Roadmap for Nation's Largest Compost Collection ProgramOpens in a new tab
- TimeOut: Brooklyn will soon have curbside composting in every neighborhoodOpens in a new tab
- Home Organic Gardening Service: Composting SystemsOpens in a new tab
- National Geographic: A 5-Step Plan To Feed The WorldOpens in a new tab
- US EPA: United States 2030 Food Loss and Waste Reduction GoalOpens in a new tab
About Dylan Licopoli and Home Organic Gardening Service
HOME ORGANIC GARDENING SERVICE or HOGS, is a family business, dedicated to planting seeds of all kinds, literal and metaphorical. In addition to practical installation and maintenance of organic vegetable gardens and systems, HOGS is committed to educating and celebrating a community of mindful gardeners on Long Island.
In Dylan’s own words:
“Some of my earliest, and fondest, memories are of gardening with my grandpa. I remember summer afternoons spent picking tomatoes and cucumbers from the garden, to eat that evening with dinner. Even then I recognized that few things are as wonderful as harvesting and eating fresh fruits and vegetables that you have grown yourself. And if you are gardening organically, you are in very real ways contributing to the health and well being of Earth.
So, in 2010, with some prodding from my partner and love, Jesse, I left my job as a construction supervisor in New York City, and made it my mission to bring organic vegetable gardening to as many friends and neighbors as possible. Since then Home Organic Gardening Service (HOGS for short) has designed and installed more than 200 gardens, composting systems, hoop houses, and water management systems here on Long Island.
I have over 25 years experience in the construction and landscaping industries, including expert tree surgeon and organic gardening certifications. I also hold an Interdisciplinary Bachelors degree from SUNY Oneonta, and a 200-hour Hatha Yoga Teaching Certification. Most recently, I earned Master Gardener certification through Cornell Cooperative Extension, as well as Permaculture Design certification through the Punta Mona Center for Sustainable Living and Education, el Caribe Sur, Costa Rica.
I truly believe in my heart that the more people who experience the wonders of organic vegetable gardening for themselves, the healthier our world will be.”
Thank you for sharing this show with your friends and family!
If you’ve learned from, enjoyed, or grown from listening to this and other HealthyPlanet radio shows over the past 17 years, please show your support for our 501c3 nonprofit health and environmental work by making a tax-deductible contribution and becoming a HealthyPlanet member. This is a team effort, and you are part of our team!
SOME PAST GUESTS ON THE HEALTHY PLANET RADIO SHOW
- Eric Adams, Brooklyn Borough President, Four-Term State Senator, Retired Police Captain
- Dr Michael Klaper, author, diet & health expert of Moving Medicine Forward
- Neal D. Barnard, MD, FACC of the Physician’s Committee For Responsible Medicine (PCRM)
- Dr. Joel Fuhrman, author of Disease-Proof Your Child and many more.
- Thomas Falcone, Chief Executive Officer of the Long Island Power Authority (LIPA)
- Gavin A. Schmidt, climatologist, Director NASA Goddard Institute for Space Studies, Climate Scientist
- T. Colin Campbell, Ph.D., author of The China Study
- Terry Tamminen, author of Lives Per Gallon
- Randall S. Abate, author of Climate Change And The Voiceless, inaugural Rechnitz Family Endowed Chair in Marine and Environmental Law and Policy and a Professor in the Department of Political Science and Sociology
- Todd Winant, author of Earth Voice, Food Choice
- David Doniger, Senior Strategic Director Climate & Clean Energy Program Natural Resources Defense Council
- Caldwell B. Esselstyn, MD, author of Prevent and Reverse Heart Disease
- Adrienne Esposito, Co-Founder Citizens Campaign For The Environment
- Collin Rees, US Program Manager, Oil Change International
- Michael Voltz, Director of Energy Efficiency and Renewables, PSEG, LI
- Sarah Anker, Suffolk County Legislator
- Karen Ranzi, author of Creating Healthy Children Through Attachment Parenting and Raw Foods
- Zoltan Rona, MD, MSc, author of Vitamin D: The Sunshine Vitamin
- Gordian Raacke of Renewable Energy Long Island,
- Brian Clement of The Hippocrates Institute
- Paul Getsos, National Director of the People’s Climate Movement
- Karen Perry Stillerman, senior analyst, in the Food and Environment Program at the Union of Concerned Scientists
- Jonathan Balcombe, Biologist, Author & Director of Animal Sentience, the Humane Society Institute for Science and Policy
- Chuck Kutscher, Center Director, Buildings and Thermal Systems at the National Renewable Energy Laboratory (NREL)
- David Goldston, The Director of Government Affairs for the Natural Resources Defense Council
- Karen Davis, PhD Founder and President of United Poultry Concerns
- Janice Nolen, Assistant Vice President, National Policy for the American Lung Association
- Alex Beauchamp, Food & Water Watch’s Northeast Region Director
- Brigitte Mars, author of The Home Reference to Holistic Health and Healing, and many more
- Will Tuttle, educator and author of The World Peace Diet
- Gerald Iversen, founder of Simple Living Works
- Hope Bohanec, author of The Ultimate Betrayal: Is There Happy Meat?
- Brenda Davis, RD, author, past chair Vegetarian Nutrition Dietetic Practice Group of the Academy of Nutrition and Dietetics
- David Robinson Simon, author Meatonomics: The Bizarre Economics of Meat and Dairy
- Robin Helfritch, Founding Director of Open the Cages Alliance and the Vegan Living Program
- Julie M. Simon, author The Emotional Eater’s Repair Manual
- Vesanto Melina, RD, nutrition expert, co-author of Becoming Raw and the Raw Food Revolution Diet and many more
- Michael Greger, MD, author, internationally recognized speaker of NutritionFacts.org
- Dawn Moncrief, Founder and Executive Director of the non-profit organization, A Well-Fed World
- Jeff Gohringer, National Press Secretary of the League of Conservation Voters
- Carol Murphy, Executive Director of the Alliance for Clean Energy New York (ACE NY)
- Dr. Steve Blake, author of Understanding Dietary Fats and Oils: A Scientific Guide to their Health Effects, and 28 other books
- Justin Van Kleek, freelance writer, educator, community organizer.
- Demosthenes Maratos, Sustainability Institute Communications Director
- Paul Gallay, Riverkeeper’s Executive Director and Hudson Riverkeeper
- Bill Freese, Center for Food Policy’s Science Policy Analyst
- Michael Parrish DuDell, Managing Editor of ecomagination.com
- Dr Alan Goldhamer, founder of the TrueNorth Health Center, author of The Health Promoting Cookbook and many more
- Mike Hudak, Enviro Advocate, author Western Turf Wars: The Politics of Public Lands Ranching
- Tim VanOrden, elite athlete and creator of the Running Raw Project
- Brett Cotter, Founder, CEO Stress is gone, LLC
- Jennifer K. Reilly, R.D., senior nutritionist The Cancer Project, co-author The Cancer Survivor’s Guide
- Michael Weber, Farm Animal Reform Movement Campaign Coordinator
- Steve Meyrowitz, The Sproutman, author of many books
- Nneka Leiba, Environmental Health Researcher for the Environmental working group
- Paul McRandal, National Resources Defense Council
- Barbara Loe Fisher, Co-Founder and President of the National Vaccine Information Center
- Ryan Zinn, the National Campaign Coordinator for the Organic Consumer Association
Ashok Gupta, senior energy economist and director of NRDC’s Air and Energy Program
Justin Van Kleeck, community organizer. Founder the Triangle Chicken Advocates microsanctuary
- Connie Spence, founder of The Vegan Justice League
- Eric Weltman, senior organizer Food and Water Watch
- Cate Rodgers, The Climate Reality Project
- William McKeever, Author Emperors Of The Deep: Sharks–The Ocean’s Most Mysterious, Most Misunderstood, & Most Important Guardians
- Jay Best, environmental scientist and engineer, founder and president of Green Team Long Island
- Dhar Jamail, award-winning journalist & author The End of Ice: Bearing Witness and Finding Meaning in the Path of Climate Disruption.
- Dr. Sailesh Rao, Founder/Exec. Director Climate Healers, Author two books, Producer of Cowspiracy, What the Health & Others.
- Brendan DeMelle, Executive Director DeSmog
- Lauren Ornelas, Founder/President, Food Empowerment Project
- Rob Herring, Producer/Director of The Need To Grow film
- Robyn Engman, R.D. Registered Dietician and Trained Chef with Nutrition In Motion
Marisa Miller Wolfson, Film creator, long time activist and co-author of the book, Vegucated Family Table
- Ali Tabrizi, Film Director Seaspiracy
- Joel Levin, Executive Director, Plug In America
- Karl Grossman, Award-winning investigative journalist, author of six books, longtime environmental and anti-nuclear activist/educator.
- Mary Grant, Public Water For All Campaign Director, Food & Water Watch
- Ron Weiss, MD, Ethos Primary Care and Ethos Farm Project
- Andrew Knight, Veterinary Professor of Animal Welfare and Ethics, Founding Director University of Winchester Centre for Animal Welfare,
- Gene Baur, Author, President and Co-Founder, Farm Sanctuary
- Rosemary Mascali, Co-Founder Drive Electric Long Island EV Coalition, Chair Outreach Committee.
- Dylan Licopoli, Master Organic Gardener, Home Organic Garden Service
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Hear The Healthy Planet Radio Show twice monthly at 6PM, with Bob DiBenedetto on the first and third Fridays of each month, on WUSB, 90.1FM, or Live Stream at: http://wusb.fm/
Free of charge, and rich with information and inspiration!
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The Healthy Planet Radio show focuses on topics that will help to educate you about the deep connection among all life on Earth, and the powerful effects your everyday choices can have on creating a clean, healthy and compassionate world.
Listen, learn, grow, join us in making a difference!
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