Millions of acres of free food

http://www.timebomb2000.com/vb/showthread.php?t=97986&highlight=millions+acres+free+food

To Preserve Their Health and Heritage, Arizona
Indians Reclaim Ancient Foods
By Jane E. Brody
(short excerpt)
Going back to one's roots could soon take on a
more literal meaning for the Indians of the
American Southwest, as well as for peoples
elsewhere in the world who are poorly adapted
to rich, refined foods.
For the sake of their health, as well as their
cultural heritage, the Pima and Tohono O'odham
tribes of Arizona are being urged to rediscover
the desert foods their people traditionally
consumed until as recently as the 1940's.
Studies strongly indicate that people who
evolved in these arid lands are metabolically
best suited to the feast-and-famine cycles of
their forebears who survived on the desert's
unpredictable bounty, both wild and cultivated.
By contrast, the modern North American diet is
making them sick. With rich food perpetually
available, weights in the high 200's and 300's
are not uncommon among these once-lean people.
As many as half the Pima and Tohono O'odham
(formerly Papago) Indians now develop diabetes
by the age of 35, an incidence 15 times higher
than for Americans as a whole. Yet, before
World War II, diabetes was rare in this
population.
Similar problems have been found among
Australian aborigines, Pacific Islanders and
other peoples whose survival historically
depended on their ability to stash away calories
in times of plenty to sustain them during
droughts and crop failures. The Pima and Tohono
O'odham Indians seem unusually efficient at
turning calories to body fat; nutritionists say
they gain weight readily on the kinds and
amounts of foods people of European descent
can eat with no problem.
One tablespoon of buds from the cholla cactus
has as much calcium as eight ounces of milk.
The buds are rich in soluble fiber that helps
regulate blood sugar.
Preliminary studies have indicated that a
change in the Indian diet back to the beans,
corn, grains, greens and other low-fat high-
fiber plant foods that their ancestors
depended upon can normalize blood sugar,
suppress between-meal hunger and probably
also foster weight loss.