Small-Scale Organics for Local Consumption
by Rod Castle

Dennis Graham, a resident of Crystal Waters Permaculture Village, started his one-and-a-half-acre intensive organic farm in June this year. The rich alluvial soil on the river flat near the Mary River at Crystal Waters is ideal for Dennis to grow his small crops of vegetables – cauliflower, cabbage, broccoli, onions, lettuce, silverbeet, carrots, beetroot, spring onions and tomatoes, with more summer varieties to come – as well as herbs.

Dennis employs growing techniques such as crop rotation and green manure treatments and is using products from Nutritech Solutions to help revitalise the soil and re-establish its ecological integrity.

This small farm enterprise is a clear example of a natural response that resists an ever increasingly globalised food production system, where the cost of food at most supermarkets does not reflect the true environmental and economic costs of producing it. The aim of the farm at Crystal Waters is primarily to provide local residents with continued access to organically grown vegetables – without their having to take the usual half-hour drive into Maleny. "Localised" organic food production is a political statement which, Dennis says, offers consumers a "common sense" strategy.

Over 20 years ago, Dennis first started growing food organically in Western Australia. Originally he was supplying different outlets including a health food store which he owned and managed. His inspiration to grow organically came from a number of incidents, including watching his children's guinea pigs die from eating three cases of "conventional" lettuce supplied by a neighbouring farm. He compounded the insight and reflection from this incident with a passion to feed his children the healthiest food possible. It was also essential for him to avoid exposure to the various types of chemicals used extensively in agriculture around his area back then.

Dennis currently sells his produce at the weekly markets at Crystal Waters on Saturdays, and supplies any excess to the Co-op and other outlets around the Sunshine Coast. The work on the farm for Dennis is good fun – hard, and yet enjoyable. At the ripe age of sixty-five, he says he owes his fitness to good, clean food. When he isn't getting his hands dirty in the garden, Dennis is renovating his house at Crystal Waters.

We at Maple Street Co-op look forward to being able to supply our members and customers with even more quality organic vegetables, thanks to Dennis's efforts.

[From "Maple Street Co-op News", December 2005/January 2006; published by The Maple Street Co-operative Society Ltd, 37 Maple Street, Maleny, Qld 4552, Australia, tel (07) 5494 2088, email maplest.co-op@serv.net.au, website http://www.maplestreetco-op.com.au]