|
Morag Gamble on Community Gardening On 8 June, Morag gave an inspiring talk on community gardens and community-supported agriculture, and presented an array of colourful slides from the workshops she’s given in 17 or so countries. Here are a few examples she highlighted. Fairview Gardens is a 20-acre farm in Berkeley, California, completely surrounded by residential housing. It has a farm-gate shop and an intercropping orchard, and is part of a growing trend towards community-supported agriculture. The farm also has a school with an edible garden which works as an outdoor classroom. The processes involved in managing this garden are educational, and the students are provided with a fresh food source. In Wales, there's the famous Centre for Alternative Technology. Visitors can stay in cabins and have to work within an "energy budget", as everything they use has an energy rating. They have a choice between two types of toilets – a dry composting system or the flushing variety; the catch is that if anyone prefers to flush, they have to collect the water from a stream which is not in the immediate vicinity! A pedal-power system is used to operate a compost-mixing tumbler. Building work is carried out with materials from the site, and cob – a mixture of clay, sand and straw – is utilised in brick-making. In Korea, well over 70 rice-growing villages are bringing families back into these villages by using an old system of incorporating ducks into their weed control/fertiliser system. Children moving from the city are integrated into the process by being allocated a duckling each. The audience really enjoyed the presentation and asked many questions, Morag answering them with aplomb. I'm hoping we can encourage Morag to give another talk in the not-too-distant future.
|
|
Address: 37 Maple Street, Maleny Qld 4552, Australia Telephone: (07) 5494 2088 (int'l +61 7 5494 2088) Fax: (07) 5499 9246 (int'l +61 7 5499 9246) Email: info@maplestreetco-op.com.au, or maplest.coop@serv.net.au Website: www.maplestreetco-op.com.au |