The best of both worlds: Regen ag and organics

/in , ,
Aotearoa New Zealand is seeing a groundswell of regenerative agriculture. Martin Freeth finds out just how complementary the new thinking and practices are with our longer tradition of organic farming. 

We hope you enjoy this free article from OrganicNZ. Join us for access to exclusive members-only content.

Southland farmer Tim Gow smiles to himself when regenerative agriculture (regen) is discussed. This organic sheep and beef farmer has been building soil quality, growing nutrient-dense feed for well-adapted animals, and concerning himself with carbon capture and retention for over three decades. The tenets of today’s regen movement are hardly new to him.  

Says Tim: “I’m enthusiastic about the fact that many people are moving to regen, which is a whole lot better than using all that synthetic fertiliser and chemicals, but they seem to be overcomplicating something which is basically simple and actually very old.” 

Sabbatical for the soil 

Tim Gow began ‘sabbatical fallowing’ – the practice of annually locking up one seventh of the farm for much of the year to enable natural composting of plants and soil, and regeneration of everything that grows above and below ground – in 1987.  

Tim and his wife Helen haven’t looked back since their first rotation when improvements started showing up in soil depth and biology, feed supply and livestock health. Their 469-hectare farm, Mangapiri Downs on rolling country near Blackmount, is now into its fifth rotation – and has long since become a strong platform for their stud breeding of distinctive Shire hair sheep (Wiltshire-Marsh cross) and polled Highland Tufty cattle.  

Ferdinand, a Tufty (polled Highland) bull calf

Breeding for natural health 

It’s also now more than three decades since the Gows achieved organic certification as meat and livestock producers through BioGro NZ (March 1989). For Tim, an organic approach to every aspect of farm management is a perfect, natural complement to fallowing. He hasn’t drenched or vaccinated an animal in 32 years – hasn’t needed to because Mangapiri’s adaptively bred sheep and cattle are so healthy on dense, diverse pastures and naturally enriched soils.  

The Shire rams and ewes, and Tufty cattle, are marketed to farmers throughout New Zealand as organic livestock for use in their production flocks and herds. Both have been advanced (and trademarked) on the strengths of selective breeding for hardiness and meat production, and of the organic and fallowing management system at Mangapiri.  

“Surely it’s time to reject chemicals, look to the basic cause of parasites and disease and move to organic methods of control, such as breeding the natural immunity back into your stock like they used to have before the chemicals and drench arrived over 60 years ago,” says Tim in his latest stud stock catalogue. 

Building vitality in the soil  

With sabbatical fallowing, that seventh portion of the farm is shut off each October, as a hay paddock would be, after being lightly grazed and having the residual of grasses, herbs and legumes trampled by the animals.  

“You fold much of your spring growth and summer seeds down into the topsoil where it becomes compost … you leave it until late the next winter before putting stock in again to take the top off that paddock’s huge growth.” 

The Gows import no feed and make no baleage; winter feed is all standing grass crops, mostly in blocks that are being fallowed that year. On shut-off areas, Tim has been amazed at the natural resurgence of plant life, including traditional grasses and Maku lotus not otherwise seen for decades.  

“You can see the vitality in the soil … its organic matter, worm life and just the look and smell of it. It becomes soil that will get you through a drought or flood.” 

Tim was inspired while travelling in Asia, the Middle East and Europe in the late 1970s and again in the mid-80s. He saw farmers applying their own versions of fallowing, and recognised this as ancient wisdom even referred to in the Bible, Koran and Torah.  

“I came home determined to give it a go,” he says. Within a decade, the benefits of fallowing at Mangapiri were recognised by soil scientists from Invermay Research Station, who compared soils of the same type from 19 Southland farms. 

What constitutes ‘regenerative’? 

Could there be a more regenerative farmer? Tim Gow – organic producer, sabbatical fallowing practitioner and man of constant inquiry – will surely look the part to anyone reading this year’s ‘Regenerative agriculture in Aotearoa New Zealand’ paper from Manaaki Whenua Landcare Research. 

The researchers’ literature review and wide consultation led them to identify a ‘regen mindset’ among farmers, with 11 core principles that include: treat the farm as a living system; maximise year-round photosynthesis; minimise disturbance; harness diversity; and manage livestock holistically – see sidebar. 

The Manaaki Whenua team refrain from providing a standard definition of regen because, they say, of the diversity of ideas and practices in the regenerative basket, and because more work is needed to understand the contribution of concepts in te ao Māori like kaitiakitanga. There is nothing for regen, at least in New Zealand, as clear and concise as the international definition for organic agriculture (OA) – see sidebar. 

Regen obviously does encompass the same ideas. As the Manaaki Whenua paper notes, regenerative principles and practices – the term itself originates from the United States in the late 1970s – are all about reversing the environmental damage now associated with conventional farming, and about managing ‘agroecosystems’ in holistic ways for continuous improvement in social and cultural terms as well as environmental. (An agroecosystem is a natural ecosystem modified by people for the production of food and fibre. For an overview of the concept and some related research, see  sciencedirect.com/topics/agricultural-and-biological-sciences/agroecosystems.) 

shire sheep.
Shire sheep (Wiltshire-Marsh cross) at Mangapiri Downs, Southland

Regen network: Quorum Sense 

In New Zealand today, there are said to be at least 1000 farmers systematically applying regen practices in their commercial production of milk, meat, fibre and/or plant crops. The figure comes from Quorum Sense, a farmers’ network formed in 2018 with a mission to ‘generate and share practical knowledge to support regenerative farm systems and vibrant rural communities’ – see quorumsense.org.nz. Quorum Sense holds seminars and field days, and shares stories online – all reflecting ‘learn together’ and ‘make context-specific decisions’ which are two more of the Manaaki Whenua-articulated principles. 

Needless to say, many of regen’s ‘linked in’ farmers are also certified organic producers, or on their way to becoming so. They recognise the foundational importance of soil health, the value of multispecies pastures, and the need for great care in matching animals and their feed requirements to nature and local conditions, while also eschewing synthetic fertilisers and chemical control of diseases, pests and weeds. 

You can see the vitality in the soil … its organic matter, worm life and just the look and smell of it. It becomes soil that will get you through a drought or flood.

Regen and organic working together   

Russell and Charlotte Heald, dairy farmers near Norsewood in southern Hawke’s Bay, are a good example. Last season, they milked 385 cows (once a day), with no inorganic inputs, much care in the rotational grazing regime on their nine-species pastures, and a strong focus on prevention of cow health issues, not just treatment. The Healds see a perfect fit between regenerative and organic – and they expect to attain full certification this November. 

“They’re working very well together as one cohesive system,” says Charlotte. “With organics there are few things no longer in the toolbox … you might want to apply a bit of N to help one paddock along or spray out some blackberry but you can’t and anyway, we now have effective alternatives,” says Russell, for whom the transition from conventional dairying began in 2017. 

The Healds went regenerative first with advice from a biological farming advisor on a new pasture mix of grasses, herbs and legumes, and soil enhancement using fish-based products under the Biosea brand. Benefits in soil and plant health were evident in the first season, says Russell, along with a nearly $200,000 saving in feed costs and a much reduced bill for animal health.  

Organic certification was the obvious next step, says Charlotte. “It was going well with all the changes we were making but we were also seeing how people increasingly want to know more about where their food comes from … to be assured of its quality and the integrity of the farming system. That’s where organic certification becomes so valuable … and it is also about completing the alignment with our own values.”  

For Russell, the basics are the same. “It’s all about building the immunity and health of the animals, and that flows out of having healthier soil and healthier plants,” he says.  

Not to be forgotten also is the need for farm profitability – and the Healds say their move to regenerative organic dairying has been positive in that regard, even through the particularly dry 2020–21 season. 

11 regenerative principles

  1. The farm is a living system
  2. Make context-specific decisions
  3. Question everything
  4. Learn together
  5. Failure is part of the journey
  6. Open and flexible toolkit
  7. Plan for what you want; start with what you have
  8. Maximise photosynthesis (year round)
  9. Minimise disturbance
  10. Harness diversity
  11. Manage livestock strategically/holistically

More information available at: www.landcareresearch.co.nz

Market value and provenance of food  

The regen movement definitely does have farmers’ financial health in mind: that’s part of social and cultural wellbeing. As the Manaaki Whenua paper notes, the longer-term aspiration is for regeneratively produced New Zealand food and fibre to accrue higher value as global markets recognise the embedded environmental benefits. In one sense, organic certification gives producers a headstart on this (as well as adding the quality assurance of ‘organic’ to each item of product). 

Simon Osborne, mid-Canterbury arable farmer and co-founder of Quorum Sense, thinks regen will have market value in itself when the farming and ecosystem provenance of food can be conveyed directly from producer to consumer through digital communication. Meantime, he says, it just isn’t realistic, or necessary, for every regen farmer to strive for organic certification.  

“It is probably relatively easy for pastoral farmers with their twin focus on soil fertility for growing grasses and on animal health because they have readily available organic options… it isn’t the same for large-scale arable producers like me, without huge additional costs and lots more bloody hard work,” says Simon.  

No-till arable farming 

His farming, on 280 hectares of mostly shallow clay loam near Leeston, is ‘no-till’ at its best in New Zealand. Simon has carried on and refined the practices of his father through 30 years of his own trial and error with different crops, companion planting and rotations. He grows wheat, barley, peas and various other crops – and he continues to trial new ones. 

Today his soils have depth, structure and microbial activity like never before, supporting deeper roots and more vigorous growth above ground. The farm has been at various times a learning site for agronomy students at nearby Lincoln University.  

He doesn’t use insecticides or fungicides and makes minimum, targeted use of nitrogen fertiliser, He does use glyphosate as a “primary cultivation tool” in different areas of the farm annually, prior to sowing. The only viable alternative would be extensive tillage, exposing the soil to more weeds, and pest and disease risks. That’s not an option for a farmer with such passion for his soil – and one whose soil tests show no detriment to microbial activity from very limited spraying.  

People increasingly want to know more about where their food comes from … to be assured of its quality and the integrity of the farming system.

Common ground 

Simon – and scores of others consulted for the Manaaki Whenua paper – see organic farming and regen both springing from the same philosophical, emotional and practical rejection of conventional, often called ‘industrial’ or ‘intensive’, agriculture with its bias to monoculture, and reliance on synthetic nitrogen and phosphate fertilisers, on agrichemicals and on animal antibiotics. These are all associated with freshwater water degradation, soil and biodiversity loss, excessive carbon emissions and climate change.  

“We have a huge debt of gratitude to the pioneering organics movement. If they hadn’t held the line over the past 50 years, there would be no starting point for regen … industrial agriculture would have taken over lock, stock and barrel,” says Simon. 

Manaaki Whenua describes regen as ‘a grass roots, farmer-driven movement founded in an ecological paradigm’ and its members as engaged in ‘wider systems thinking … with an outcomes focus’.  

To farmers like Simon Osborne – and others in the regen movement spoken for this article – it all comes down to this mindset of the 11 principles, and to personal willingness and capability to adopt alternatives to the conventional model.  

All share a disdain for farming based on manufactured inputs and production growth goals that have proven, longer-term damage to ecosystems. But they see no one alternative prescription for every farm or growing operation that will reverse the damage, while producing nutritious, affordable food for all and sustaining communities of farmers financially and socially. There is a common concern that achieving organic certification has become too prescriptive, and hence costly and time consuming, for farmers and too focused on creating niche consumer markets for food. 

It all starts with soil health 

Regenerative or organic, everything starts with soil health – that is certainly clear. Seems clear also that out on the land, Tim and Helen Gow, Russell and Charlotte Heald, and Simon Osborne are all moving in the same direction.  

Martin Freeth is a journalist, consultant and olive grower based in the Wellington region.  

Organics: the time is now!  

/in ,

We need to lead the way

By Noel Josephson, CEO of Ceres Organics 

We hope you enjoy this free article from OrganicNZ. Join us for access to exclusive members-only content.

The growth of the organic market is significant such that within a relatively few years every major food retailer has felt compelled to have an organic offering even though organics is still a very small percentage of the total food market.
Organics is a consumer-driven market, which caught many major food companies off guard, in that it didn’t fit their model and vision of the market as driven primarily by price. Consumers were more future facing towards their health and the environment, and organics rightly captures that through farming that works with nature rather than conventional farming that tries to control nature.

What’s more the organic movement embodies principles of fairness and trust, and holds some of the answers to climate change, working with social issues, economic development and community development. All of this resonates with the shift of conscious towards realising that capitalism, technology and science are not perfect and don’t have many of the answers we need to reverse the damage we are doing to the earth and humankind.
For these reasons the swing of awareness towards organics has passed the threshold where it has now become of interest to the government and the push to legislate for a national standard is overdue. But if we in the organic sector sit back we risk letting this opportunity slip away at the very time when we should be doubling our efforts.  

Speaking with one voice  

This is precisely the time to encourage good leadership in our sector organisations to unite the movement to speak with one voice to government, and create a comprehensive plan for organics that the sector fully supports.
Any division in the movement opens the door to others taking the lead and government downplaying our voice. We need to speak with one voice representing the domestic market, the export market, growers, processors, certifiers and consumers. We need one voice representing the larger commercial interests in organics and the innovators and leaders of the organic movement who carry its ideals and values. We need one voice to ensure the standards that sit behind the legislation are primarily held within the organic movement and reflect the common interests of those directly involved in organics.
What is our vision of organics and how can we inform government of what is required? We should be approaching multiple government departments talking about the benefits of organics and what is needed.  

Funding organics for success 

We should orchestrate multiple channels of funding towards sectors of organics that need support, such as financial support and encouragement of farmers to transition to organics, education and advisory services to farmers, research to establish best practice and quantify data to underpin those practices, consumer awareness of organics and its benefits. These all need funding if organics is to succeed.
We can’t just think when legislation passes it will all happen – that is too late. Do we know what will come our way in terms of financial support? Is this something we have contributed to or are we just accepting what’s given to us by a government that’s just starting to understand organics, let alone know what it needs? A whole plan, together with the funding channels, needs to be on the table now.  

The many solutions organics offers 

Organics Aotearoa New Zealand (OANZ) as the peak body of the organic sector is in the best position to canvass the organic sector, build a comprehensive picture of what is required, and place this before government.
It is in the interests of the government to listen to ways of reducing greenhouse gas emissions, getting a greater return from agriculture as one of the major pillars of the economy without further intensification of agriculture from existing land.
It is in their interest to understand how we can move towards less polluted land and more productive soils, cleaner waterways and air quality, greater biodiversity as well as how to spend some of their $3 billion on regional development for a good return. 
Some of the most pressing problems the government is looking for answers to are exactly the ones organics can bring substance to, and this places us in a strong position to engage and bargain with the government.  

We cannot leave the door ajar 

We should be keenly aware of the experience of organic movements in other countries at the stage we are at, where they didn’t ask up front for their needs and it goes on to the back burner as an issue to be dealt with in the future. Meanwhile the organic movement struggles and never fully develops its potential.
We should also think of the agendas of those interests that will lose out from a strong organic movement and in any vacuum we create, they will quickly fill it with their vision of how to proceed. 
The pressure created by consumer demand for organics growing far faster than farmers and land are converting to organics already creates a tension that could undermine the organic movement. Demand will push commercial interests to meet it, and if the supply is not there the temptation to lower the standards to up supply will work its way into the organic movement. Therefore a strong push from the outset with government support to convert more farmers to organics will help keep the standards strong.  

Our public image will make or break us  

In the minds of many we are still fringe. The more we enter public consciousness the more we need to be leading the story. 
Legislation will up our visibility and unless we are telling the story of the benefits of organics, interests that lose out (and who are more financial than us) will tell their story about Luddites and how we block ‘science’. You need only to see the bias in the Listener editorial at the end of April (on the purported benefits of GE ryegrass in decreasing methane emissions to alleviate climate change, and how science needed to trump the ideology of people who were opposed), to understand it doesn’t take much to paint us into a corner of being backward and blocking so-called progress. Once a public perception gains traction it takes a lot to change it.
This is the time we need leadership from our peak sector body, OANZ, to bring a renewed energy into our movement, together with a vision that encompasses the movement and stretches us to reach forward knowing that we are a strong partner for the government to work with.
The AGM for OANZ is yet to be announced but it is normally held in August. Through your membership organisation of OANZ encourage them to speak at the AGM with the purpose of activating organics in New Zealand. 

OANZ 

Organics Aotearoa New Zealand (OANZ) is the national voice of the New Zealand organic sector. Its member organisations include organic producers, processors, consumers, exporters and domestic traders. Soil & Health, the publisher of Organic NZ, is a member of OANZ. 

Super natural growing power

/in ,

We hope you enjoy this free article from OrganicNZ. Join us for access to exclusive members-only content.

I’ve seen many small family-run market gardens in my time but none aspiring to an annual turnover of $100,000. I remained skeptical until I visited Niva and Yotam Kay from Pakaraka Permaculture.
In their first season, the annual turnover was $20,000. The second season brought in $50,000 and last year it was $90,000. They also teach workshops so beginner market gardeners can skip the mistakes they made and start at the $50,000 annual turnover point.
Niva and Yotam are originally from Israel and, after travelling the world to explore sustainable living best practices, they founded Pakaraka Permaculture in the Coromandel’s Kauaeranga Valley. Now parents of two children, they share land with organic visionaries Jeanette Fitzsimons and Harry Parke from Pakaraka Farm.

Making the most of it

“It’s not the best site [for growing vegetables], but we want to show what is possible,” says Yotam. “Perfect sites are rare anyway, most of them being under dairy at the moment,” says Niva.
Limitations they’re working with include slope (they learned very fast that it’s impossible to sow directly on sloping ground), difficult access (for bringing materials on site), a high wind zone, and shade from nearby mature bush, mostly from an ancient kahikatea tree. Some garden beds are off-limits for sun-loving vegetables as a result.
At the beginning Niva and Yotam were working 12–14 hours a day. This was never going to be sustainable, especially with young children in the mix. They got smart about what systems worked for them and invested in key infrastructure like the cool room and good quality tools that made a huge difference in the way they structured their work days.
Currently only 2–3 hours a month are spent weeding. One of their workshop attendees wrote in their feedback: “I would have liked to try using the hoe, but there were no weeds!”

The Pakaraka Permaculture site as of 2019.

Certified organic

Pakaraka Permaculture market garden is part of a group of organic growers in the valley who are certified with OrganicFarmNZ (OFNZ).
“We love the pod system because as a pod we learn from each other, and share resources, such as bulk orders. There is a lot of paperwork and tracking to be done, but our certification manager is very helpful with any questions we have,” Niva explains.
“Our wholesale clients appreciate it that we are certified organic, and it also helped establish our difference at the markets and give us an edge,” says Niva.
Pakaraka Farm as a whole has been certified organic for over twenty years; Harry and Jeanette grow chestnuts, olives, pecans and raise livestock.

Go forth and multiply

With just under sixty garden beds, Niva and Yotam standardised the beds at 15 metres long, 80 cm wide with 30 cm paths. This makes planning, reusing weed mats and moving cloches easier.
“We used to calculate plantings meticulously, but we don’t plan where we plant now. It’s wherever there is available space,” says Yotam. “We try to put different botanical families in next but there are exceptions. All that is within our main crop rotations.”
The aim is to earn $100 per square metre with 4–7 crops per bed per season. To increase diversity and to supplement the homestead’s larder Niva, Yotam and the girls have planted a food forest around the market garden area.
Most plants are under cloches at the start and end of the season. It’s taken perseverance to find the right combination of seed variety, plant care and the best garden beds to grow certain plants. Yotam and Niva had a superb bed of spinach growing when I visited in late October but that was hard won, the result of a few seasons experimenting.
“We don’t want to just do salad because that’s very boring. We want people to be able to make a whole meal from our market stall,” says Niva. As the area is prone to high winds and rainstorms, tomatoes are grown only in the large polytunnel, which is also bursting with a colourful array of microgreens.

Stewardship of the soil

With such intensive production I was curious about soil fertility management. “The key is to give back. We used three tonnes of solid fertiliser– rock dust and 50 cubic metres of compost – over the last three seasons. All certified organic,” says Yotam. Potting mix is brought in too.
A recent soil test came back with a note from the technician saying: ‘Wow, we don’t really see such healthy, well mineralised soil’. The pride at this proof of holistic land stewardship is evident. And with good reason – these folks work hard.

Secrets of success

What about that amazing turnover of $90,000 of produce from a quarter acre? I asked them what the secret was. In short, SYSTEMS! See the sidebar for their recommendations.
The whole set-up looks very organised. There is a covered work area that acts as garden HQ, with a whiteboard illustrating garden bed planning, propagation calendar and charts on clipboards. It’s a business. A well-thought-out one always striving to do better.
“We’re improving our systems all the time; keeps it exciting. There is always something new to try. We encourage people to get comfortable with using current technologies in ways that allows growing food to take care of the earth and live a good life,” says Yotam.

Connecting with customers

Pakaraka Permaculture sell their produce to the organic shop in Thames, and to five cafés and restaurants year-round. They also sell at two markets for 6–7 months of the year: Thames market on Saturdays and Clevedon in southeast Auckland on Sundays. Niva’s face lights up when she talks about meeting their customers at the stall. It’s a transaction that is much more than money.
The focus is on retail sales rather than wholesale to maximise income and connection with people. Niva talks about buying from small growers being about the relationship; each customer becomes part of the Pakaraka story. “Everyone is yearning for connection.” When they started, three-quarters of their produce went to cafés and restaurants, with a quarter going to markets. Now it’s the reverse, and their public profile and earnings reflect the wisdom of that decision.

The tomato trellises, housed in the long polytunnel.

Earth care, people care, fair share

Yotam and Niva’s interest in permaculture is broader than gardening. “Our philosophy is to give more than we take,” says Niva.
She outlines permaculture ethics: earth care, people care, fair share. Niva and Yotam apply that to all aspects of their lives, especially their gardens and workshops. This holistic approach to permaculture as life is exemplified by the farm as a whole, which they say is carbon negative. The no-dig system is not just about less work for them, it’s valued for capturing the carbon in the ground. Market runs are done in their electric vehicle (a Nissan Leaf) and tools are run off the solar panels.

Passing on the knowledge

Their education work, including gardening and homesteading workshops, makes up 20–30% of their total income. Niva and Yotam are passionate about teaching what they’ve learnt and about contributing toward a more sustainable world. “We don’t want to be just the model, that’s not the point,” says Niva.
When I asked if they were afraid of breeding competition, Yotam replied no without hesitation. “We know there is much more demand than we can produce and if we want to push this mass movement, we need thousands more gardens like this. It will bring healthy food to the people, healing to the land, totally win-win.” Yotam adds that they absolutely see that small-scale farming can feed New Zealand.
“We’re proof that there is a different way of growing. We don’t have supernatural powers. We work hard. We’re persistent,” says Yotam.
Business skills had to grow alongside the market garden. Cashflow was hard when they were starting out. The usual twentieth of the month invoice payout was challenging for a small business. They’ve learnt to stipulate that invoices are to be paid within seven days.

A joyous life

In the winter Niva and Yotam’s combined working hours can go down to 40 hours a week. In the summer this goes up to 70–80 hours combined. Much of the profit goes back into the market garden and farm. There is no daily commuting, they can be available for their children, and they’re part of a global call for sustainable living.
Factor in the flexibility, the joy of doing what you love, being able to grow and share good food together daily and you have the ingredients of a very rich lifestyle as well as a successful market garden.

Pakaraka Permaculture at a glance

  • Location: Kauaeranga Valley, just outside Thames in the Coromande
  • Land area: quarter-acre+ market garden, within 215 acres of land co-owned with
    Pakaraka Farm
  • Soil type: Waihi ash, clay sub-soil
  • Crops: Range of greens, strawberries, cucumbers, eggplants, tomatoes and more
  • Annual turnover: $90k from market garden – not including education work www.pakarakafarm.co.nz

Tips for budding market gardeners

Pakaraka Permaculture share their recommendations.

  1. Weed management system. Eliminate perennial weeds before starting and use weedmats. Then you’ll have a blank slate to begin with. Keep on top of weeds using the right tools – take the weeds down to ground level with a sharp tool.
  2. No-dig cultivation system. Use appropriate tools for bed prep and maintenance. Niva and Yotam use a broadfork or forksta to aerate the soil, hoes and a bed rake.
  3. Cloche system. It’s important to use good quality cloches to protect crops and extend the season at either end. Niva and Yotam are on their fifth year of using the same cloches.

Anissa Ljanta is a writer, not-for-profit professional, seamstress, blogger and online content specialist and keen gardener currently doing battle with snails on the wild west coast near Auckland. growmama.blogspot.com 

Local food, local money

/in ,

Sharon Stevens looks at the connection between local, regenerative food production and homegrown currencies such as her local ‘Loaves’.

We hope you enjoy this free article from OrganicNZ. Join us for access to exclusive members-only content.

From local markets to direct farmer-to-consumer relationships, regenerative agriculture is bonded with place-based economies.

To support local food and other relocalisation initiatives, many communities have turned to homegrown currencies. In the rural Pohangina Valley and in Ashhurst village (where I live), volunteers are developing a multi-business voucher currency called Loaves (Local Origin Ashhurst Voluntary Exchange System).

Developing Loaves is a slow and small-step process, inspired by the successes of more established initiatives in other New Zealand communities. Even at these early stages, Loaves is serving as a tool for awareness-raising and small behaviour changes. For my part, as a Loaves volunteer, I hope to see Loaves serve as a subtle catalyst, stimulating the innate power of community and developing our connectedness to one another and to nature.

The problem with bank money

Local currencies support the development of healthy, small-scale systems. In a well-designed local economy, goods and services cycle in trading patterns that counteract the extraction-oriented economy promoted by the global monetary system.

I often hear that money is neutral and that all that needs fixing is our individual attitudes and spending habits, but the reality is that bank money (such as New Zealand dollars), has built-in flaws. Money is created by banks as interest-bearing debt. As a result, while individual uses of money may be positive, on a collective level money circulates in ways that harm people, harm the planet, and exacerbate inequality.

Exponential growth on a chessboard

This problem is often explained by reference to an ancient Chinese fable in which an inventor develops chess and gives the game to the emperor. (There are other versions of this fable in India, Persia and elsewhere.) Delighted, the emperor offers the inventor a gift: name your price.

The inventor, appearing modest, asks for one grain of rice for the first square of the chess board, two for the second, four for the third, and so on. This quickly adds up, because it is a doubling pattern, a type of exponential growth, analogous to rapid, exponential population growth. There are sixty-four squares on a chessboard, or (20 + 21 + 22 + 23 + … + 263), equal to (264 – 1). That’s eighteen-and-a-half quintillion grains of rice – more than the empire could provide. Incensed, the emperor orders the inventor’s execution.

Let’s translate this to a contemporary bank money example. When someone mortgages their house, they agree to a modest interest rate. Over the life of the mortgage, they

usually pay the bank about twice the value of their original loan. This is doubling, and it requires extracting extra money from the economy. That extra money enters the economy as somebody else’s debt, so that, for example, new mortgages pay for old ones.

For debtors to remain solvent, and to prevent financial uncertainties that might contribute to a run on the bank, more and more money needs to be pumped into the economy. Until the bubble bursts, this causes exponential growth of the collective private debt burden, price inflation, and pressure to create real wealth – goods and services – to back up the ever-increasing money supply.

On-farm pressure to create real wealth

On the farm, what does the exponential increase of interest-based debt money look like? Too many farmers worldwide carry debts they can barely manage. Even those who don’t are pressured by a global market structured by inflationary costs. Consequences include farmer stress, chemical and fossil fuel inputs for short-term production gains, cash crop monocultures, forest-to-farm conversions, carbon released from poorly managed soil, and other practices that degrade people and the earth. Indebted farmers are under pressure to play the wrong game, trying to feed bank profits instead of people.

In short, the exponential growth of the interest-oriented money supply drives the intensification of agriculture. The efforts of regenerative farmers are all the more heroic because there is so much stacked against them.

A different game

Let’s return to the emperor. That execution is horrid – but what if the emperor had tried to deliver? How many farmers would have worked too hard? How many would have exhausted their rice paddies? How many families would have starved to redistribute rice to the games-man?

Violence isn’t the answer, but neither is giving away power. I prefer to imagine the emperor replying in good humour: “You outsmarted me, so take back your competitive chessboard. I refuse a gift exchange that harms my land, harms my people, and concentrates wealth while others go hungry. Go design a cooperative game, one grounded in farming rather than battle strategy.”

A cooperative economy would start with the soil and people that produce our food, because this is the most basic aspect of our livelihood. Growth would be linked not to exponentially increasing debts but instead to whatever real wealth could be sustainably produced. Trading tools would make equitable mutual support more straightforward. Just by keeping things more local, for example, a cooperative economy would increase face-to-face accountability, reduce transport footprints, and provide a barrier to how the global concentration of dollars systematically increases the gap between rich and poor.

An evolving Loaves model

Our society is not yet ready to release its reliance on bank money. The Loaves local currency accommodates this with a transitional design.

For now, Loaves are issued by a not-for-profit organisation, LEAP (Society for the Local Economy of Ashhurst and Pohangina, leap.org.nz). New Zealand dollars (NZD), used to purchase Loaves, are kept in the bank and listed as a liability in LEAP’s accounts, in case a business needs to redeem Loaves. This strong NZD link makes Loaves more manageable, but it also leaves it vulnerable to the same dynamics as bank money. For now, Loaves’ focus is on buy-local awareness raising and on creating a direct experience of how a community can invent its own solutions.

Recently, LEAP has taken another small step towards local self-reliance. In the current ‘Loaves 2.0’ approach, only three businesses redeem Loaves for NZD. These businesses all have a rural base and a track record of community support. All are well established in the local economy, and therefore risk over-accumulating the currency, which is designed for spending, not saving. Two of them resonate strongly with the values of the organic community, but, like most other local currencies, Loaves’ focus is on the general system conditions for regenerative economy, without additional criteria for business participation. Loaves is not a money-maker for businesses that already have strong demand, so the generous participation of these three helps develop – and anchor – the following community benefits.

Nature is the foundation of wealth

Wealth begins with nature and human co-creativity. Loaves’ ‘anchor’ businesses are a cheesery (Cartwheel Creamery), a specialist fruit and nut tree nursery (Edible Garden), and a roadside fruit and veg shop (Riverside Orchard). Rural supply to the local economy grounds all other Loaves exchanges; that is, all others participate in Loaves because they can spend with one another and at these shops.

In the long run, an even more robust model would be to have regenerative rural businesses issue Loaves as a promise to provide future goods or services, such as sustainably grown food boxes. This approach would be similar to a CSA (community-supported agriculture) fruit and veg box subscription, but it would also involve multi-party voucher circulation backed by the recognised value of those boxes.

Local currencies strengthen communities

Friendship, business loyalty, and community accountability are all enhanced by the face-to-face connections that physical voucher spending requires. Local currencies are also proven to increase the identification of people with place. Additionally, increased local purchasing is a positive correction to an overemphasis on global corporate trading.

Local currencies make small and start-up businesses more visible. Evidence indicates that any ‘buy local’ campaign – from posters to currencies – raises awareness and increases support for small- and medium-sized private businesses.

Local self-reliance requires a local economy

For a community to be resilient to outside shocks requires collective capacity to meet needs closer to home. There’s a chicken-and-egg issue, with local production and local distribution networks needing one another to keep developing. Local procurement policies, local currencies, and other local economic tools create the conditions for regenerative economy.

Reconnecting with nature and community

In their truest form, economic trading tools help people cooperate to meet their needs and wants. Like other small currencies, Loaves shifts the focus away from money accumulation and back to the basics – back to the deep value of human connection, back to nature as the deep foundation of our collective wealth.

Living Economies Educational Trust

Living Economies (LE) is a national charity that provides information on how interest-free financial solutions can foster community wellbeing, help sustain regional economies, and respect living planetary systems. LE volunteers do not provide financial advice, but do provide information on a range of initiatives:

  • Local exchange trading systems (LETS): membership-based networks that use book-keeping to track flows of credits and debits;
  • Time banks, or time-based exchanges that value all participants’ time equally;
  • Community-issued vouchers such as Loaves;
  • Private tradable coupons issued by a social enterprise to finance growth, backed by future goods and services;
  • Savings pools, or interest-free savings and loans within small, closed networks of people who wish to provide reciprocal, mutual support;
  • Mutual assurance through networks of people who wish to join forces for risk management. Information and specialty books are available at http://livingeconomies.nz

Dr Sharon Stevens is the volunteer project coordinator for Loaves, working on behalf of LEAP.

Living the change

/in ,

A new film shines the spotlight on our organic and sustainable heroes. Philippa Jamieson finds out more.

We hope you enjoy this free article from OrganicNZ. Join us for access to exclusive members-only content.

Climate change… la la la la la. Environmental destruction – I know, it’s terrible! Social breakdown, economic collapse, help, what do we do? Living the Change is a documentary that features courageous Kiwis with practical solutions to these massive problems.

Voluntary simplicity

Filmmakers Antoinette Wilson and Jordan Osmond are themselves trying to ‘live the change’, in a 20m2 room at the end of a shed on a friend’s land near Katikati. The place isn’t plumbed; they have a bucket and use rainwater, but it’s palatial by comparison to where they were.
The pair met three years ago at a year-long community project in Victoria, Australia, learning how to live simply, grow food and build tiny houses. Jordan filmed the project and A Simpler Way was the documentary that resulted.

In high school Jordan became fascinated by the impact that documentaries can have. “Food Inc had a big impact on me – I changed my diet a bit,” he says. The self-taught filmmaker began making short films on tiny houses and earth building.
Antoinette was working at Wairarapa Eco Farm when she applied for the tiny house community project. After living in Argentina for six years, she had moved back to New Zealand for a healthier life.
“I’ve had gut problems for most of my life, and these were exacerbated in Buenos Aires, which isn’t a great place to find healthy food. In 2007 I went online and by a stroke of absolute fortune I discovered Sally Fallon’s Nourishing Traditions. Blew everything out of the water for me.
“I became interested in everything, not just food, but the paint on the wall, the clothes on my body, the creams I was putting on my face.”
After the simple living project, Antoinette and Jordan travelled around Aotearoa New Zealand for two years making a series of short films about permaculture and resilient living. Out of these grew Living the Change.

Organic, holistic and permaculture growing

About a third of the film relates to food in some way.
“One of the biggest changes people can make is food: what we eat, who we buy it from,” says Jordan. “Organics, growing your own, supporting regenerative agriculture is the way of the future. Pouring pesticides on the land has to stop.” Jordan reacts to the Hi-Cane sprayed on kiwifruit – not great when you live in the Bay of Plenty.
Growers in the film include Robyn and Robert Guyton (Riverton), Andrew Martin (Katikati), Wiremu Puke (Parapara Gardens) and holistic grazing farmer Greg Hart (Mangarara Station, Hawke’s Bay).
Andrew Martin swapped a materialistic life working in the finance sector in Sydney, for a simpler life in New Zealand. He now feels happier and deeply connected with the natural world at his permaculture property.
Frank van Steensel and Josje Neerincx of Wairarapa Eco Farm talk about their CSA (community supported agriculture), which connects farmers and communities, provides reliability of supply and income, and a sense of belonging and connection with the land.

Healing our separation from nature

At the root of many problems is our disconnection from nature, and one of several to articulate this is the only non-Kiwi interviewed, US author and thinker Charles Eisenstein. He makes a statement as a ‘degrowth activist’ just by wearing a cream-coloured jersey mended with red stitches.
“When we cut ourselves off from any aspect of nature, we create a wound,” says Eisenstein. “This is painful and we yearn to recover our wholeness. Due to ideology, the economic system etc., the reunion we long for is unavailable. This drives consumerism, greed, neurotic behaviours that seek to compensate for the missing relationships.”
“We are not separate from the wild world,” says Robert Guyton. “It’s going to realign us fairly soon… unless we recognise that we need to be fully integrated into that world.”

Financial collapse

The precariousness of the dominant financial system looms large in the film.
“There’s going to be a collapse in one form or another,” says Charles Eisenstein. “The money system demands endless growth.”
We have to design and develop an economy that operates within ecological limits, says permaculture designer Shane Ward. “That’s our only safe bet. It’s our only bet at all.”
Setting up alternative systems now will make us more prepared and resilient. Sharon Stevens woke up one morning with the idea of starting a local currency, and so LOAVES was born: Local Original Ashhurst Voluntary Exchange System. Also interviewed are Phil Stevens and Helen Dew, founding members of Living Economies, and Maria Lee of Diamond Harbour School, whose pupils were filmed making kale chips and broad bean dip from their garden produce, helped by locals paid via the timebank.

Reduce, reuse, recycle

Closely linked with the monetary system premised on infinite growth is rampant consumerism and the destruction of planetary resources.
Enter those down-to-earth Kiwis who are making a difference by going rubbish-free, such as Waveney Warth and Matthew Luxon. And the Bayswater Repair Café, where people fix appliances and bikes, mend clothing and furniture. The social connection is equally important; an older man reports a sense of belonging and feeling useful, passing on his skills.
We need to think ‘resource’, not ‘waste’. Wanaka couple Greg Inwood and Lisa Johnston show their humanure composting system, starting with a bucket, and emptying the solids into a compost heap with kitchen and garden waste. They monitor the temperature to ensure it’s hot enough to ‘nuke’ any pathogens. After a year or so, the beautiful rich compost is heaving with worms.
“I find it extraordinary – it’s one of the indicators of our disconnection – that we mix good quality drinking water with our shit,” says Antoinette. Composting loos “would be so much more cost-effective, so much less work for the council.”

Can technology save us?

Some people have faith that technology will save us. That we can invent our way out of the problems. So why haven’t we done it already?
“I’m not disillusioned with solar or wind or anything; I know that the substitution of those things for fossil fuels isn’t possible,” says Susan Krumdieck, professor of mechanical engineering at the University of Canterbury.
“So as long as we keep telling ourselves the story that it is, we aren’t actually doing the thing that we have to do, which is just leave the stuff in the ground. Which means what? There’s only one thing you can do then, which is to use less of it. A hundred years from now, every solar panel we build will be toxic waste.”

This could be the best film you see all year. But don’t take my word for it; see it for yourselves.

Living the Change

Directed by Jordan Osmond and Antoinette Wilson
Running time 85 minutes
livingthechangefilm.com

A Simpler Way

Dir. Jordan Osmond, Samuel Alexander. View free online, buy it or host a screening: happenfilms.com/a-simpler-way

Philippa Jamieson is the author of The Wild Green Yonder: Ten Seasons Volunteering on New Zealand’s Organic Farms (New Holland Publishers, 2007).

Savings pools: interest-free loans and trading

/in ,

Frith Chamberlain outlines a system that uses money in a fair and reciprocal way.

We hope you enjoy this free article from OrganicNZ. Join us for access to exclusive members-only content.

In November 2015 I had the pleasure of attending New Zealand’s first national ‘savings pool’ hui. This was held in beautiful Opotiki and hosted by the wonderfully talented team at the Awhi Tautoko Trust (if you need some daily inspiration for your community spirit then look these guys up). We had a fantastic time with incredibly inspiring people where we discussed savings pools and where we see them in the future.

Pooling resources to help each other

For centuries, people have recognised the benefit of pooling their resources, through co-operatives, buyers’ clubs and investment syndicates. Savings pools, where individuals combine their savings into a larger pool of funds, can bring with them similar benefits. Members deposit funds into the savings pool, and then take turns to access the pool’s funds (to buy the fridge, the holiday or pay off a loan) on an interest-free basis.

There are savings pools in New Zealand and in other countries – for example, the JAK Members’ Bank, which launched in Sweden in 1965. There are around 30 pools operating in New Zealand at present, with more starting every year.

The basic operating principle of savings pools is that a member who uses the pool funds in the form of a loan is obligated to make available to the pool the same amount of money for an equal time period. Once this reciprocity requirement has been satisfied, the member is free to withdraw that money, or continue to leave any part of it in the pool. This ensures fairness and guarantees the continued availability of funds without the need for interest or fees.

Kiss that interest goodbye!

Here is a simplified example of what usually happens when dealing with a bank. An individual applies for a bank mortgage of $225,000. After 25 years of payments, they have a freehold house to live in. They have also paid over $225,000 in interest to the bank, with nothing tangible to show for this money.

An individual belongs to a savings pool and applies to borrow $225,000. After 25 years, the individual has a freehold house to show for the $225,000 it paid the vendor plus $225,000 in savings! This is called reciprocity, where you have lent this money to the pool to borrow from in exchange for no interest. At this stage the individual can either leave their savings in the pool (where they enjoy the benefit of helping others reach their goals), or they can remove this money and leave the pool.

Our savings pool

The savings pool I am part of has completed two loans in the year we have been together. We had the joy of paying off the remaining mortgage of a wonderful retiree. She is now paying her $10,000 loan off to us interest-free. The other $8000 loan has been used to pay the debt of a young family. This has helped to reduce the financial burden while one family member is fighting cancer. The family have used their caravan as security and are paying the loan off interest-free. After these loans are paid they then have the added bonus of knowing their savings are secure and available if required.

We are inspired by another pool in New Zealand that has recently facilitated a $200,000 loan for a mortgage, and hope to tackle some bigger loans for our members this year.

It is exciting to eliminate the amount of interest we pay, as interest represents an enormous waste, a constant flow of wealth out of our households and out of our towns. A savings pool is a way of conserving local wealth, where we all have something to offer and we all have scope for initiative and leadership.

Fair, transparent and member-controlled

Because members don’t earn interest on their contributions, savings pools are not money-making investments. The following key features, however, make them extremely effective cost-savers.

  1. No interest is charged for the use of pooled funds and no one creams off any profit, thus there is value and equity.
  2. Contributors themselves decide how their funds are used and purchased assets belong to the pool until they are paid for in full, creating control and security.
  3. There are next to no costs; members balance received benefits with matching contributions, and accounts are open to all members. This makes for a simple, reciprocal and transparent system.

Setting up a savings pool

Anybody can start a pool in New Zealand. It requires a group of like-minded people, good communication and some courageous forward thinking. One organisation that can help with this is Living Economies. The Living Economies Educational Trust is a nationwide charity dedicated to strengthening regional economies by conserving local resources, nurturing local talent, promoting regional self-sufficiency and developing community- and business-friendly means of exchange.

Organisations like Living Economies are not afraid to ask these probing questions: What if we could trade without paying interest? What if communities could replace debt-based money with forms of exchange involving no waste? They alsoeducate and inform communities and individuals (whether or not they are members of savings pools) on how savings pools can work.

Savings pools are legal – provided the pool members take care to ensure they abide by applicable legislation. Living Economies can provide information about the legislation that can apply, but its advice is necessarily general, and those involved with savings pools as members or prospective members, and persons considering forming a pool, should seek their own legal advice.

If you’d like to know more about the savings pool system or be part of one in your area, then contact either myself or Living Economies for further information.

More information

Frith Chamberlain is the chair of Soil & Health’s Mid Canterbury branch and a passionate believer in the savings pools concept. havelockseakayak@clear.net.nz

child and gourd

Local food and seed in Aotearoa NZ

/in ,

In 2012 and 2013, a team of New Zealand permaculture educators hit the road for an ambitious teaching and filming tour: the Localising Food Project.

We hope you enjoy this free article from OrganicNZ. Join us for access to exclusive members-only content.

They found a bounty of creative organising across Aotearoa, and captured the stories of 250 different local food initiatives on video. But they also found the networks often weren’t aware of each other. Now, they’re distilling a series of documentaries aimed at disseminating successful local models, and inspiring a more self-sufficient, food-resilient nation.

Local food trends in NZ

Nationwide, the Localising Food team discovered a strong surge of community gardens and farmers’ markets.

They were also pleasantly awed to find a newer community food trend taking off: the planting of fruit and nut trees in public spaces. A forthcoming documentary from the project will explain how various local councils and community members are working together to plant and maintain public food trees in their streets and parks.

The team also visited 50 school and preschool gardens, documented in the recently released film series Growing Schools. The doco shows the benefits of gardening for children’s motivation, academic success and overall wellbeing. It’s already attracting international attention, and is being translated into Slovenian, Spanish and French. The four-part series can be downloaded from the Localising Food website .

child and gourd
Amelia Ngātai, a student at Rhode St School in Hamilton, is going to save seeds from this gourd.

Where are the gaps?

Still, the team found plenty of gaps in local food resilience in New Zealand. Community gardens, while numerous, are not producing nearly the capacity of food that they could. Instead, they focus primarily on social wellbeing. Raw milk distribution networks are flourishing, but often in black-market-type situations, which are likely to be driven further underground when new regulations come into force in March.

In one of the biggest obstacles to national food self-reliance, New Zealand’s once-thriving mixed grain farms have largely given way to dairy monocultures. Grain processing equipment has become derelict, and certified organic grain processing infrastructure is particularly lacking. Investment is needed if New Zealand is to live on its own grains again.

Seeds of community

The team’s next documentary, soon to enter production, addresses a fundamental basis of food systems: seeds. Local seed-saving networks are crucial to our collective food future, as corporate control of seeds increases globally and biodiversity decreases. Around 90% of all seed varieties have been lost in the last 100 years, according to the UN Food and Agriculture Organisation. But unlike a monetary bank, a seed bank can’t function as a closed vault; as the Localising Food team is documenting, successful seed banks are living community networks, with social and geographic resilience.

As they travelled the country collecting seed savers’ stories, the Localising Food team uncovered common themes central to successful seed networks.

One lesson for seed saving is similar to saving computer data: back everything up! The Southern Seed Exchange’s Christchurch seed bank burned down, and is now replaced by a solid earth building. Thankfully, some of those seeds had been replicated and stored at Waimarama Community Gardens in Nelson. Mould destroyed seeds stored in an old wooden building in Dunedin; unspoiled ones were divided in half, with half stored at the Riverton seed bank to ensure a backup set.

Wanted: more seed kaitiaki

Dedicated kaitiaki (guardians or caretakers) are vital to the survival of heritage seed lines, but there is a shortage of such people around the country in comparison with the amount of genetic material that needs propagating and protecting. New Zealand has some excellent community seed-saving models in place, but many bioregions have no seed networks at all.

One of the most important seed repositories and distributors in New Zealand is Koanga Institute in Wairoa, Hawke’s Bay. Heirloom seed gardens are a core feature of this farm. Of particular note are the ‘isolation gardens’ in the next valley over – essential for crops that would otherwise cross-pollinate. Such geographical sanctuaries could become even more important safeguards against contamination if GE crops are ever allowed to grow in New Zealand. Other growers around the country also grow seeds for Koanga, acting as kaitiaki of specific crops.

However, one doesn’t need to go big to run a seed network; the main requirements are determination, love of seeds and good record-keeping. An avid seed saver in Port Waikato offers her seed locally through her personally handwritten catalogue and is only contactable for two hours in the evening by phone – no deterrent for her regular customers.

Using New Zealand’s leading seed savers as teachers in their own gardens, the Localising Food seed-saving doco will be a call to action and a lively how-to manual. The film, which will be released later in 2016, will strive to inspire Kiwis to save seeds locally, and will teach gardeners how to save their own seed and set up their own bioregional seed banks and seed exchanges.

Successful seed saving

  • Start in your own garden, and specialise in a few species to start with.
  • Save only open-pollinated varieties, and don’t bother saving F1 hybrid seeds; hybrids will not grow true to type.
  • Store seeds in a cool, airy, shady place.
  • Select your seed plants halfway through their growing cycle. Select the most robust, healthy-looking plants, not necessarily the biggest.
  • Label everything meticulously (species and variety, where grown, date harvested).
  • Design and position your seed bank to secure it against flooding, fire, etc., and double up your stock in two locations.
  • Keep tabs on dates, making sure you grow and refresh seed lines regularly enough to keep them viable.
  • Germination test if you can, to make sure you are distributing viable seeds.

Tips, vids, docos and more

The Localising Food website (www.localisingfood.com) contains a wealth of articles and video clips about local food production systems in NZ, plus free downloads including a seed-saving chart and 10 seed-saving tips.

Setting up a school garden? Download the project’s first documentary, Growing Schools, from the website. It’s in four parts (total running time two hours).

The Localising Food films are funded entirely by donations and sponsorship. To produce the seed and public tree crop documentaries, the team is running an online crowdfunding campaign on PledgeMe (www.pledgeme.co.nz) is seeking more sponsors. Can you help? Please contact localisingfood@gmail.com.

Robina McCurdy is director of the Localising Food Project, and has a diploma in seed technology and in permaculture. For 30 years she has been an international permaculture and organic educator-activist, with a passion for seed saving and food sovereignty.

Rebecca Reider is an organic systems researcher, writer and advocate based in Golden Bay.

The joy in crop swapping

/in ,

Franziska von Hünerbein writes about a movement that’s about sharing excess produce, community connection, and so much more.

We hope you enjoy this free article from OrganicNZ. Join us for access to exclusive members-only content.

It all began with a tree, a big lemon tree full of bright juicy fruit. There it was, radiating beauty and offering abundance – unfortunately not to us, as it was growing in a neighbour’s garden down the road. I admired it from afar and was longing for lemons to cook my rhubarb jam with.

One day I gathered all my courage, knocked on my neighbour’s door and asked politely whether they were planning to eat these hundreds of lemons by themselves or whether they would be happy to give us a few. He quickly got a box, filled it with fruits and swapped it for a jar of rhubarb jam.

I have been a hedge peeker, a garden sneaker, a fruit stealer all my life. Spotting a tree full of fruits fills me with joy; seeing fruits rotting on the ground highly irritates me and brings up questions. When researching online I came across green swaps, vege swaps, food swaps and crop swaps all over the world. Names, logos and formats vary; the concept is the same. People meet, bring what they have, and exchange it for what they need. After a good read I knew we would do this!

Let me take you to a Crop Swap Taranaki gathering. People carry full boxes and baskets into the community hall, sign in, find a free table and proudly display their goods. Neighbours and friends greet each other, walk around, admire produce, exchange gardening tips and welcome newcomers. Children run around, eye cupcakes and pet the ducklings. The whole room is buzzing with excitement and anticipation. The variety on offer is huge: vegetables, fruits, plants, flowers, seedlings, herbs, eggs, preserves, jams, baking, liquid manure, gardening books, magazines, planting containers, sometimes even chooks who need a new home. After half an hour of admiration and connection time, the swap is opened with a brief introduction and everyone is welcome to take a fair share of what they are interested in. Everything is free. Baskets fill, tables clear and after a quick clean-up everyone leaves with fresh local produce and a big smile.

Where does this immense joy come from, that floods everyone who enters the Crop Swap temple? Is it really just about swapping local produce to fill our stomachs? Crop Swap gatherings seem to meet many profound human needs. Connection is a biggie. For some people it is the social highlight of their week. They meet neighbours and friends, learn from the elders, hold a baby, are seen, are greeted, are hugged.

We all have a need to be of service, to give and be recognised for that. The joy of generosity shows in the immense effort that some put into preparation and presentation: jars are labelled, fruits polished, muffins beautifully decorated, bunches of flowers bring colour to the tables.

Most Crop Swappers are keen gardeners. Having our hands in the soil, witnessing growth, experiencing the seasons, observing and caring for all the expressions of life around us gives us peace and a sense of belonging. Sharing the fruits of this work with others is the cherry on top.

Crop Swap gatherings have potential beyond the generous sharing of food. So far we have had mini workshops on seed sowing, organic gardening, sourdough bread making, food fermentation and the benefits of raw milk. Crop Swap Taranaki is connected to the food bank, the seed bank, the time bank, the environment centre Hive, and to our future community café. Imagine the possibilities of cooperation!

Since the first Crop Swap gathering in New Plymouth our movement is constantly growing. We have three venues around Mount Taranaki (see box below), and there are more to come. Ideally we will have a Crop Swap Hub in every suburb and village of New Zealand, or, let’s say, the world. Creating one is easy. All you need is a venue and the people. In Taranaki we use a community hall, a church hall and a café as venues. Costs are covered by gold coin donations. We communicate via our local newspaper, school newsletters, email lists and our Facebook page.

On Saturday 5 September we celebrated Crop Swap Taranaki’s 2nd birthday. And while we shared a huge birthday cake, we also celebrated being part of a paradigm shift, where giving with a mindset of abundance and taking with a mindset of fairness will lead into a future of collective wellbeing.

Thank goodness it’s lemon season again.

Note from the Organic NZ office: as this article was published in 2015, some of the below information may be outdated. Use their Facebook page or get in touch with Franziska for current times.

Taranaki venues

  • Merrilands Domain Hall, 1st and 3rd Saturday of the month, 4–5 pm
  • Waitoriki School Hall, last Saturday of the month, 10–11 am
  • Café Downtown Okato, 2nd and 4th Monday of the month, 3.30–4.30 pm

More information

Franziska von Hunerbein, 06 769 6841, franziska@babuli.eu
Facebook: Crop Swap Taranaki

Franziska von Hünerbein lives with her family, a cat, chooks and a beehive in suburban New Plymouth, and is passionate about creating an abundant local food production in and for her community.

Hemp: The comeback crop for building

/in

Hemp is an ancient crop, grown for its fibre and put to thousands of uses. Unreasonably lumped in with cannabis, hemp was supplanted and restricted for nearly a hundred years – but it is now being heralded as an outstanding building material for our time.

We hope you enjoy this free article from OrganicNZ. Join us for access to exclusive members-only content.

New Zealand’s first house made of hemp will be finished this summer. Lance and Miranda Palmer are building a 195 m2 home in Taranaki using hempcrete for their walls.

Why hemp? “I wanted a home that would breathe naturally,” explains Lance. “When we learnt about hemp, it ticked all the boxes. It’s unusual in that it’s both a great insulator and yet provides a lot of thermal mass.”

Benefits for building

Hemp as a building material delivers an impressive list of benefits, say proponents like Greg Flavall, a builder and entrepreneur encouraging the use of hemp in New Zealand. He claims hempcrete is a carbon neutral or even carbon negative material. The fast growing hemp sequesters carbon and, once processed, the fibres are mixed with a lime and cement binder to create ‘hempcrete’. The lime continues to harden over time, absorbing more carbon as it calcifies. Some 110 kg of carbon is locked up per cubic metre of hempcrete, according to UK consulting firm Hemp-Lime Construct.

Hemp building materials are lightweight, insulating, and highly breathable, producing homes with excellent air quality, according to Greg. It’s fireproof and rodent and insect resistant. It’s extremely durable, with an expected lifespan of several hundred years. Hemp is also versatile; just vary the ratio of binder to make floors, walls, or insulation. And it can be deconstructed and recycled in another building project!

What it isn’t, is load bearing: hempcrete is being used in New Zealand as infill between timber structural framing.

Eco-architect Graeme North also has an interest in hempcrete but takes a more cautious view. He questions the claim about carbon neutrality, saying that manufacturing lime produces more carbon than it subsequently absorbs. “Claims of both insulation and thermal mass need to be considered carefully,” he warns, as it depends on the thickness and density of the wall.

Hemp growing in Taranaki

Different varieties of industrial hemp are grown depending on the desired yield (seed, fibre or fabric). They are alike in having extremely low levels of tetrahydrocannabinol (THC), the active ingredient in the Cannabis sativa grown for marijuana use: 0.3% compared with 3–22%.
A regulatory scheme was established in 2006 that makes it legal for license holders to grow, process and distribute hemp in specific circumstances. A grower must send crop samples to a lab before harvesting, to ensure THC levels are below prescribed limits. Crops not meeting this requirement may be destroyed. As at 23 September 2013, 27 licences to grow industrial hemp have been issued by the Ministry of Health, with a further two being processed.
Last summer, two Taranaki farmers working with Greg Flavall got their hemp licenses and 4.45 ha was sown, including at Avonstour, an organic, rare breeds family farm east of Stratford.

From field to house

Hemp is a fast-growing and robust annual broadleaf, with a root system that can extend two metres. It is naturally insect and pest tolerant and may not require fertilising.

Hemp’s history spans some 12,000 years, having been grown in Asia and the Middle East for fibre to make fabric, cloth and rope. It was grown extensively in the US from the seventeenth century. But its cultivation was outlawed in the US and UK in the 1920s and 30s when fears about cannabis use were running high, and fell away in Europe last century as hemp was supplanted by newer, synthetic fibres.

After harvesting, the plant is retted: soaked in water to loosen the fibres from the woody core. The fibres are separated out in a mechanical process called decortication before the stem is dried and chopped to produce shiv. To make hempcrete, the shiv is mixed with a small amount of hydrated lime-rich binder. Greg advocates a 5:1 mix of lime and cement, which means the binder is about two percent of finished volume. Natural pigments can also be added to create striking natural colours or patterns.

Greg runs workshops designed for owner builders, architects and building professionals, who get their hands on the raw material, building their own small hempcrete block. This is a miniature example that shows how hemp walls can be constructed, by lightly tamping hempcrete in place in between single or double-sided formwork. “Professionals come along and say, ‘Wow, this isn’t difficult at all!’,” grins Greg.

Houses that Greg is involved with are using single-sided forms. “We’re framing into the interior edge of a [400-450 mm] thick wall and lining the interior of the house with magnesium oxide building board, a gib replacement. Mag oxide board is inert, fire-resistant and it breathes with the hemp,” he explains.

There are other possibilities. “Boxing both sides around a timber frame is common in many parts of Europe,” says Graeme. “The wall is then clad for protection from the weather, especially wind driven rain, or simply plastered with lime plasters. Inside can be left as is, or any breathable natural finish [applied].”

Hemp can also be used as loose fill insulation and a flooring material. In Europe, large commercial buildings have been built with pre-fabricated hemp wall panels hoisted onto a post-and-beam structure.

Buildings made from hemp can have any kind of look you want, says Greg. For instance, the first US house built of hemp materials, in Ashville, North Carolina in 2010 – with which Greg and his Canadian based company were involved – is a high-end example of striking contemporary architecture (see www.gizmag.com/first-us-hemp-house/17115/ for photos and construction details). But hemp is also just as suited to natural renders that make a feature of the colour and texture of the natural fibre.

Notwithstanding information you’ll find on the internet, Greg is adamant that hemp is not suitable as a foundation material. “We know from history that hempcrete doesn’t work below ground. If subjected to constant moisture, it will break down and the lime will not carbonate. It’s the carbonation that preserves the hemp.”

Hemp construction underway

The Palmer house is being built on concrete foundations topped with insulated concrete forms. Building consent applications for this and other hemp houses have used alternative solution provisions provided in the New Zealand Building Code. The Palmer house was approved by the New Plymouth District Council in 20 days. “We introduced the building method first and asked the Council what information they wanted from us,” says Lance. “They were really good to deal with.”

“The building inspectors were pleased to see lime coming back,” says Greg. “We provided documentation from the US and Europe – and a sample block! The fact that the hemp was the aggregate was of no importance.”

The first New Zealand houses of hemp are being built with shiv imported from Europe but Greg wants to establish a Taranaki based co-op (a ‘hemp village’) that will grow and process hemp and produce local hemp products.

Meanwhile, plans are being drawn up for homes made with hemp and building consent applications have been lodged with Auckland and Waikato councils. The 14 projects between Dunedin to Northland range from expensive, architecturally designed homes to owner-builder homes that will be slowly completed as funds and time permit.

More information
  • Hemp Lime Construction: A guide to building with hemp lime composites, Rachel Bevan and Tom Woolley, BREPress (Graeme North calls this ‘a definitive text’)
  • Greg Flavall: www.hemptechnologies.co.nz
  • Graeme North: www.ecodesign.co.nz

Interested in growing hemp in New Zealand? Growers, processors and suppliers require a license, administered by the Ministry of Health. Start here:
www.health.govt.nz/our-work/regulation-health-and-disability-system/medicines-control/hemp-industrial-hemp

Rachel Rose is establishing an urban permaculture property in Whanganui.

How to create a GE-free zone

/in ,

Zelka Grammer encourages you to press for a GE-free zone in your city, region or district

We hope you enjoy this free article from OrganicNZ. Join us for access to exclusive members-only content.

Gardeners, beekeepers, seed savers, foresters, orchardists, organic growers and consumers: you know what’s at stake. GE experiments and releases present serious risks to our biosecurity, unique biodiversity, primary producers, economy and public health. Evidence of harm from GMO (genetically modified organism) land use overseas is irrefutable and continues to mount.

Here in New Zealand, we’ve held the line against GMO land use for many years. We have no commercial GE crops and firmly maintain our ‘zero tolerance’ policy for GE content in imported seeds.

Local government approach needed


Existing legislation for GMOs (the Hazardous Substances and New Organisms Act) is grossly inadequate, with a lack of strict liability and no requirement for the national regulator to take a precautionary approach. Ratepayers don’t want to end up forking out for GE experiments gone wrong!

By working constructively with our local councils, however, we can stop GMO land use. Independent reports and legal opinions commissioned by the Northland/Auckland Inter Council Working Party on GMO Risk Evaluation and Management Options (the ICWP) clearly show that local authorities do have jurisdiction to control GMO land use out of doors.

Here’s some information to help you create a GE free zone in your district or region or, at the very least, a strong precautionary GE policy to create an additional tier of protection for communities, and serve as a deterrent to those who wish to experiment with GMOs out of doors in our fair land. Outright prohibition (a total ban) of GMOs is also achievable.

What’s been done already?


A number of cities and areas of New Zealand have already been declared symbolic GE-free zones, including Nelson city, Napier, Waitakere, areas of Auckland like Waiheke Island, Western Bays, Mt Eden and Mt Albert, and various community boards in Northland and elsewhere. Buller District Council put in place a two-year ban on all outdoor GMOs.

All councils from South Auckland to Cape Reinga have precautionary or prohibitive GE policies in their long-term council community plans (LTCCPs), and precautionary GE policies in some annual plans.

Whangarei District Council ‘has adopted a precautionary approach to the management of biotechnology in general and to GMO land uses in particular. It will continue to investigate ways of maintaining the District’s environment free of GMOs (genetically modified organisms) until outstanding issues such as liability, economic costs and benefits, environmental risks, and cultural effects are resolved. Together with other Northland and Auckland councils on the Inter-council Working Party on GMO Risk Evaluation and Management Options, Council has committed to investigating possible local and/or regional management of GMO land uses under the Resource Management Act.’

Auckland City Council (now part of Auckland Council super city) has already set a precedent, achieving outright prohibition for all GMOs in its Hauraki Gulf and Islands District Plan since 1998.

Enforceable GE-free zones: rules with teeth

Even more desirable than symbolic GE free zones are concrete regulatory options (with methods, policies and rules) through the Resource Management Act 1991. To create an enforceable (rather than symbolic) regional exclusion zone for GMOs, we need rules with teeth in regional policy statements and/or district plans. A regional policy statement (RPS) is an overarching regional document for the next 10 years; content in the RPS must be given effect to by the district councils of the region.

Bay of Plenty Regional Council has precautionary GE wording in its proposed RPS. Northland Regional Council is considering right now whether or not to include a strong precautionary GE provision in its new RPS. The council received a huge number of submissions requesting this, including submissions from all the district councils and all Tai Tokerau Iwi authorities.

Such precautionary GE policies (provisions) can require those who apply to do GE experiments (and clear the easy hurdle of the Environmental Protection Authority – EPA – in Wellington) to abandon their plans or, if GE experiments aren’t prohibited outright, to post a substantial bond and be financially liable for unintended adverse impacts of EPA-approved GE experiments.

Local plans should place a strong emphasis on prevention of incursions of new organisms, GMO and otherwise (not just management/suppression of existing problem organisms). They should specifically identify GMOs as a threat, due in part to the nature of these self-replicating organisms containing controversial viral promoters etc., but also ongoing flaws/gaps in the HSNO legislation such as a lack of strict liability and the fact that ERMA is not required under the Act to take a precautionary approach to GMOs).

Councils working together to evaluate GMO risk

In Northland and Auckland, all councils have become full members of the innovative Inter Council Working Party on GMO Risk Evaluation and Management Options. The ICWP on GMOs was formed in 2003 as a direct result of strong lobbying and education of the councils by northern ratepayers.

Auckland Council and the Northland District Councils recently commissioned an independent section 32 analysis on GMOs (a requirement of the RMA), proposed plan change provisions, and a new legal opinion from Dr Royden Somerville, QC. This was done with a view towards a collaborative plan change to regulate GMOs in some way on a local level (this could include outright prohibition).

These new documents were made publicly available in February 2013, recommending that member councils of the ICWP on GMOs consider regulating the outdoor use of GMOs under the RMA through provisions in their planning documents.

Steps to a GE-free zone

  1. Ask your council for its policy on genetic engineering or genetically modified organisms, if there is one. If there isn’t (or the policy is inadequate), you can request the convenor of the ICWP on GMOs to email key policy documents and reports to your council’s relevant planner, your mayor (or chairperson) and councillors  (contact details below).
  2. Read the independent GE reports and legal opinions provided at the GE page on the Whangarei District Council website. There are three ICWP commissioned reports, published in 2004, 2005 and 2012.www.wdc.govt.nz/PlansPoliciesandBylaws/Plans/GeneticEngineering/Pages/de…
  3. Join GE Free NZ (or your local GE-free group). Your membership subscription or donation helps to fund the good work they do.
  4. Obtain from GE Free NZ the precautionary or prohibitive GE wording / policies that other councils have already put in place (contact Zelka Linda Grammer – details below).
  5. Find out when public consultation takes place in your district/region for the council’s Annual Plan, Long Term Council Community Plan, proposed District Plan or Regional Policy Statement review. Make submissions asking your council to (at the very least) put in place a strong precautionary GE policy/provision. You can also ask for all GMO land use and GMO aquaculture to be a prohibited activity. Network with like-minded allies and write letters to your local newspaper to raise the profile of the issue.
  6. Collect signatures on a local petition (suggested wording available from GE Free NZ)
  7. Vote with your dollar for GE free, buying from Kiwi companies and manufacturers with best practice GE-free policies (organic and Fair Trade where possible).

Websites and contacts