Right now a small bunch of silverbeet is $4.90, green beans are $18.00/kg, broccoli $15.00/kg and even zucchinis are $4.90/kg. The years long drought and human resource issues due to COVID19 are pushing the price up despite even more Australians experiencing food insecurity due to job losses from the summer bushfires and COVID19.
The fires and COVID19 have highlighted the problems of our long distance, just in time food system. Producers have been unable to get their produce to market and supermarkets were unable to be stocked as roads were closed for days and sometimes weeks.
And yet all around me there is free food growing in abundance. Food that has not been transported long distances using fossil fuels, is plastic free and unprocessed goodness.
The trouble is that we have been trained to see only a narrow selection of fruit and vegetables as food and taught that food comes from shops. The fact is that many of the plants that we have been trained to see as weeds are actually not only edible but more nutritious than the modified plants made for easy handling for supermarkets. If we train ourselves to see the world differently we can see the abundance of food all around us.
In my corner of the world, the Far South Coast of NSW, Australia, fejoias and lillypillies are falling to the ground uneaten and edible weeds are growing faster than people can mow them. The sheer abundance makes me feel happy.
So why is foraging a climate action?
1) It is low carbon. Fossil fuels have not been used to grow, harvest and transport the food
2) It is seasonal. Instead of eating a fruit or vegetable all year round it can only be eaten during the short period it is ripe/available
3) It connects you with your local environment. You watch nature and observe it more intensely. You can see the effects of climate change close up. For instance I didn't get any stone fruit this year because the local birds and flying foxes are starving from the drought.
4) You learn new food processing, cooking and preservation techniques
5) It connects you to your community. Seeing fruit falling off trees in neighbours yards is the perfect impetus to ask them if you can pick some and initiate conversations.
6) It teaches you to use and eat imperfect fruit and vegetables
7) It's like gardening without a vegetable garden.
8) It improves your observation and pattern recognition skills.
9) Bush tucker increases our connection and appreciation of indigenous history and culture.
Foraging increases your resilience to external shocks and disasters by giving you a way of feeding yourself without money.
How do you start foraging?
The fires and COVID19 have highlighted the problems of our long distance, just in time food system. Producers have been unable to get their produce to market and supermarkets were unable to be stocked as roads were closed for days and sometimes weeks.
And yet all around me there is free food growing in abundance. Food that has not been transported long distances using fossil fuels, is plastic free and unprocessed goodness.
The trouble is that we have been trained to see only a narrow selection of fruit and vegetables as food and taught that food comes from shops. The fact is that many of the plants that we have been trained to see as weeds are actually not only edible but more nutritious than the modified plants made for easy handling for supermarkets. If we train ourselves to see the world differently we can see the abundance of food all around us.
In my corner of the world, the Far South Coast of NSW, Australia, fejoias and lillypillies are falling to the ground uneaten and edible weeds are growing faster than people can mow them. The sheer abundance makes me feel happy.
So why is foraging a climate action?
1) It is low carbon. Fossil fuels have not been used to grow, harvest and transport the food
2) It is seasonal. Instead of eating a fruit or vegetable all year round it can only be eaten during the short period it is ripe/available
3) It connects you with your local environment. You watch nature and observe it more intensely. You can see the effects of climate change close up. For instance I didn't get any stone fruit this year because the local birds and flying foxes are starving from the drought.
4) You learn new food processing, cooking and preservation techniques
5) It connects you to your community. Seeing fruit falling off trees in neighbours yards is the perfect impetus to ask them if you can pick some and initiate conversations.
6) It teaches you to use and eat imperfect fruit and vegetables
7) It's like gardening without a vegetable garden.
8) It improves your observation and pattern recognition skills.
9) Bush tucker increases our connection and appreciation of indigenous history and culture.
Foraging increases your resilience to external shocks and disasters by giving you a way of feeding yourself without money.
How do you start foraging?
- There are books, tours and websites available to help you identify plants.
- Walk around your neighbourhood and see if you can identify fruit trees in peoples backyards. Spring is a good time to identify fruit trees because of the blossom.
- Start with something simple and easy to identify like dandelions and gradually increase the plants you can identify and use.
- Connect with foragers on social media to learn from them.
- Start now. It is very difficult to learn new things in an emergency. So practise them now when there is no pressure.
The important thing is do NOT EAT something unless you are 100% sure of your identification and that it has not been sprayed or contaminated.
Follow my website South Coast Forager and on Facebook South Coast Forager and get more ideas on my Urban Forager Pinterest board
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