The Blue Mountains will be scene of a fireside farmers chat about the future of food growing this month.
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Climate change, economic recession, and big agriculture is threatening small scale food growers across the country.
How can we support farmers in the Blue Mountains and help create a sustainable, connected, localised food growing system?
Join three Blue Mountains farmers; Nic Moodie of Southleigh Farm, Rhiannon Phillips of Mountains Gourmet, and Aaron Brocken of Harvest Farms, for an informal panel discussion on The Future of Food Growing in the Blue Mountains.
Nic Moodie grows cattle, and fruit and veg at his property in Hartley using regenerative pasture management systems. He is working to repair land that has been damaged by years of overgrazing and clearing by restoring good hydrology to creeks, eliminating erosion, allowing regeneration of bushland, and creating biodiversity to encourage rare and threatened species.
Rhiannon Phillips tends three thriving market gardens in the mid Mountains producing a diverse range of seasonal veg for the local community and food co-ops. She is also an educator, offering food growing workshops, with a passion for syntropic farming which she plans to incorporate into her Hazelbrook plot.
Aaron Brocken knows only too well the havoc wrought by climate change on food growers in the Blue Mountains - his Bilpin farm has been hammered by both fire and flood in recent years. Despite setbacks he continues to regenerate the land on which he grows and is dedicated to providing a framework for a local food system that is beneficial to both the environment and community.
This is a collaborative event presented by Blue Mountains Food Co-op and Lyttleton Stores Co-op, and hosted by former farmer, Sonya Byron.
Sonya Byron works as a naturopath, herbalist and yoga teacher in clinical practice at Lower Mountains Health and Healing in Blaxland.
Prior to her career in natural health, she earned her living as the owner/farmer of Good Karma Farm in the US, a sustainable two-acre organic farm producing 60 different vegetable and herb crops.
She believes that fresh, locally grown food is one of the foundations of good health, and she's passionate about empowering people to care for their health (and to save money, time and the planet in the process) by learning how to grow and preserve their own food, and how to make their own simple herbal and nutritional remedies for common health complaints.
The event is on Saturday August 26 from 1 - 4pm at Lyttleton Stores Co-op, 1 Badgery Crescent, Lawson. Cost is $25 (includes welcome drink).
Food and drinks available to purchase / BYO camping chair, cushion or picnic rug.
