from w
A short post - a point raised by the tribewanted members on Vorovoro Island. Just how far away does your food come from?
'It’s been quite a full day on the island. The morning was spent sorting out the recycling, gardening and meke. In the afternoon some members went on the reef trip, those were left had a sustainability forum, the topic of the day was food. 20% of food used for cooking is sourced from the island. Hopefully with the help of the dam, this will be increased to 50%. They also discussed the concept of food mileage, which is the distance between where the food is produced and where it’s eaten. Did you know the average item purchase in the supermarket travels 16000km?! Fact!! Therefore we should go out and support our local farms and markets buying from source wherever possible.'
A good point raised, not only for Fiji, but for everyone wherever they may be.
Yes - Duncan from Syrup and Tang wrote about the same thing this week.
ReplyDeleteHe found bread in a Melbourne supermarket that came from the USA!
http://www.syrupandtang.com/200904/what-is-your-supermarket-importing-now/comment-page-1/#comment-2159
It's crazy buying so much stuff from overseas. Even one of the chains om aistra;oa -Subway - gets its breadrolls dough from Canada! When I was little our parents had about ten fruit trees, and about ten beds of vegetables, we had chooks, etc. In Labasa we grew vegies, grew rice, had breadfruit trees etc. bartered with the Indian neighbours. These days even there, the people buy too much stuff in the market and supermarket. I'm all for local produce particularly your own garden.
ReplyDeletew.
Oops - I mean 'in Australia' - somehow my fingers did the talking!
ReplyDeletew.
Phew - for a moment there, I thought that you were typing in tongues! :-)
ReplyDeleteYes, we had avocado, guava, lemon and breadfruit trees and we were always swapping with friends and neighbours who gave us dalo, cassava and bele in return.
As soon as the house plots got smaller and people started to subdivide their sections, there was no room for trees and vege gardens. Plus, it would probably contravene some stupid council bylaw in these days!
Also, fruit trees are harder to grow nowadays - given the hybrid examples that pass for trees in any of the garden centres today.
That's another result of globalisation - make it harder for people to be self-sufficient so that they have to buy crap from supermarkets.
A story from Lautoka in today's Asutralian newspaper - a travel writer Susan Kurosawa talks about women making chutney.
ReplyDeleteCheck it out at:
http://www.theaustralian.news.com.au/story/0,25197,25365296-33835,00.html
w.
Fantastic story - I hope that they do very well.
ReplyDeleteBut now I'm pining for mango chutney, achar and tamarind chutney after reading that!