Top-down encouragement of bottom-up activism to preserve the genetic basis of tomorrow's food at the local level in Australia
Megumo Ogata 1
The paper will give a brief overview of what food varieties are grown and how they are grown in Australia. The activities of the Seed Savers’ Network on preserving diversity of species and varieties nationally and how it is now devolving to local seed networks that are established on a bioregional basis will also be described.
The situation in Australia
One big difference between Australia and other Asian countries is that there is neither a long term nor homogenous way of life that is connected to the land to tap into for seed varieties. Every crop that is grown for consumption in Australia, besides the odd native Australian bush food, has arrived in the last two hundred and thirteen years. The English brought their parsnips, the Italians their capsicums and tomatoes, the Greeks their spinach and eggplants, Middle Eastern people their chick peas and garlics, South East Asians their many spices and the Japanese their seaweed, miso and wasabi.
Culturally Australia is a mix of these and the many other cultures that make up its population. Despite its large area, Australia is one of the most urbanised countries of the world, where about 85% of the population live in cities of over 100,000 people. The agriculture production system, which is the source of food of majority of people, is large scale monoculture. However, the tradition of back yard vegetable gardening in the spreading suburbs enables at least some familiarity with growing food plants.
The Seed Savers’ Network
For the fifteen years since its inception, the Seed Savers’ Network has focused its attention on varieties that do well biodiverse small-scale systems. This is done by a number of ways, namely:
· Appealing to the general public for seeds of traditional varieties of food plants
· Popularising seed saving of these plants
· Organising their seed exchange amongst growers in all parts of Australia
· Conducting trials and bulking up quantities of seeds of different varieties both at the Seed Centre and through a network of experienced seed savers.
Activities of the Seed Savers’ Network
Sources of seeds
Samples of seeds come from members of the public who heard of work of the Seed Savers' Network work through the media, word of mouth, or from subscribers to its newsletter, who act as regenerators and custodians of rare traditional varieties.
Distribution of seeds
The network operates as a linkage/connector between seed savers. They can exchange their seeds with the seed bank and with other subscribers to the network. A 24 - 30 page newsletter comes out twice a year. The Autumn (March) issue has a list of the seeds that are available from the central seed bank. These seeds are available to those who are interested for the cost of return postage. This Autumn there were 280 varieties, mostly vegetables, that are available. It also contains articles of interest and clippings about seed issues and seed projects around the world, feedback from our regenerators and custodians and news from our local seed networks. The Spring (August) issue has a list of what subscribers around Australia offer one another, usually for the cost of postage and handling. This Spring there were over 1000 offerings.
The Seed Centre
There is a seed bank where incoming seed batches are recorded, tested for viability, stored in a low-tech insect proof system and packetted for distribution to subscribers and to community projects.
The Seed Centre is a one acre 'garden' that are both species and variety diverse. There is a strong programme of growing out batches of seeds at centre for comparative trials, for seed production and for teaching seed saving techniques through courses, workshops and internship.
Funding
The main funding come from the sales of The Seed Savers’ Handbook. The fund generated support the Seed Savers’ work in publicising the issues related to seed conservation and management, public education on these issues, and the conduct of trials and generation of practical experimentation in the centre. The Seed Savers' Network received separate funding for its work in developing countries on community seed banking.
Training
The Seed Savers' Network has a training programme for people who work, or plan to work, in agriculture projects. Since 1997, the Seed Savers has provided eleven long term internships for numerous Australians, four for young people from other developed countries, and four for people from developing countries. It intends to offer scholarships to more of this last group. To date they have worked on seed projects in Solomon Islands, Cambodia, Cuba, Ecuador, India, Japan and East Timor.
One-week courses on "Preparation for Working in Development" are held every April since 1997. Training in community seed banking has been provided by The Seed Savers’ Network in several countries of the Pacific, Caribbean, Africa and South, East and South East Asia. Details of information on its activities overseas is available at The Seed Savers’ website www.seedsavers.net, (sections on Projects and Resources).
Strategy to encourage local seed networks to focus on locally adapted varieties of farm and garden plants in Australia
For the last two years, the Seed Savers has encouraged the formation of local seed networks. At its inception in 1986, the founders, Jude and Michel Fanton decided to create a national group. At the time there was a kind of theoretical interest in issues of ownership of plants with the passing of patenting laws in Australia. However there was a definite trend away from the actual practice of saving seeds in the garden and on the farm. A national public awareness campaign was necessary and the collection and re-dissemination of those few seeds that were non-commercial was essential.
Now fifteen years later, there is enough expertise in seed saving. With the increasing availability and use of genetically manipulated food and crops in Australia, there is increasing public interest in conserving biodiversity and to devolve the network into local networks. This satisfies a burning desire to service gardeners with locally adapted varieties.
To date there are twenty such local seed networks in Australia, some independent, but most are attached to some kind of growers’ group, including gardeners’ clubs which attract mostly retired people, organic farmers and community gardens.
Encouragement has been given to these local seed networks and to active individuals. This is done through advice on the telephone, photocopied resource materials on strategies for the setting up and maintenance of seed banks, and through the internet (The Seed Savers’ website: www.seedsavers.net under Local Seed Networks).
There is a plan in the near future to publish the seed lists of these networks on the website so that they can do seed exchange amongst themselves.
The Seed Savers' Network has strong interest in working with, and helping people in the Asian region and would welcome enquiries from anybody concerning the sending of interns from Australia to work on projects. It also welcomes receiving members of organisations for further training. It is expanding its training activities with the building of a new training facility in the next year.
1 13 Old Banglow Rd. Byron Bay NSW. Australia, email: megthesloth@hotmail.com, website: www.seedsavers.net