In August 2023 Lyttleton Stores hosted a Farmers Fireside Chat, where the topic of discussion was the future of food growing in the Blue Mountains. This was the second event in our “Meet the Farmers” series - a collaboration with the Blue Mountains Food Co-op⤻ to support and raise awareness of our amazing local farmers.

On a lovely Saturday afternoon, over 30 attendees gathered in our Community Garden for an informal panel discussion with three local farmers - Nic Moodie⤻ of Southleigh Farm in Hartley, Rhiannon Phillips⤻ of Mountains Gourmet in the mid Mountains, and Aaron Brocken⤻ of Harvest Farms in Bilpin, with Sonya Byron⤻, a naturopath and former farmer herself, as moderator. Each farmer provided valuable insight into the challenges of small scale agriculture and how they are working towards regenerative land management and localised food security in the face of climate change induced weather events and cost of living pressures. The discussion, as with its subject matter, grew organically, with a wide range of subjects being explored.

On the topic of challenges faced by our local farmers, Nic highlighted the vital importance of valuing and protecting our food producing land

“I just think it's so important that we keep productive land productive. We are a Mediterranean High rainfall environment up here - we are extraordinary. And down around Windsor, you've got these amazing Windsor planes that are just some of the most fertile country in the world, and it's all Turf! Why are we growing Turf within 50 kilometres of our largest capital city in the country when we need food?
“Anywhere you can put it, we should be growing food - and we should be growing it well, and we should be growing it in a way that supports ecosystem services”

While Aaron spoke of the important role local food production can play in community, for both the consumer and the farmer:

“... seeing some of these people get inspired about their foods and things like that, that's that that gives me pride in my work. I think we often think about trying to bring the consumer closer to the farmer for the benefit of the consumer … a lot less we think about bringing the farmer to the consumer and having a sense of pride in your work as well.
“I think that that's a knock-on fact of building tighter Food Systems and bringing people closer … people are starting to think that … this is my community, I want to grow food for them, and this is a sense of place and we're trying to build a food system as well that is representative of the people that grew up in that system and are part of that system”

Meanwhile, Rhiannon noted that these benefits can extend beyond just the local area

“Every week I go to a child care centre in Sydney and I'm doing Connect to Earth classes. Basically so we sow seeds, we look at the soil, we collect worms, we feed the chickens. Really really basic stuff that a lot of these kids have never done. A lot of these kids have never had dirt under their nails.
“Recently I shared a video of a group of kids planting some seedlings with me, and I had to say to them ‘Don't worry we'll wash it off later’. As soon as they got their hands dirty they looked up and they were like ‘I want to wash it now’. It was really shocking to see that some of these kids have never touched soil! But it's also really nice to see them go through those stages, and now when I get there it's like ‘Miss Farmer's here!’
“I think it's really important to nurture the younger generation, because it really makes a difference”

You can see a recording of the event here⤻.

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