Grow your own food!

In this week’s Sunday Times, Mark Keenan in his Plot 34 column makes telling arguments about the decline of the Irish food-producing industry, with ever-increasing reliance on imported food, the security of which can hardly be taken for granted in the troubled world of today. Climate change, oil crises, financial collapse, supermarket domination and the vicissitudes of world markets all contribute to a very uncertain supply chain for our food, and thus for our very survival. Keenan argues that for the first time in 500 generations, the knowledge of how to grow our own food is not being systematically passed down by adults to children, and that most children are not growing up watching and learning as their dad or granddad works the soil, plants seeds and produces food for the family table.



We all bemoan the rain and lack of real heat in our weather, but we have the most wonderful climate for growing and it is surely a nonsense that farmers, whose industry is more important than any, are being forced out of business, in part because of the low prices they receive. The connection to nature is not being adequately made in our children’s daily lives, and schools will struggle to fill the gap if there is such a strong cultural negation of the importance of the natural world, of our agricultural heritage and of horticultural knowledge and skills. These are things of such overwhelming importance that they should be part of our folk-memory, of our indigenous wisdom, transmitted from generation to generation as part of our daily lives. Without them, we become dependent on others, dependent on chance, helpless in adversity and unable to provide sustenance for our families.



A recent report said that to continue in our current lifestyles, the planet will have to produce as much food in the next fifty years as it has in the last 10,000. Can we even begin to manage such a task unless we all take more responsibility for growing our own? And that means understanding the soil and maintaining its health and productivity.



Cabragh Wetlands Trust is of course doing its bit to get children (and adult visitors) to think more deeply about such issues and to foster better understanding of both our local habitats and global environmental issues. As a new development we are working with our friends at Pallas Hill Open Farm at the Ragg, a family farm with a variety of animals for visitors to see, plus information on wildlife, and a museum and display of horse-drawn machinery, which helps us to understand our farming heritage and the central role of agriculture and food production in the lives of all our ancestors until perhaps the last two generations. We are hoping that some schools might like to spend a full day in the area, perhaps spending the morning at Cabragh and the afternoon at Pallas Hill. This would make a great day out of the classroom, and we hope some schools from further away might make the journey for a field study outing in the beautiful countryside of North Tipp. Contact either Ella at Pallas Hill (0504-54294) or Michael at Cabragh (0504-43879).