Farmerama

This month we speak to Cumbrian sheep farmer and celebrated author James Rebanks about the collective discovery of aligned interests of farmers as they are regenerating their landscapes together. And Abby has visited, Erica ten Broeke, Landscape Manager at Commonland, a Dutch NGO that bring a holistic approach to landscape restoration as initiator, catalyst and enabler of large-scale, long-term restoration initiatives.  This episode of Farmerama was made by Jo Barratt, Abby Rose and Olivia Oldham. A big thanks to the rest of the Farmerama team Katie Revell, Fran Bailey, Annie Landless, Eliza Jenkins and Dora Taylor. Our theme music is by Owen Barratt. We’re very grateful to those of you that support us and allow us to bring you these stories every month. Even the smallest contribution makes a big difference to us. If you'd like to become a supporter, visit patreon.com/Farmerama Links: James Reanks @herdyshepherd1 La Junquera lajunquera.com/ Common Land https://www.commonland.com/

This month we begin with a story from Rosie Bristow, MSc student of Fashion and Textile Management based at Phantassie Organic Farm in Scotland. We learn from Rosie about a farm to fashion project she’s pioneering as part of her studies, to prototype a UK textile economy in collaboration with George Young at Fobbing Farm in Essex. Next, we head to Uganda, where we hear from Noah Ssempijja of YICE (Youth Initiative for Community Empowerment), a social enterprise focused on providing smallholder farmers access to regenerative farming technique. Finally, we hear from Alfonso Chico Gusman and Yanniek Schoonhoven of La Junquera, who are experimenting with rain-fed regenerative techniques on their mixed farm in the arid mountains of southern Spain. La Junquera’s influence extends beyond the farm, with training initiatives such as the Regenerative Academy which offers education to the wider community as well as research collaborations with different universities bringing research to the farm. We will be heari

So if, as it turns out, the family farm is a colonial concept, what are the alternatives? And if we’re to address the tangled mess of challenges we’re faced with – the climate emergency, biodiversity loss, farmer burnout, food inequality and the need for reparations – then perhaps we need to be thinking not at the scale of the individual farm, but of the entire landscape. In this final episode, Col explores the patchwork of pre- and post-colonial land relations that already exist across Scotland. He learns more about the tried and tested model of crofting that still exists in parts of the Highlands, as well as Scotland’s community right-to-buy legislation, and asks whether, together, these could be part of a broader strategy to rethink land ownership and tenure, and even our relationship to land more broadly. In the end, Col concludes that it’s not the case that the family farm is no longer relevant – it’s just that on its own, it’s not enough to deal with what the future has in store. Instead, the family

In Part 2, farmer’s son Col Gordon explored the ways in which the colonisation of Highland Scotland destroyed a rich pre-colonial culture and relationship to the land. But in Part 3, he learns that the story of Scotland as the victim of colonial practices is just one part of a much bigger narrative. The Highlands is one of the least racially diverse parts of the UK, and it would be easy to think of the area as far removed from the UK’s grim colonial history – a place where racial justice and reparations have no direct relevance. But, as Col discovers, this would be far from the truth. Col traces the connections – some indirect, others very concrete – between the rural landscape he grew up in and global patterns of displacement, exploitation and enslavement. To dig deeper, he speaks with Josina Calliste, co-founder of Land in Our Names (LION) – a Black-led, grassroots collective committed to reparations in Britain by connecting land and climate justice with racial justice – and explores what it means to be

Over the last 250 years, Gaelic culture in the Highlands of Scotland has experienced what academic Iain MacKinnon refers to as “cultural devastation”. For farmer’s son, Col Gordon, the forced displacement of people during the Highland Clearances, and the dismantling of Gaelic language and traditions, are best understood through the lens of colonisation. Now, only small pockets of Gaelic culture remain, detached from the conditions and ways of life that they evolved in. In this episode, Col learns about the pre-colonial attitudes of the Gaels towards the land, investigating the question of what came before the family farm. What he finds is a system based on community and collective work, with a yearly migration to the hillside “shieling” to graze the cattle and rejuvenate the spirit. Above all, what he finds is a fundamentally different way of relating to the land – an understanding that people belong to the land, not the other way around. Could a revival of these “indigenous” practices, and these relationsh

“What if we’ve been getting this wrong?” Col Gordon is a farmer’s son from the Scottish Highlands. After a decade away, he’s finally returned to the place that he loves: his family farm. Now, he’s eager to start realising his vision for an agroecological future: a future in which rural areas are alive with culture, many more people work on the land, farms operate in sympathy with nature, and nutritious food is available to everyone in society. But now that he’s back, Col’s starting to wonder whether this vision can be achieved within the existing family farm model. Increasingly, it seems the odds are stacked against farms like his. Many are struggling to survive, let alone to employ people and deliver good food affordably to local communities. As older farmers retire without succession plans, and their land is amalgamated into large industrial operations, the future of the small family farm looks pretty bleak. As he wrangles with all of this, Col stumbles across something that throws his vision – and his v

This month we are introduced to the importance of ecosystem architecture by a forest ecologist and winegrower. We hear from two researchers investigating a shift in how we understand our relationship with the natural world - from one where humans are in control, to one where we work with other life-forms and biological processes to build human and ecosystem health. And we finish hearing one grower’s experience of implementing regenerative techniques on her flower farm.

This month we start with a fond farewell to internationally renowned water specialist Professor Tony Allen, most noted for his pioneering work on the concept of virtual water. We’ll hear a conversation with him from 2017 about the OurField Project. We then hear from the Kindling Trust. They work on a range of projects that model a fairer, more responsible, ecologically restorative food system, and are opening up an opportunity to invest in their new farming endeavours in Manchester. Next, farmer John Turner introduces us to a new vision of dairy farming- a vegetarian dairy farm producing cow’s milk alongside innovative naked oat mylk. Tiger and Float are making this oat mylk, using the naked oats that John is growing. Finally we meet Mohammed Ruzzi, a fair trade farmer in Palestine, who talks to us about the role of regenerative farming and the Zaytoun cooperative in supporting a better life for Palestinian farmers.

This month, we learn from an entomologist in Wiltshire about the importance of dung beetles in our farming systems. We hear how a medical herbalist in London is bringing people together to care for and heal each other and a soil microbiologist shares how restoring hydrological cycles is vital in mitigating the climate crisis and how the soil carbon sponge is core to that.

63: Indian farmers’ protests, the Forever Flock and Biopriming by Farmerama

This month we invite you to join us as we take a dip into some of the key sessions at the recent Global Oxford Real Farming Conference, where Farmerama were official media partners again this year. We hear from two women lawyers in Aotearoa New Zealand who tell us about how a river and a forest have been given legal personhood. Then, we hear how an economic think-tank and a London CSA have worked together to understand the community benefits of localised routes to market and local organic food. Next, we head to Cape Town to hear about food justice from two women working at a farming cooperative. Finally, we hear from an indigenous seedkeeper and leader in Turtle Island (the United States) about cultivating ancestral brilliance and regenerative economies.

It’s good to be back this month with a collection of conversations with farmers who are building a more ecological future. We begin at Whistlebare Farm learning how raising sheep and goats ecologically results in wool that’s extra special – all because of good work going on in the soil. We head to France, to Andy Cato’s farm, to hear about his regenerative learning journey, and discover how he’s putting that learning into practice here in the UK. And finally, we’re in Germany, where the Kulturland Cooperative has created an innovative funding model bringing farmland back into common ownership, and securing it for generations to come.

In this final episode, we revisit some of the people we’ve heard from throughout the series. We tease out some common threads that bind these apparently disparate voices together – threads such as reverence, gratitude, sovereignty, dignity and abundance. We hear more about what these people have learnt over the course of this year, their visions for resilient, localised food economies... and how they see the future of who feeds us. It is clearer than ever: Food is not just a question of calories. Food is nourishment for the body and soul. Food is about community, culture and our relationship with each other and with the Earth. We are all part of the food system. The journey ahead – towards a truly resilient, humane and nourishing food system, a food system rooted in abundance – that journey is complicated, and it will most likely be bumpy. But this series is an invitation to embrace that complexity, to dive into it, to seek out and connect with those who feed us. After all – food doesn’t come from shelves.

In this episode, we visit one region – the West Midlands – to explore how the pandemic has highlighted connections between the local and the global, the present and the past...and between food, health, community and identity. What can we learn from this time about the experiences, the resources and the needs of individuals and communities in the UK – and, in particular, communities of African descent? How can having access to land, to green space and growing space, “feed” us in multiple ways – physical, emotional and spiritual? Does being together in growing spaces allow the experience of abundance and the ability to share in that? Featuring: Lynda McFarlane: https://veganvybes.co.uk/ Dr Lisa Palmer: https://www.bcu.ac.uk/social-sciences/sociology/staff/lisa-palmer Andre Reid: https://kiondo.co.uk/ Farmerama.co Producer: DeMarkay Williams Executive Producers: Jo Barratt, Katie Revell, Abby Rose Community Collaborator: Andre Reid Project Manager: Olivia Oldham Artwork: Hannah Grace www.hgraceoc.com/ Mu

At the start of lockdown, as supermarket shelves were cleared of flour, people who might not otherwise have thought to seek out a local bakery – let alone a local mill – started to do just that. In this episode, we’ll hear about how this sudden upsurge in demand presented a huge challenge for these small-scale bakers and millers – but it was a challenge they met with enthusiasm and ingenuity, as well as a deep sense of responsibility to their communities. At one time, pretty much every town and village had its own flour mill, driven by wind or water. Today, across the whole of London, just one working windmill remains – Brixton Windmill. It’s a unique heritage site with a rich educational programme. But as lockdown began, the mill became much more than a historic curiosity – and its volunteers found themselves providing a vital service to the local community. Meanwhile, bakers across the country, from the city of Bristol to the highlands of Scotland, were baking nourishing loaves for the people who needed th

As lockdown came into effect, and supermarkets struggled to restock their fruit and vegetable aisles, the idea of “growing your own” took on a new significance. In towns and cities across the UK, those of us lucky enough to have access to gardens or balconies – even if we’d never grown anything before – suddenly started looking for compost, tools, and seeds. Many of us discovered, perhaps for the first time, the joy of eating freshly picked, homegrown fruit and veg. It’s a joy that you just don’t get when you bite into something that’s been harvested unripe on the other side of the world, flown across oceans to be processed somewhere else, then eventually picked up from a supermarket chiller here in the UK – maybe weeks later. But, to grow your own food, the first thing you need are seeds. For millennia – for the vast majority of our agricultural history, in fact – farmers saved their own seed. Over time, plants adapted to the specifics of the area they were growing in, and local varieties emerged. But when

American poet and farmer Gary Snyder writes of the interconnectedness and interdependence of the food chain. He says, “To acknowledge that each of us at the table will eventually be part of the meal is not just being ‘realistic.’ It is allowing the sacred to enter and accepting the sacramental aspect of our shaky temporary personal being.” In this episode, we explore the ways in which a growing consciousness is developing around food, based on ideas of reverence, and gratitude. How have the people who care for the animals that feed us – both in life and in death – changed during this time of crisis? How has the way they understand the future of food been altered by the pandemic, and their own responses to it? How do they see their own place in that future? Who Feeds Us? is a celebration of these key workers, a thank you and a call to action – so we don’t forget just how ‘key’ they are. Featuring: Dean Wright: https://www.ballyliskofarmagh.com/ Muhsen Hassanin: https://abrahamshalalmeat.com/ John Martin Tull

As the COVID-19 lockdown hit the UK in early 2020, our nation suddenly looked very different. Supermarket shelves were empty and, for the first time in most people's lives, we started to question how we were going to feed ourselves, and our families. Almost overnight, localised food systems went from being niche fantasies to a vital source of sustenance for many people around the country. But who – and what – made up those localised food systems? Where did this sudden burst of community provision come from? In this episode we hear from four very different corners of the food system. From people supplying high-end restaurants to people on the frontlines of emergency food response. They all share what the lockdown meant for them and their communities, as well as how what they are doing helps feed us every day – the strength of close farm-restaurant relationships, the difficulties dairy farmers have faced in the last few decades, the health benefits of local honey, and the need for culturally appropriate food.

This month, we hear how some artisan cheesemongers are starting to embrace regenerative farming. We give you a sneak peek at of one of the producers featured in our new series, Who Feeds Us?. We learn about a new course investigating the complex links between food and development, and finally we hear from a long-time farmer who has some clever tips on how to be resourceful with machinery. This month’s episode is supported by Treedom - a platform that makes it easy to support a farmer in Africa or South America to plant a tree. When you buy a tree with Treedom you’re financing farmers to plant trees as part of small agroforestry systems, and providing the local know-how and support to ensure those trees have the best start in life and truly benefit the farmers, their communities and the soil. Once you buy a tree you can also follow its journey online. Since they started in 2010, Treedom have planted over a million trees. Let’s green the planet. Website: go.treedom.net/rh5f Instagram: www.instagram.com/treedo

This month we explore an innovative model for ecological restoration in the uplands that’s a combination of rewilding and regenerative farming techniques. We head to Kenya to hear about tree planting with farmers there and why the future is bright. And we end up in Los Angeles speaking to a gardener who is reckoning with the words we use and proposing a new approach to the language of regeneration. This month’s episode is supported by Treedom - a platform that makes it easy to support a farmer in Africa or South America to plant a tree. When you buy a tree with Treedom you’re financing farmers to plant trees as part of small agroforestry systems, and providing the local know-how and support to ensure those trees have the best start in life and truly benefit the farmers, their communities and the soil. Once you buy a tree you can also follow its journey online. Since they started in 2010, Treedom have planted over a million trees. Let’s green the planet. Website: go.treedom.net/rh5f Instagram: www.instagram