Lots to swap and share at Essential Edibles – Our Urban Village

Last Sunday about 20 people gathered at Joslin Reserve for Essential Edibles Swap and Share. The most important things we swapped and shared were ideas, news and experiences.

‘How do you get your capsicums so healthy David?’ ‘How big is your jujube tree Des?’ ‘How do you use amaranth and purslane?’ ‘How do you get your rhubarb to grow?’

Then there was the huge variety of fruit and vegetables – capsicum, beans, zucchini, eggplant, spinach, chilli, rocket, sage, basil, figs, jujubes, apples, grapes, rhubarb, guavas (small and sweet) and another rare fruit like a lychee with a citrus flavour and beautiful brown eggs. Seedlings of spinach, purslane, amaranth, and various other herbs. At 10am we ask each other what they would like and gradually the table laden with baskets of fruit, vegetables and seedlings is cleared.

We talked about ‘Our Urban Village’ and how we can extend this activity to other local activities to improve our food security in the future. Various people filled in the lists we now have for local tradespeople, local; professional businesses, local commercial businesses, fruit trees in the area that may be available for sharing produce and skills and products people can exchange on a one on one basis.

To find out more about Our Urban Village contact Beth bmylius@chariot.net.au  and Essential Edibles lisa.lanzi@bigpond.com