Dear Fair Food Community,
Lots has happened since our last newsletter!
On a local level, we successfully launched the Wollongong Online Farmers Market, providing an additional pathway within our community to actively support our fantastic producers, our environment and our future. Meanwhile on a state level, we provided a submission to the NSW Parliamentary Inquiry into Food Production and Supply and have been invited to speak at the hearing on the 9th May.
It is important to celebrate these wins towards a fairer, local and more resilient food system, particular with food supply challenges and rising food prices showing the vulnerability of industrial food systems.
Read on for:
- The many ways you can get involved in building a fairer food system.
- The current Dharawal Season: Marraigang
- Our Grow Your Own Fair Food Guide
- Fair Food Champion Penny from Penny’s Plants & Produce
- What’s on for the upcoming months and some must reads & podcasts.
Click & collect for local sustainable food
Fill your cart with goods from over 25 different local producers and collect each Thursday from our Fairy Meadow hub. Orders open every Wednesday at 2pm till 11pm Monday.
Together growing a more resilient, sustainable, and local food economy!
Volunteer with Food Fairness Illawarra
Are you interested in developing your skills in marketing and communication? Would you like to help educate our community and encourage them to take action towards a fairer food system? Join our team! Apply by the 12th of May!
Click here to find out more
Nominate your fair food champion
Do you know someone who would be a great #FairFoodChampion to be featured in our next newsletter?
The #FairFoodChampion segment is our way to recognise and celebrate the amazing champions we have in our community, all working towards a fairer food system.
Click here for more
Dharawal Season: The Time of the Marraigang – Bana’marrai’yung Wet, becoming cooler (April / May)
The Time of Marrai’gang is the time to survey the bushland to make ready for the burning of the country if the Keeper of the Flame, Dharamuoy, considers it necessary and if the weather and winds allow it to be done safely.
Fair Food Champion: Penny Thompson
Penny is the owner of Penny’s Plants and Produce in Towradgi and has recently joined as a producer for the Wollongong Online Farmers Market!
Recipe for Choko Curry
A delicious recipe to keep you warm in the colder months from our May Fair Food Champion.
Our GROW YOUR OWN FOOD field guide promotes gardening as a fun, productive outdoor activity. Read on for some practical tips to get started on growing your own food!
You don’t need a backyard to grow your own food. For those with limited space there are plenty of ways to grow small amounts of vegetables. Click here for more
Composting is an easy way to sustainably discard your kitchen scraps while improving the health of your vegetable garden. Click here for more.
For those who have the space, a backyard veggie patch is the simplest way to produce your own food – and you don’t have to be an experienced gardener to begin Click here for more
Becoming a member of a community garden is a great way to meet people, learn new gardening skills and share in the produce that’s grown. Click here for more
Want more? Head to the Grow Your Own Food section of our Fair Food Field Guide to find:
- Building Healthy Soil
- Veggie Gardens & Urban Agriculture
- Beekeeping
- Advocate, Educate and Support
No-dig, Small Space Gardening Workshop
28th of May | Green Connect | 9:00am – 12:30pm
The chance to learn practical skills to set up a productive garden space almost anywhere plants can access light and grow!
Click here for more
Double Delicious 8th
8-11th June 2022 | Merrigong Theatre Company
Come and listen to a night of stories from five different cooks revealing the secrets of dishes that are significant in their lives. Smell the mouth watering aromas and hear salty, sweet, sour and bitter stores from the heart, infused with memory and lived experience. Plus each story ends with an audience taste test.
Click here for more
Permaculture Living Online Course
13th June 2022 | Milkwood
A 12 week self paced online course giving you the skills you need to cultivate abundance, increase your households’s resilience and bring lots of climate-positive actions into your everyday. Learn how to use permaculture thinking, skills, designs and habits!
Click here for more
Podcasts
The Food Fight
A frank and irreverent exercise in food talk, offering a different perspective on food and hospitality issues. Hosts Stefan Posthuma and Simon Evans speak with a range of chefs, producers, business owners and experts to hear their stories and get their perspective.
Click here to listen
Fair Food Forager
Follow for light, fun, informative chats with legends going above and beyond – environment, health and well being focussed. With over 50 episodes. Listen now!
Click here to listen
Reads
Grow Green by Jen Chillingsworth
Grow Green: Tips and Advice for Gardening with Intention is a practical guide and focuses on sustainability. Packed with easy tips and advice, this book reveals how to adjust your outdoor space and create a wildlife haven, while reducing your impact on the environment as you grow and cut your own flowers, fruit and veg. Live simply, grow green.
Home Grown by Paul West
Home Grown: A year of growing, cooking and eating features planting guides for the most popular vegetables and fruit trees to grow yourself using whatever space you have, whether it’s a balcony, backyard or nature strip. Paul also has loads of ideas for garden projects to improve your crop, from raising seedlings and building a mini greenhouse to managing rain water and heat-proofing your garden.
Proudly hosted and governed by Healthy Cities Illawarra since 2005
We acknowledge the Traditional Custodians of D’harawal Country where our organisation is located. We pay our deepest respects to the Elders past, present and emerging.
While FFI takes every reasonable effort to ensure that the information contained within this newsletter is correct at the time of issue, we recommend that the individual takes care to confirm details, as events especially are subject to last minute changes, and run at the organiser’s discretion.