Even good permies need a holiday now and then, for Silvia and I this means a research trip to somewhere, this time it was to Spain, Ireland & Southern England.
Yes you can augue about the cost of airtravel to the enviroment but we look at the benefits derived from these trips after we return plus we save our money and our "enviromental footprint" points in the years prior so that we can feel we are justified in making the trip.
Well enough of me trying to feel better about it, what are some of the expected benefits to come from it.
1, we looked extensively at "simple" cider production in these 3 countries, (one of the reasons for starting Snake Gully Cider here in Vic was the use of all that unsaleable fruit that gets left to be mulched back in particularly on an Organic orchard) , we believe many orchards can benefit from lacally producing there own value added products "on farm" such as Cider and Cider vinegar, we hope to produce a small video detailing the simple low tech methods of making this product that have been practiced for 2000 years in Europe. With Hrs of full high definition video plus a couple of thousand photos this should be achievable in the next 2 years.
2. we took over 18,000 photos and 300gig of HD Video, we also purchased $3k of technical books for our library on the subjects of apples, pears, rootstocks and propagation, from this we wish to produce a data base relative to Australia for fruit identification, mainly for Apples, Pears, Nashi and Quinces.
3. from this material we should be able to develope simple communcation tools ( DVD's CD's, booklets & Online products) to be used in PC Certificate education and possible schools uder the VET program of cerficates or even the VCE units.
4. we visited Orchards in all these countries and found systems that would be suitable for small orchards in Australia, we hope to use this info in our consultancy business and to promote Australia's heritage fruits being grown.
5. I have been asked recently to join the Vic Curriculum and Assessment Authority committee in developing the next Horticulture in schools guide for year 11 & 12 VCE & VET, this will give an opportunity to see Urban & small scale horticulture systems considered as an option for students who dont live in large scale country areas, my experience so far has been they are often bored when only given options that relate to large scale enterprises, this will all become very relative with the implications of Peak Oil in the near future.
Why am I telling you all this ,
well partly it's so you can keep me honest in making the trip beneficial and to deliver the expectations and returns on this ecological investment but secondly it is to keep me motivated as I work best when I put myself under the pressure of deadlines.
