By Stephen Webb
In July on ABC Radio National Breakfast, Mark Bannerman spoke with Peter Cundall about his final episode of Gardening Australia. Mr Cundall spoke about how, in a time of environmental crisis and world shortage of fuel, it was essential for people to take up gardening instead of buying food that had to be transported great distances.
As in many of his recent “farewell” interviews, Mr Cundall repeated his message, “Grow your own in your own backyard or in pots or tubs and we can survive.”
He is working on a book titled We Can Survive, responding to the fear of climate change, food shortages and falling food standards by providing a guide to growing food in the smallest of gardens.
“I’ve been making television programs since 1969 ... because I want to say to people, ‘What’s wrong with going out the back door and pulling up your own carrots and cabbages?’
People are sitting down
to food that has travelled
several thousand kilometres
“Most people who sit down to a meal today are sitting down to food that has travelled several thousand kilometres or more.
“And yet even my little vegie patch at the Royal Tasmanian Botanical Gardens — four metres wide by twelve metres long — is enough to provide a family of four with all the vegetables they can eat, including enough spuds to last seven or eight months.”
Communities with such gardens could share food with one another, he said Jesus said it was impossible to serve God and wealth. But, in our consumption-obsessed society, how can we discern what, if anything, Jesus would want us to buy?
Insights magazine this month asks, “How would Jesus want us to live?” and has produced a website inspired by the film What Would Jesus Buy?
The website contains
articles, links,
resources and
a guide to
transforming
our habits and
communities.
Garden guru Peter Cundall who
retired from the ABC in July
Stephen Webb is a religious affairs journalist currently working with the Uniting Church in Sydney.
Paget's Parable
