[Pil-pc-oceania] Sydney bio-region / food production

[RussGrayson]

Maybe not Bringelly alone but the Sydney basin, mainly to the north-west and
south-west of the metropolitan area.

Sydney is fortunate among cities in being able to feed itself in fresh
vegetables from its immediate hinterland. A full 90 per cent of the metro's
vegetables, nearly all of the state's Asian veges, 80 per cent of its
mushroom supply and more is grown on the flatlands that enclose the city.
There is also fruit coming down from the cooler, more temperate climate of
the Blue Mountains. Grain comes from over the ranges, from the drier
country.

An August 1995 issues paper from NSW Agrculture, Sustainable Agriculture in
the Sydney Basin, listed commercial tree and berry crops produced in the
Sydney basin, which incorporates the catchment of the Nepean-Hawkesbury
rivers, to include citrus, stone fruit, nuts, berry crops and apples.

The industry is worth around $1 billion annually to farmers and around $4.5
billion to the industry as a whole. It employs around 12,000 in the farming,
processing and distribution components of the industry.

THE CHALLENGE
The challenge is to maintain good lands as agricultural and allow marginal
lands to go to development.

Of all the political parties, only The Greens in state Parliament have taken
on the mission of doing this. The Labor Party, not unmistakenly closely
associated with the development industry in NSW, which does much to bankroll
the party, seem ready to do all they can to pave and tile the agricultural
lands. The state Liberals, as usual, are in hiding. They reportedly take a
little less, parhaps, from developers to top up their accounts and are
silent on the future of agricultural lands just as they are invisible on
most things.

Pleasing to see that the Labor minister that told the regions market
gardeners that they only had a 20 year future, a few years ago, is long gone
and forgotten herself and has been relegated to a  minor listing in the
state's political history. Justice.

MORE INFO
The future of the metro's local food supply is critically important to the
city and the state.

If you want to find more about this fascinating topic, download the 'Sydney
basin Agriculture - Local Food, Local Economy' discussion sheet from the
website of the sydney Food Fairness Alliance -
www.sydneyfoodfairness.org.au/discussion/syd_basin_ag.pdf

See also my website www.pacific-edge.info/journalism for:

- Urban farming on way to extinction

- Drought makes urban food production more than a good idea.

...Russ




On 12/10/07 2:00 AM, "jedd" <jedd at progsoc.org> wrote:

>  Greetings,
> 
>  The ABC ran a story a couple of years ago:
>  http://www.abc.net.au/rural/content/2005/s1525490.htm
>  
>  ... that asserted that 90% of Sydney's fresh produce was
>  grown in Bringelly.
> 
>  This seems an astonishingly unreasonable figure, even for way
>  back in 2005.  Can someone point me at some better and/or
>  more recent statistics for Sydney?
> 
>  taa,
>  Jedd.
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