Armidale Local Food (ALF) Meeting Minutes
Time: 12 noon, Saturday January 30th
Place: Armidale Community Centre, 3 Alexander St
Present
Jo Leoni (chair), Paul Reader, Alan Cunningham, Paul Kristiansen, Robert Gasparre, Adele Gibbs, Adam Fitzpatrick, Melissa Danks, Michelle Owens (minutes)
Apologies
Albert Model
Minutes of previous meeting
None
Correspondence
None
Reports
2010 Home Grown Garden Tour
Jo reported that because of the number of new gardens available for the tour this year, it had been decided to include just new gardens this year. Jo suggested that next year the tour could include a mix of the previous two years. Paul K reported that 8 gardens were confirmed, and 3 more in the pipeline. There was some discussion regarding the likelihood (or not) of the remaining 3 gardens committing to the tour. The Tour is to be held on the 6th & 7th of March. [Update: all 10 gardens are now confirmed, PK]
Action: Ray agreed to post information about the Tour on the SLA site
Paul K suggested that we notified the local garden clubs of the Tour.
Action: Paul K will notify Guyra gardening club and will try to find the contact details of Ray Monty who is a member of one of the two Armidale Gardening Clubs. Ray will contact Jill ? regarding the Uralla Gardening club.
Alan asked if we are competing with the Waldorf school tour but Ray advised that that tour is for small farms and at a different time so no competition.
Paul K suggested we submit a press release for the local newspapers, 250-350 words
Action: Ray agreed to compose the press release and Paul R and Adele and Adam agreed to provide garden photos for the press release.
The latest submission date for the press release would be Thursday 18th February. Paul R suggested sending a copy of the press release to Don and Dawn Tranter’s daughter who is currently working in the media in the hope that she publish in the Sydney papers.
Jo suggested that we reuse the poster Shivari created for last year’s tour, after discussion, it was agreed that we would use Shivari’s poster for the posters, gate hangers, nametags and booklets. We agreed that we would like Shivari’s poster to become our logo. Melissa suggested the gate hangers be bigger because last year they were easy to miss, but after discussion, we decided that the repetition of Shivari’s picture would aid people to find the gardens.
Armidale Farmer’s Market and Car Boot Sale
Jo introduced Robert Gasparre, the organiser of the Armidale Farmer’s Market and Car Boot Sale (AFM&CBS). Robert reported that the producers were going well (he now has 9 regular producers) but that it would be good to have more backyard producers. He advised that there is strong demand for the produce and that the opportunity is there to earn $3000-$4000pa for people planting in their own backyards. Robert believes that the market will continue to grow slowly as it becomes better known.
He is also hoping to work with The Ascent Group to run live sculpture workshops at the market in the future.
Jo asked Robert how he believes ALF can aid AFM&CBS and vice versa – Robert replied that he is also interested in getting people into gardening and that ALF might run workshops at the community garden. He also suggested communal composting. Ray spoke about ALF’s target of 50% of locally consumed food produced locally by 2020 and that the AFM&CBS would be a great way to help achieve this, therefore, it is important to work together.
Paul K suggested he presented a similar informal talk at an SLA monthly meeting to reach a wider audience with more diverse interests
Jo suggested sending an email out to the SLA mailing list reminding of upcoming AFM&CBS.
Proposed change to the questionnaire to local growers
Ray proposed the inclusion of the questions:
‘Do you sell through AFM&CBS or other local market?’ Y or N
‘If no, would you consider doing so?’
Paul K proposed the question:
‘What factors limit your ability to sell food locally?’
The group agreed to the changes.
Autumn Festival display of produce
The group discussed the arrangements for the display at the Autumn Festival.
Paul K, Robert, Melissa, Michelle and Jo agreed to help on the day. After some discussion about borrowing a marquee, it was decided that to look into buying one.
Action: Paul R to get quotes for 3m x 3m and 6m x 3m, after which the group will make a decision on whether to purchase 2 small or 1 large marquee. Paul will also look into the cost of walls for the marquee.
The group discussed the need for insurance purposes to display ‘Sustainable Living Armidale Inc’ somewhere on the marquee. Additionally, we identified the need for an ‘Armidale Local Food’ banner. Melissa proposed that we introduce new elements to the stall to maintain interest, such as guessing the weight of a pumpkin, or the number of beans in a jar.
Action: Michelle will get a quote for a banner. Michelle also agreed to bring her chooks to the Autumn Festival.
Action: Paul K agreed to provide a cage to house the chooks for the day.
Steve Widders request for support for beginner vegie gardeners
Steve Widders has approached ALF requesting help to encourage and teach gardening in the local aboriginal community. There was some discussion about the best way to approach this, with some favouring mentoring, and others favouring workshops. Ray and Jo will be meeting Steve soon for further discussion regarding this matter and will report to the group at the February ALF meeting; therefore, we decided to hold this matter over until then.
Slow Food New England Convivium (SFNEC)
Robert spoke about the Slow Food New England group’s aims and commonalities with ALF, including their focus on local produce, community and education. The group agreed that it would be good to foster a relationship between ALF and SFNEC. The next meeting of the SFNEC is at 7pm (?) on the 3rd February at Maureen Chapman’s house at 33 Hargrave Street, Armidale. Ray and Paul R indicated they might attend.
Visioning Exercise
The group decided that the commitments of the Home Grown Garden Tour and the Autumn festival stall made it necessary to delay our visioning exercise. Thus, we decided that the visioning exercise would constitute the whole of the March meeting
Permablitz/Workshops
Held over
Other business
We agreed to bring a plate to future meetings.
Next Meeting
Noon Saturday 27th February at the Armidale Community Cottage, 3 Alexander St, Armidale. [Venue possibly changed to SNELCC please check email].