A community in transition to a low carbon, sustainable, resilient life.

Food & Land

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The Food, land & Farming Group

Location: Forest Row
Members: 26
Latest Activity: Aug 14

Food Guide

It is a wonderful thing to know where your food comes from. Relationships with those who have produced it, knowledge of the local land and the ability to ask questions of producers add an extra dimension to a meal.

We have aimed in this guide to find producers within roughly a 10 mile radius of Forest Row village. We have included a couple from a few miles further away for special or unusual produce. All are, to the best of our knowledge, traditional-type modest scale farms and producers that care about issues such as animal welfare and give back to their communities in different ways.

Locally grown food helps us cut food miles, support our local economy, and can encourage diversity and good land and animal husbandry. Transition Forest Row celebrates all local producers and all that you may grow in your garden, allotment or window box. After some tough years for British farming, where many farmers have left the industry or retired, there now seems to be a growing recognition of issues around nutrition, sustainability and food security. It’s good to see organisations like the National Trust and the Women’s Institute behind local food and “grow your own” initiatives.

When we started the directory we also aimed to include restaurants and cafés who promoted local food but they proved scarcer on the ground than we had expected (and scarcer than in many other towns and villages). A number of the places listed do have tea shops and restaurants, and many offer other products, events or facilities.

We hope this brief guide may help you on an adventure to source more of your own food more locally. With grateful thanks to all those who have helped us discover other producers, to the farmers and retailers themselves who have given such positive replies, and to Wealden District Council for funds to print this guide through a grant to Transition Forest Row.

Enjoy!
Rowena Moore and Juliet Cumpatescu
March 2009

Download a copy here
Food Guide

As a hard copy booklet can only hold limited information and goes out of date, we have also encouraged all producers and retailers listed to load their details onto the local food finder website www.bigbarn.co.uk

Discussion Forum

'Radical rethink' needed on food

Started by Mike Grenville Aug 12.

Bee Keeping 14 Replies

Started by Mike Grenville. Last reply by Michael Cassels May 15.

Allotment website - resource for new and more experienced gardeners

Started by Rowena May 10.

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Comment by Phill on August 14, 2009 at 8:34am: Text from my reply from the food standards agency ref Organic has not health benefits:
Thank you for your email concerning the London School of Hygiene and Tropical Medicines (LSHTM) literature review which compared the nutrient content of organic and conventionally produced food that was funded by the Food Standards Agency. The study was the most scientifically rigorous and independent review of research ever carried out in this area, it looked at 50 years worth of research, and focused specifically on the nutrient content of all foodstuffs. The work was commissioned to ensure the Agency’s position on organic food is up-to-date and reflects the weight of current scientific evidence. It was also as a response to the increased number of papers focussing on nutritional differences between organic and non organic food and calls from the organic sector to review this emerging research. As 162 relevant papers were found our review was both timely and needed.

Pesticides and contaminants were specifically excluded from the study, as were environmental and other impacts. The purpose of this study was to review all the published scientific research which compares the nutrient content of food produced both organically and conventionally and to asses the significance of any differences found. In addition a smaller study, again with the focus on nutritional content, looked at the evidence for health benefits from the nutrients between organic and conventional foodstuffs. The report was extensively reviewed prior to publication by a number of leading scientists. The Food Standards Agency therefore has complete confidence in the validity of the work carried out by the LSHTM.

The Agency recognises that people buy organic food for a number of reasons, for example environmental and animal welfare concerns, or to minimise their intake of pesticide residues and/or additives. However for the Agency this is a matter of consumer choice and not one of safety. Before pesticides are approved they are rigorously assessed to ensure they do not pose an unacceptable risk to human health or the environment, and that any pesticide residues left in food will not be harmful to consumers. Pesticides are strictly regulated and all food available in the UK is monitored to make sure that there are no unexpected residues – this goes for both food produced in the UK and imported food. All of this means that the safety of our food is kept under close watch.

The Agency is not for or against organic food, our role is to provide consumers with the best possible scientific evidence so they can make informed choices about the food they eat. The work carried out by the LSHTM indicates that there is currently no evidence to suggest that people should select organic over conventional food in terms of nutrient content. The important message is that people should eat plenty of fruit and vegetables as part of a healthy balanced diet, whether it is produced conventionally or organically.

If you would like further information on the results of the recent review the full reports can be seen at http://www.food.gov.uk/news/newsarchive/2009/jul/organic.

Yours sincerely

Richard Wood
Labelling, Standards and Allergy Division

Comment by Mike Grenville on August 4, 2009 at 9:25am: The Daily Mail summed up the FSA report with this headline:
A cancerous conspiracy to poison your faith in organic food

This more considered comment on The Ecologist is worth reading:
FSA organics study: read it closely

Comment by Tali on July 30, 2009 at 9:36pm: So when is the next Food and Land group meeting planned?

Comment by Phill on July 30, 2009 at 9:11am: Organic 'has no health benefits'
I’ve just read about this on the bbc
http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/health/8174482.stm

I don’t see how they can claim “Organic food is no healthier than ordinary food” when the study only looked at nutritional value, which is only a small part of the story.
I would like to see more rounded research; for example what effect does all the extra stuff you get with non-organic food such as the pesticide residue have on our health?

I have written to the food standards people and will let you know what they say!
Phill

Comment by Rowena on July 17, 2009 at 11:53pm: The High Weald have also taken a look at the ability of the area to be more self sufficient in food...
http://www.highweald.org/text.asp?PageId=410

Comment by Laurence Green on July 9, 2009 at 11:31pm: THE BAD NEWS - CODEX ALIMENTARIUS
Watch http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VmrF9KjlGsc . This is in 5 parts of 8 minutes each. Note the permitted pesticides and their levels. It makes even more sense to produce our own food.

Comment by Rowena on April 20, 2009 at 10:09pm: Apparently this is an inspiring radio 4 programme on a farmers co-operative supplying local organic food, particularly to schools, in Essex...http://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/b006qnx3

Comment by Laurence Green on April 18, 2009 at 12:25am: SUSTAINABLE ORGANIC DAIRY FARM (correction) The link is
fora.tv/2008/08/28/Dairies_and_Feedlots_Whats_the_Good_News#chapter_00

Comment by Laurence Green on April 17, 2009 at 10:43pm: SUSTAINABLE ORGANIC DAIRY FARM
Albert Straus runs a progressively sustainable organic dairy farm in Marshal, California, despite difficult trading conditions. He even powers his car by electricity generated from methane produced from manure from his about 300 milking cows. His 55 minute talk is at:
fora.tv/2008/08/28/Dairies_and_Feedlots_Whats_the_Good_News#chapter_03

Comment by Mike Grenville on April 3, 2009 at 2:09pm: Local eating out guide is a good idea - just get our breath first!

To be included they ought to be GM free - not all the eateries even in Forest Row are.