Ticking boxes on sustainability

A community project is delivering locally grown fresh fruit and vegetables to 50-60 households in Sunraysia every week, as BROOKE LITTLEWOOD discovers.  Picture: Ben Gross.

If people really want to make an impact, the best way they can do that is three times a day, when they decide what they eat.

That is the message from Food Next Door executive officer Deb Bogenhuber, who is encouraging Sunraysia residents to do exactly that by subscribing to Out of the Box.

Out of the Box is a community project that works closely with local, small-scale and family growers within a 100km radius of Mildura and supports them to grow using methods that improve soil quality and biodiversity.

Ms Bogenhuber says the idea for Out of the Box followed a series of monthly conversations as part of a local food activation program, which involved between 12 and 20 people.

“What came out of that quite strongly was that people here wanted to have access to more local produce,” she explains.

“The box idea came out of that – how do we do that, how do we connect with people with local growers.

“Then we had just a couple of really small-scale growers locally who wanted to be involved in supplying.”

The program initially ran as a three-month trial and was limited to 30 boxes a week, which filled within 24 hours.

It has since doubled and today delivers fresh fruit and vegetables to 50-60 households every Wednesday.

Ms Bogenhuber says after the trial the group had a break to reassess the program and its purpose.

And what became apparent was the need for more small-scale growers across the region who were growing according to the practices Out of the Box was looking for.

“People were pretty strong on wanting food that wasn’t grown on chemicals,” she says.

“A lot of that was because young families were the ones interested and they didn’t want their kids growing up to eat food that had been sprayed with pesticides, herbicides and things.

“At that point, we kind of went back to how we find small-scale growers and since then we have had a couple more people start farming.”

Out of the Box has five core growers, who have only a local market, as well as bigger, certified organic and biodynamic farms outside the region. 

The small-scale growers aren’t certified, but Ms Bogenhuber says the program would develop its own certification system this year.

“It is a regional system where growers inspect each other’s properties,” she says.

“That certification is based on the organic guidelines, but it makes it a bit more specific to our region and our growers.

“Luckily we have a climate that can grow all year, but we do have these periods where things can get a bit light on and during those times we might supplement the boxes with things like eggs, bread from Giovanni (Barbera), who uses biodynamic flour, so it is still sticking with our principles but having a few value-added products in there.”

Ms Bogenhuber says there are “a lot of reasons” why she encourages people to support businesses and farmers by shopping local.

“Research has shown that money spent with local farmers circulates through the economy, so when you spend a dollar in a program like this or at the farmers’ market that dollar will circulate another three or four times within your local economy,” she says.

“Also, for anyone who is concerned about our impacts on climate, actually the biggest piece of activism that they could do is to buy local produce that is grown regeneratively three times a day, every day of the week.

“This is a social enterprise run by Food Next Door Co-Op, so any profits from this get fed back in, supporting new farmers to farm.

“It’s really creating, hopefully, a system that keeps growing itself.”

Pushing on with organic vision

Mildura resident Michelle Gray first became involved with Out of the Box as a subscriber with a young family and an interest in organically grown and locally sourced produce.

Today, she is operations manager of the program and says she is learning every day.

Ms Gray says it made sense to step into the role after reaching a point where she could fit volunteering into her week.

“I just love the fact I know the people are growing the food that my family are eating,” she explains. 

“I know that it is all seasonal and local and hasn’t been subjected to lots of nasty chemicals.

“I think that has to be good for my family.”

Ms Gray says her family took a different direction with their health about a decade ago, when they decided to reduce their intake of processed food, start growing their own produce and buy organic.

“When Out of the Box came out and I first read about it, I was just so excited because previous to that in Mildura there wasn’t a lot of access to both organic and local,” she says.

“To have that combination was just perfect for what I was looking for, so I didn’t hesitate at all to become a subscriber.

“It is always great to support local wherever you can and this is the perfect opportunity to do it.

“But also the nutritional value – some of this produce has been picked this morning and it will be in people’s homes for dinner tonight, you can’t get any fresher than that.

“You’re certainly not getting that sort of freshness if you drop off at the supermarket on the way home to buy something for dinner.

“Consequently the nutritional content, because of the freshness, is higher.”

A chance to grow

Growing up on a vineyard, Ben Mitchell always had an interest in farming.

So when a property behind his father’s vines in Merbein popped up for sale two years ago, he had his heart set on buying it.

The 26-year-old is one of five core growers involved in the Out of the Box program and grows on a quarter of an acre.

He says he first came involved after seeing a call-out from Deb Bogenhuber, who was looking for small-scale farmers.

“I was sort of in the process of doing this and thought, ‘Oh yeah, beauty’,” Mr Mitchell says.

“From there it has been really good, it has been easier to start selling produce to someone.

“I always wanted to get into farming, but it’s a bit hard when you don’t have a million bucks to buy all the tractors and large acres.

“I enjoy most the satisfaction of looking after (the produce) from start to finish and other people have been grateful for them, as well as the challenge and learning different techniques.”

Mr Mitchell grows any seasonal vegetables, and says he has “a few things on the go” at present, including white and purple eggplant, spring onion, basil, garlic chives and cucumber.

He says in the first year he experimented with a lot of things, but this year he had a plan of where he wanted to go with his farming.

“I’m only doing it sort of one day a week and on the weekends at the moment – I want to do it full-time, hopefully this year,” Mr Mitchell explains.

“I only have the Out of the Box customers and a few family members and friends at the moment, so hopefully I can pick up a few more bigger customers.”