Workshop Weekend at the Farm

 The kitchen and barn were abuzz at Ambury Farm last weekend, with local participants attending preserving and Bokashi workshops run by Friends of the Farm members.  Inspired by community ideas generated at our Sweet Talks event earlier in the year, the workshops were advertised around the Mangere Bridge area, through our new Facebook page, email tree and at community WasteWise presentations.  A total of 20 people attended a workshop and, without exception, gave excellent feedback.

The preserving workshop, facilitated by Sharryn Park, gave participants hands-on experience making orange marmalade, pineapple marmalade, lemonade, rhubarb and ginger jam, lemon honey and meringues (to use up the spare egg whites!).  The friendly, laid-back atmosphere of the workshop provided the perfect setting to get to know each other better and swap cooking tips. And the results were particularly well received, with each person taking home a couple of jars of the finished product. Sharryn’s tips on presenting a jar of jam as a gift inspired us to start planning our Christmas hampers now!

The relaxed, hands-on experience continued the following day at the Bokashi workshop, with our environmental educators Meredith Fountain and Caroline Walmsley showing participants how to construct their own systems using repurposed paint containers and buckets.  People appreciated the ‘know-how’ of the facilitators and went home with practical skills to get their own Bokashi systems up and running.  Some also had Christmas on their minds and were making plans to give Bokashi systems away to family and friends.

In general, the workshops contributed to our community’s growing knowledge about how to reduce waste in our households, through using what we don’t want (fruit and food scraps) to create things we do want (preserves and compost).  Having our timeline showing how long it takes waste to break down in landfill on display outside the barn captured the attention of workshop participants, as well as many other visitors to the farm, and reinforced our “WasteWise” message.

Participants’ children spent the afternoon exploring the farm and having fun together and we all appreciated the lovely homemade afternoon teas provided by Friends of the Farm member Caroline Walmsley.  Special thanks to Jacqui Geux, who documented the workshops for us through the beautiful photos below.

The weekend generated lots of ideas for future workshops, including making vegetable preserves (e.g. chutneys and sauces), cooking $10 meals, and composting/worm farming.  If you have an idea about a workshop you would like to attend or run, please contact us by email at justineskilling@gmail.com or through our Facebook page www.facebook.com/FriendsoftheFarmMangereBridge

 

WasteWise Community Presentations

Our WasteWise team has been out and about in the community this month, raising awareness about waste issues, providing education on recycling and inspiring people with our vision for a “wastewise caring community”. With some ongoing funding from Auckland Council, we’ve been able to contract a Project Manager (Sharryn Park) and Project Leader (Justine Skilling), making it possible for us to offer to speak to groups or organisations in our community about waste issues and the work we’re doing.

We were fortunate enough to be given a slot at the Mangere Bridge Residents’ and Ratepayers’ AGM last week, where 58 people were in attendance. Our presentation began with a brief history of our Friends of the Farm group and how we’ve become so passionate about waste.  We shared our vision for Mangere Bridge and showed photos of the work we’ve done to date in growing awareness about waste issues, developing waste champions, supporting households, groups, community events and village businesses to divert waste from landfill, creating opportunities for people to participate, putting community ideas into action and recording inspiring stories. 

Meredith (our Environmental Educator) delved into a rubbish bag and talked about some of those items people are unsure about and which are often sorted incorrectly (e.g. plastic bags, polystyrene meat packs, moulded plastic without numbers etc).  She drew attention to our soft plastics display, encouraging people to bring their stretchy plastic bags and milk bottles to the Mangere Bridge Village Market on Sunday mornings to be upcycled.

To finish, we highlighted some of the opportunities we’ve created for people to participate, including being involved in Friends of the Farm events, becoming a “waste champion”, volunteering, or attending one of our upcoming workshops on Preserving and Bokashi.  Four people signed up to one or more of these opportunities and we also had invitations to speak at Brownies and Rotary.

A smaller group of 10 Mangere Bridge Playcentre parents received a similar presentation last week, with five people requesting to participate in the project at some level.  We’re thrilled to be able to visit local groups in our community where and when they meet, and to not only share our knowledge but also give people the opportunity to contribute to our wastewise vision for Mangere Bridge.  If you would like us to present to a group you’re involved with, please email Justine at justineskilling@gmail.com

Special thanks to the Mangere Bridge Residents’ and Ratepayers’ Association for their ongoing practical support and for their commitment to our community work.

     

Soft Plastics Collection Point

This month has seen Friends of the Farm members Meredith and Sharryn bringing a long planned WasteWise initiative to fruition, with the creation of a soft plastics collection point in Mangere Bridge.  Having sourced a collection bag from Enviroreel and a frame from Steve Rickerby (We Compost) earlier in the year, the problem of finding a suitable place to locate it was solved with the help of recent Friends of the Farm recruits Dawn and Denise of Oddbits, a local crafty upcycling operation with a stall at the Mangere Bridge Village Market. 

Not only did Dawn and Denise offer to keep the bag at their stall permanently, they also made a connection with fellow stallholders Rematerialise and arranged for the contents to be taken away by them and used as raw material for their own durable upcycled bags.  Just goes to show what can happen when we put our heads, contacts and skills together and work towards a common goal!  Rematerialise will deliver any surplus soft plastics to Enviroreel, a Penrose company that recycles these into garden edging and cable reels.

To start the ball rolling and to ensure that people were educated about what could be recycled through the collection bag, Meredith and Sharryn created signage and a display, as well as attending the first three market days to engage with passers-by.  Prior to the first market, an email was sent through our WasteWise email tree and other community networks letting people know about the new collection point.

Sharryn reported that over the three days a total of 65 people approached the stall to discuss the new collection point, mostly curious market-goers rather than prior contacts.  Some of these people returned to drop off their soft plastics, and the bins were overflowing on all three days, despite the inclement weather!  A keen community supporter, Natasha, baked lovely loaves for our team to enjoy while hosting the collection point.

Our hope is that this initiative will raise awareness of the problems plastic bags create in our environment and encourage people to get into the habit of dropping off soft plastics as part of a regular visit to the Sunday market. An article will be going into next month’s Community Newsletter and the new collection point will also be advertised through upcoming community WasteWise workshops.

The Friends of the Farm WasteWise team are thrilled to be able to offer this service to our community and extremely grateful for the generosity and enthusiasm of everyone who has been involved in making it happen.  So keep those soft plastics coming in!       

Local Business Association leads the way

Carol-Anne Armitage, manager for the Mangere Bridge Progressive Business Association, has been hard at work over the past year, assisting our business community in their efforts to reduce waste. Carol-Anne became a WasteWise champion through her relationship with members of our Friends of the Farm group. She has often observed that our passion for a WasteWise, caring community is a good fit with the Business Association’s desire for a more environmentally-friendly Village. A growing awareness of the upcoming changes to Council kerbside collections has created interest amongst local businesses in finding ways to keep the cost of waste disposal down and especially to avoid passing it on to consumers through higher prices.

A waste audit of the café strip (carried out by Sunshine Yates of Waste Not Consulting) revealed that leftover food and food waste was going to landfill, where it releases greenhouse gasses when it breaks down. Also, aware that many families struggle to put food on the table, Carol-Anne used her local networks to find a use for the leftover food. Te Whare Marama o Mangere (a women’s refuge), Monte Cecilia Housing Trust and St Vincent de Paul Society embraced the opportunity to pick up the café and restaurant leftovers at the end of each day and distribute them to families accessing their services - a win-win situation for all!

Another outcome of the waste audit is a proposed change in the bin system used by businesses in the café strip to two larger Eco Stock food waste bins. These bins take all compostables, including meat, and will actually cost less than the current bin arrangement. Once this system is up and running it will be rolled out across the whole Village. “I’m excited about these changes because they add value to our reputation as a responsible business community,” Carol-Anne said, “I am also impressed with the willingness of our business owners to climb on board this important community initiative. Their willingness will earn the goodwill of local customers, who will feel encouraged to frequent their premises.”

Carol-Anne’s next step is to progress a ‘plastic bag free’ initiative in the Village. She would like to see people bringing their own cloth bags as they used to, before plastic bags became so widely used. “I try to remember to bring my own bags when I go shopping,” said Carol-Anne, who once asked a SuperValue checkout operator to put her shopping to one side while she ducked out to the car to retrieve them! She believes it’s a matter of retraining ourselves to change our habits.

Carol-Anne is supporting our plan to set up a collection point for soft plastics in the Village. She’s already discussed the matter with SuperValue Manager Andrew Giarn, and raised  her other idea for a collection point for small used batteries, which she remembers seeing in her travels in Europe in the 1970s.

The Council-supplied bins on the main street are another focus for Carol-Anne’s attention. She would like to see these replaced with bins that separate waste into recyclables, food waste and landfill, and has put this idea to Council. “I think this action would show leadership from Council and provide good modelling for our residents on how to sort their rubbish at home,” she said.

Carol-Anne’s enthusiasm for and commitment to this project stem from her belief that “we are caretakers of the Earth for the generations to come”. She believes we have a responsibility to look after our planet and feels that we haven’t done a very good job of this. “Globally we are not doing well; changes to the environment and waste accumulation are horrendous.” Carol-Anne believes there is much more we can do and wonders why we aren’t farther along with our efforts. She is pleased, however, to be able to play a small part.  “If we each do our bit, we all win.”

According to Carol-Anne, increased awareness is the most significant change resulting from our WasteWise initiative to date. “Prior to this project, many people were blindly going along without thought for the cost to the environment or to their businesses.” Her vision is for Mangere Bridge to become a trailblazing WasteWise community.

Frances Hancock, co-founder of the Friends Group had this to say about Carol-Anne’s contribution. “Through Carol-Anne’s leadership, the Business Association has become a strategic partner in our local Wastewise initiative. It’s fantastic to work alongside someone as passionate and as aware as Carol-Anne, knowing she has the support of her Board. Carol-Anne is not only a wastewise champion and village manager, but also a community leader whose many contributions have earned respect among the people who live or work here. She is reliable and trustworthy, goes the extra mile every time, and makes a significant difference in our community.”