Scottish Gov seem to be waking up to the concept, with this press release:

The increasing appetite for ‘grow your own’ was served up a cash boost today by Environment Minister Stewart Stevenson. Mr Stevenson announced a £600,000 package of support to encourage the development of more community growing and support the growth of Scotland’s grow your own sector. 

For more info go to: 

http://www.scotland.gov.uk/News/Releases/2012/05/fundingboost17052012

and

http://www.growyourownscotland.info/

Hi Nourish - we are currently looking for an experienced Project Coordinator to join our team  for 12 months whilst our Development Director is on Maternity Leave.

Fife Diet Project Coordinator, Part Time, Maternity Cover

Fife Diet is a members-led project which aims to

• Transform our food culture
• Build local economic resilience
• Create low carbon & sustainable food models

Our new Local Food Solutions project will reduce the carbon footprint of participants through community engagement around food throughout Fife. We are looking for an enthusiastic and suitably experienced project coordinator with project management experience.

Full details are here:…

james chapman

Here's the courses I'm running over the next 12 months. 



* Short design course - Fife

Venue - Monimail Tower

Dates - Thursday 2 to Tuesday 7 August 2012 (over a bank holiday weekend)

Price - Sliding scale from £200 to £360 + optional camping at £5/night. Subsidised places available on request.



* Introduction weekend

Venue - The Big Shed, Tom Breck, Loch Tay, Perthshire.…

The Otesha Project's team of volunteers is taking shape for the Tastetastic summer cycle tour, which will be exploring and spreading the word about food sustainability in southern Scotland. We're now around 20-strong!

The team will be trained to deliver workshops on food sustainability, which they'll deliver at schools and community events en route. They'll also be visiting and volunteering at sustainable food projects - and promoting those projects as they go, by blogging, talking to the media and telling the children and teachers they meet.  And they'll be living low-impact together in the saddle, 'cycling the talk', if you like (sorry).

And it's going to be a learning experience for the team, too, as they explore and debate everything from trade and transport, to…

A blog on forest gardening in Scotland has now been online for twelve months, meaning that it now carries dispatches from a whole year's growing cycle. The blog reports on a 10-year-old project to adapt forest garden plants and growing techniques to an ordinary size allotment in the north east of Scotland.

www.scottishforestgarden.wordpress.com

Blasda 2012 - Scotland's local food feast - will be on and around Saturday September 15, as part of Food and Drink Fortnight. It will again be a celebration of  regional food variations, community growing and an opportunity to 'connect up' the local food movement. The project is open to all and we are again looking for a great spread from highland to lowland and from urban and rural Scotland.



The Fife Diet is co-ordinating the project in collaboration with the Hiddens Gardens, which will be delivering the 'Culture Kitchen…

Local food farmer of the year award is one of the categories in the Farmers Weekly annual awards, closing date 30^th April.  See link:

http://awards.fwi.co.uk/wp-content/uploads/2012/01/Local_Food_Farmer.pdf

Disillusioned by the unfulfilled promise of the cities and feeling stifled by tough austerity measures aimed at coping with an economic downturn, some Portuguese are opting out and returning to the land.

Jose Diogo, who spent two years in Lisbon working as a technical advisor at a meat company, was one who fled at the beginning of Portugal's debt crisis in 2009, and has no regrets.

"I lived in Lisbon and decided to go back home to the interior to grab the opportunity of exploring the land my father owned," Diogo said on the porch at his stone farm house, looking out over apple orchards and grazing fields for his 30 cows.

Read more here:

http://uk.reuters.com/article/2012/04/19/uk-portugal-land-idUKBRE83I0EW20120419

Saturday 5th May is Portobello Market day!

This month: Following on from the fantastic success of the Easter market, we are once again offering entertainment: AnnieD will be appearing with her amazing face painting and a young student duo will be providing great music in two 1-hour sets.

Our traders this month include:

Award win­ning oils, fresh fish and meats, artisan cheeses, unique snacks, hand made soaps, cards and gifts, sea­sonal veget­able, sushi and noodles, organic herbal teas, knit­ted gifts, Fair Trade products and a first class BBQ for those hungry mouths.

So come along on the 5th and sup­port your local sus­tain­able mar­ket and find out about the excit­ing devel­op­ments for the next mar­ket in June when we will have a first in the UK piece of entertainment!!!

Where: Brighton Park, Brighton Place, Portobello, Edinburgh, EH15 1LJ

When:…

Folks - we are having a blossom day in the Children's garden Tuesday - tomorrow to celebrate all the school and community orchards we've got planted over the past season. We are still able to supply fruit trees for a few weeks yet (trees are in cool store) if you want to grow your own.

Details below:

see www.fruitfulschools.com or www.scottishfruittrees.com

Blossom Day @ the Children's Garden, Glasgow Botanic Gardens, celebrating the start of the apple blossom season, and the success of the Fruitful schools project.

Time - 1.30 PM - Date 24th April 2012

Organiser John Hancox, Fruitful Schools - 0778 606 3918

Children from nurseries will be at the Children's Garden, "wassailing" the trees and encouraging a bumper harvest. (Children have photo permissions)

Editorial:

Across Scotland over the past couple of years the…