Tour to Inspire Communities to Take Ownership of Their Seeds

12 May 2014

Tour to Inspire Communities to Take Ownership of Their Seed, Their Soil and Their Health

One week left to secure your ticket to this nationwide tour

Kay Baxter, director of Koanga Institute and world-renowned expert in seed-saving and permaculture gardening, is on a mission to travel the length of New Zealand in a fundraising quest to save the New Zealand heritage seed.

Kay will be doing two talks in one session to inspire and empower you. Her first talk will be ‘Future proof Your Health and Design Your own Nutrient Dense Diet’ and in the second Kay will share her journey around ‘Seeds, Humans and the Process of Co-evolution… a regenerative way forward’.

“Whether you’re an advanced gardener, you're still dreaming of your future plot, or simply have an interest in food production, these talks are guaranteed to inspire and inform. Koanga Institute is a really unique trust, there is no other seed bank with organic heritage seeds like this in New Zealand says Malcolm Rands (EcoMan), director and founder of Ecostore.

Following this tour there will be a series of workshops run by some of the Koanga team cov-ering practical skills on how to live in a more sustainable way. The workshops include; a one day urban garden workshop, a one day bio-intensive gardening workshop, a one day work-shop on designing your own forest garden, a one day workshop on how to grow nutrient dense food, a one day workshop on cooking and preparing nutrient dense food, a one day workshop on saving your own seed, a one day course on introduction to top bar beekeeping, and finally a one day course on rocket stoves and solar ovens.

The Koanga Institute, a registered charitable trust in New Zealand, co founded by Kay Baxter, has spent 30 years building up a living library of hundreds of heritage fruit and vegetables stocks that are in danger of being lost.

In 1994, the United Nations estimated that 94% of vegetables and 85% of apple varieties have already been lost.

Koanga Institute, now based in Wairoa, Northern Hawkes Bay, has saved 800+ seed lines and 400+ fruit trees and berry varieties.

Three years ago, the Koanga Institute, found the right land to literally and figuratively plant their roots. Currently this land is leased. Koanga urgently needs to raise $705,000 by 29 June 2014 and a further $250,000 by the end of September 2014 to buy the land they are currently on and the adjacent hill block which supplies all the water for their plants.

The speaking tour travelling New Zealand hopes to raise a significant amount of these funds.

“Koanga Institute is literally in a race against time to save these seeds, the link between our past and our future, do we really want to be the generation that dropped “the ball?” says Kay.

To support the nationwide tour coming to a town near you, purchase a ticket and be a part of saving New Zealand's heritage seeds.

One lucky person, who buys a ticket to a talk, will win the opportunity to have Kay do a garden consultation at their place AND the first 10 people in each town to register will receive a free booklet of their choice written by Kay.

To purchase your ticket please visit www.koanga.org.nz/tour

ENDS

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