Barefoot farmher, sauerkraut queen hits ground running in CQ
'Its women who are the backbone of any community, rolling up their sleeves and taking care of each other.'
Rockhampton
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SONIA Ghiggioli feels a connection to the Queensland Country Women's Association even though she hasn't been a member since she was 21.
"We lived in Ipswich during the 2011 floods and, when we evacuated to the emergency centre, who were the first group of helpers we saw but the CWA.”
"They were the ones in the kitchen, wrangling fruit and milk for the children during some pretty tough times.
"Its women who are the backbone of any community, rolling up their sleeves and taking care of each other.”
That's why she was keen to share her knowledge at the QCWA's Outback to Ocean conference last week at the Yeppoon Town Hall.
Her consulting company, Barefoot Farmher, recently moved from Stanthorpe, where Ms Ghiggioli was an acclaimed cheesemaker for the past three years, to Rockhampton.
In addition to working directly with farmers, she hosts a blog about culinary arts including cheese and wine-making, fermenting, and the native tucker to be found in Central Queensland.
"Prostrate ruby saltbush can be found in cow paddocks, pigface in the rocky outcrops, native almond along the ocean front and native seaside tumbleweed,” she said.
"I have had the opportunity to wild harvest the pods of the introduced species of tamarind from trees beside the creek, and make a tamarind paste for the base of many of my wok dishes.”
Her Australian Native Foods of Provenance cookbook earned her a place in the Rural Women's Award finals last year.
Ms Ghiggioli said her adventures in permaculture began as the child of Dutch refugees, in the multicultural suburbs of Woolongong.
"I grew up with neighbours from every part of the world, and suburban food growing was a major part of their culture,” she said.
"It was the Italian Nonnas' backyard experiments that got me involved in making wine for six years before I turned to cheese.”
She spent time on a five-acre organic farm in Agnes Water before helping women of Batiki Island in the South Pacific make a massive "seachange”.
"I'm working with the Sea Mercy medical team on a five-year study about the impact of reducing carbs through eating more native foods,” she said.
"We focus on regenerating the entire island's agriculture to more traditional crops such as taro and yams and, in particular, getting their export vanilla certified organic for export,” she said.
A permaculture approach to their practices is one which Ms Ghiggioli finds most farmers only reach out to once the damage is done.
"I think there is a tipping point at which farmers realise they have to make different and better decisions about how they produce food, and that's largely driven around Queensland by the drought,” she said.
"Without rain or topsoil, in the face of arid soil biology, the cost of farming goes up and up as they pump more water and fertiliser and pesticide into their land.
"The longer they wait to implement change, the longer it takes to see a good response initially, so it's a matter of advocating for early intervention and managing expectations.”
The Barefoot Farmher works with farmers to educate them about permaculture and it supports associations such as the QCWA in lobbying for government reform.
"Most people measure success by money, by economic growth,” Ms Ghiggioli said.
"We encourage them to take what is traditionally seen as the 'softer' approach and look more holistically at how we raise healthy families without destroying the land we live on.”
So, apart from her seminars and blogging and joining the CWA and travelling to the South Pacific and raising three children and bottling vanilla and crocheting mermaid tail skirts and settling into her new Rockhampton home...what is next for the Barefoot Farmher?
"I'm working on a novel called Whatever Happened to Rachel McLean, which was inspired by real life events which most of us have been through,” she said.
"And I have access to a 100-acre property nearby so I'm looking at grazing some cattle and trialling native species for sale at a commercial garden nursery.”
And they say a woman's work is never done...
Originally published as Barefoot farmher, sauerkraut queen hits ground running in CQ
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