Food sovereignty in the time of Covid-19: April 24, 2020

Phoebe Balle is of Norwegian and Pākehā descent, growing up in Auckland she now lives in Wellington working as a researcher. She recently spent 3 months at the Koanga Institute based near Wairoa, which is a centre for regenerative living founded by Kay Baxter and Bob Corker about 30 years ago. Over that time they’ve collected heritage seeds from fruit trees, vegetables and flowers. They now have over 800 varieties of seeds. We have actually had Kay on the show before when Lillian was looking into alternatives for overusing phosphate in our fertilisers as part of my Western Sahara investigation, so it’s great to hear a bit more about her mahi. Lillian saw a post from Phoebe on facebook about her time at the Koanga Institute and the importance of our relationships to our grown kai, so she reached out for a chat about this, particularly in the context of Covid19. In all honesty, Lillian had to start by asking what a heritage seed was.