4. TROPICS

Developing a Food System

  
  

 

20. HAWAII

("the Big Island"), HAWAII.

Fresh a ’a lava flow has been crushed and levelled by tractor,
spot-mulched with compost and Macadamia nut husks, and
irrigated. See 21 for growth in 1 year. Steve Skipper inspecting.
USDAtriaI.

  

22. MOLOKA'I, HAWAII (Lat. 28°); Sub—tropical
chicken tractor system.

Developed by Dario Gorsich. Foreground is 6 weeks of vegetable
growth following the clearing of the chicken tractor (5 pans in 0.5
ha). Dana and his wife, and members of the Busby family stand at
the front edge at a papaya system which is 2.5 years old. Chickens
(Australorps) are moved from pen to pen over the year to clear
weeds and grasses; they get most of their food from fallen papaya,
seed, Insects, and greens. Income from their eggs and papaya at the

Ioca: cooperative plus home garden largely support the Gorsich
lami y.

 

 

24. MAUI, HAWAII.

Kikuyu grass. Here, people have planted Tagetes (marigold) around
their avocado tree to kill, and form a barrier to, the grasses.

 
 
 
 
 
 
 
   
 
 
 
 
 
  
  
   
   

21. HAWAII ("The Big Island“), Hawaii
Growth of trees in one year on a 'a lava site; more extensive mulch
enables interplant, Numbers 2|] and 21 reveal that mulch plus water

can establish valuable trees an apparently hostile sites, here mango,
citrus, macadamia, guava,

23. MOLOKA'I,
HAWAII.

Traditional Hawaiian garden
combines banana, papaya,
chili, and taro. Pigs fed
from surplus, chickens
range below system.
Developed by iMU and
RACHEL (RAHELA) NAKI.
Together with fish and
home garden. this is a
self—reliant and commercial
system.

25. KAIWAKA. Nth IS.
NEW ZEALAND.
Instant garden or 7
jungle
About 18 months previously, ' '
this was pasture. KAY
BAXTER first set up a small
nursery, then set out (at one
time) a windbreak of eucalypt
and blackwood (Acacia
melanoxylon), and an
interplant of nasturtium
comlrey, sweet potato
(ground covers); banana, ’
tagasaste. taro (under-
storey); and a scatter oi
Acacia, guava, mulberry, ,
citrus, apple. peach, etc. as
fruit crop. Grass is
suppressed and the system
co—evolves. Mulch from
comfrey, tagasaste is thrown
around lruit trees.