Issue No 10, July 1998.

NOTICE: Hard copies of the Australian New Crops Newsletter are available from the publisher, Dr Rob Fletcher. Details of availability are included in the Advice on Publications Available.

16. Issues with planning bushfood plantings

Gil Freeman
President
Southern Bushfood Association
21 Smith Street
Thornbury Vic 3071
Telephone: 03 9416 7150 (preferably Monday to Wednesday)
Facsimile: 03 9416 7150 (Monday to Wednesday)
Email: gilf@compost.apana.org.au

What should we plant as bushfoods on our parcel of land?

What bushfoods are currently in demand by the food industry?

Is there an income to be made in bushfoods?

Hardly a week goes by without questions like these turning up on the SBA answering machine. There are so many issues raised by these questions that it is difficult to do justice to them during a telephone response.

One constant theme in the bushfood industry is the need to Do Our Own Research. Indeed, there are now programs available from some State Departments of Agriculture which are providing individuals and groups (like the SBA) with the tools and processes for doing OOR.

For the process of managing YOR, it is important to have some starting points.

Look at what grows locally.

Identify plants which have bushfood potential.

Remember the Koorie knowledge and the information available from the Dr Beth Gott database available to members of the Southern Bushfood Association.

If favoured plants are not local then investigate whether these will thrive locally.

There is a need to understand our own land: the microclimates, the water patterns, wind, soils, native flora, introduced plants including exotic and native weeds, native fauna and introduced fauna including pests.

Undertake trial plantings of small quantities of mixed species.

Watch the growth.

Consider all the uses for plants - bushfoods are only one of the possibilities.

What about timber, oils, seeds, cut flowers/foliage?

Develop plans for a mixed plantation - plants which occupy different vertical as well as horizontal zones and spaces.

Get to know the foods the plants produce.

Carry out experiments ourselves.

Consult experts in the food industry, showing them our samples.

Look at what is happening in the market place, food halls, gourmet outlets, supermarkets.

Get to know how our favoured plants grow and how to increase productivity.

What are the best varieties, best planting conditions, best methods for trellising, watering, plant guard needs and so on?

Before committing to larger scale planting, take a deep breath and think of the very best and worst outcomes in your future.

Imagine what we would really like to achieve.

What are the best steps to achieve these goals?

Imagine the worst possible disasters.

How can we plan to minimise the risks of such outcomes?

What prices are likely for our products?

This process of pricing our products will form part of the effort required to work out a tentative business plan. This will involve projections of expenditure and income over the foreseeable future.

The DOOR Marketing process leads participants towards the business plan stage. Business plans may require professional assistance and there are several steps not described here.

In order to derive accurate pricing, find out from the industry what prices are generally prevailing.

If intending to produce what is already in production avoid setting prices which undervalue the investment and our labour.

Avoid undercutting the efforts of other industry members.

If setting prices for new products, remember that our first prices are likely to become benchmarks and so they need to carefully take account of all our costs before being set.

The advantage of working with neighbours is that potential buyers can be assured of a regular and reliable supply.

Products must meet all statutory and regulatory requirements, including:

• weights and measures;
• packaging; and
• cleanliness and hazard controls.

There is a need to continually investigate new markets.

Care should be exercised to avoid competing head to head with fellow producers over the same small bushfood patch.

Our market should be considered as being more than just the specialised bushfood industry. Agencies are probably saturated with approaches from new growers.

Why not look to other local food producers and ways in which new partnerships can be achieved?

Are there ways of introducing bushfoods as components of mainstream foods and food outlets?

Why not look to regional food specialties for these growth areas and outlets?

Once we have something to work on and our plans are firming up, then plant, plant, plant.

If we have nothing in the ground then we will have nothing to sell in years to come. So plan the larger scale plantings after this initial research has been undertaken.

We should continue to DOOR on all the issues which will confront us for years to come.

Tarnuk Bushfood and Flowers has been producing a number of native plants with special flavours for several years, such as mountain pepper (leaf and berry), round leaf mint, river mint and warrigal greens.

We had built up a small but steady outlet for these products amongst some traditional bushfood outlets. In an attempt to diversify the outlets for our products we looked at local food producers to see whether there were any opportunities for partnerships.

The listing by the local Economic
Development Board of local businesses identified a number of food industries, including cheese, wine and pasta manufacturers. With samples of our products in hand we started a round of visits and found a local pasta manufacturer who showed interest in working together on some new products.

This pasta company had been producing specialty pastas using organic flours for a number of years and the owners were interested in diversifying their product range. They were already familiar with some of the bushfoods we had available and were familiar with risk taking and innovation.

A number of months of experimentation with ingredients then followed.

The pasta company was prepared to invest in the costs of new packaging and labelling. We were able to assist with information to be used on the labels and assisted with advice from a specialist designer for the pasta packaging.

We needed to supply plenty of the raw material for the experimentation and also contributed some ideas on possible outlets. We also used contacts through the Southern Bushfood Association to source supplies of other ingredients (including wattleseed and lemon myrtle leaf) to diversify the range.

Several other factors had to be taken into account by the pasta manufacturers prior to commitment to the new products. We had to be confident about meeting projected longer term need for the raw products, including any possible growth in demand.

We also had to be able to ensure good quality controls on the screening of the ground product to ensure the dies used to extrude the pasta were not blocked. Hence, the materials had to be produced in a clean and fresh state for use when required.

The new range of products was recently launched and early indications of acceptance in the market place have been positive.

For more information on Bush Pasta, from Tarnuk Bush Food and Flowers, contact:

Contact: Dr Rob Fletcher, School of Land and Food, The University of Queensland Gatton College, 4345; Telephone: 07 5460 1311 or 07 5460 1301; Facsimile: 07 5460 1112; International facsimile: 61 7 5460 1112; Email: r.fletcher@mailbox.uq.edu.au

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originally created by: GK; latest update 6 June 1999 by: RF