Recently we wrote our Annual Impact Report. It gave us a wonderful opportunity to bring together all the strands that make up Kelmarna Community Farm as we gathered our stories and impact from all activities over the past year, plus made plans for the coming ones.
The farm itself has never been more productive. Says General Manager, Sarah McFadden: ‘We grew and sold more organic kai than ever before! Our workshops were fuller, our events brought over 2,000 people through the gates, and we found many new connections - with schools, community organisations, and businesses who are discovering Kelmarna for the first time.’
In terms of food production and distribution a few stats pop out:
● 143 fruit trees in production
● 1.040m2 of market gardens in production
● 1,266 CSA veggie boxes supplied
● 12,000 eggs sold to the community
● $150k+ of fresh organic produce grown and sold
Beyond our own kai, we've been empowering local community members to grow food in their own spaces. We've supplied 3000+ seedlings to home gardeners and other community gardens and last year had 45 graduates from our Farmhands training programme. School education was up by more than 20% with 452 students coming on site to participate in our Education Programme.
In supporting the health and wellbeing of the Tāmaki Makaurau community we achieved nearly 11,000 garden volunteer hours with 90% of volunteers saying they felt more connected with nature. Twenty people participated in our therapeutic gardening programme with 10 of these going on to grow their own produce at home. In total, 2500+ hours were spent gardening for therapy.
A key component of our kaupapa as kaitiaki of the whenua and surrounding ecosystem is to regenerate the land and support biodiversity. To this end we:
● use and promote organic practices that support biodiversity
● have an active pest management programme in action across the farm
● support four beehives managed by a volunteer beekeeper
● have 25 different native plant species and 300 individual plants
● have used 20,600 litres of Soil Factory compost on site to support more food production
Another key goal of Kelmarna is to honour Te Tiriti o Waitangi. This year we have continued our steady journey of deepening cultural awareness and practice, recognising our responsibilities as Tangata Tiriti. We have also grown our knowledge and use of te reo Māori and some of you will have noticed the use of both English kupu and te reo in our external communications, such as our weekly farm shop updates.
Sarah: ‘Perhaps our most significant milestone this year: we secured a 20-year lease on this whenua from the Waitematā Local Board. For the first time, we can plan with real confidence - considering new and improved facilities, and beginning the community consultation to shape Kelmarna's long- term vision together.
https://kelmarna.co.nz/
