Forest gardens also known as food forests are on the rise in Europe
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They mimic natural ecosystems embracing
biodiversity and producing an incredible amount of food
Forest has a very diverse systems
in terms of plants you put in
and then they become very diverse
systems in terms of the wild life as well.
Research so far shows that
things like insect and invertebrate diversity
is much higher in forest gardens
than in native woodlands.
Forest gardens often have a lot of non-native plants in them.
So it is not a question of native is always best for wild life
That is simply untrue.
It is the question of diversity.
How diverse your system is?
They are an invitation to explore
our relationship with plants and Earth more deeply
We have a long history in Britain and Europe
of classifying plants down into
ornamentals, edibles, medicinals and
those are tend to be kept all very separate.
In the plant world, life is not like that
Many other cultures, plants are not treated in that way.
For example, the little houttuynia plant growing by the pond here
which is a fantastic edible spice, is also a medicinal plant
it is one of the main Chinese medicinal plants!
There are many vegetables as well, perennial vegetables
that are treated as ornamentals,
certainly in Britain and Europe.
But in other parts of the world,
they are big and commercial perennial vegetables.
So if we have limited our outlook to a degree
by taking this compartmentalised view
of plants and I think gradually we need to change that!
Food forests have proven to be highly productive for families
and small communities
They are also showing great promise as an alternative
to destructive industrial agriculture
"The concept of the rational
harvestable food forest
specializing upon certain crops
within the food forest concept
and taking care of the ecology
enough is convincing the first farmers already.
We have rows of one species
but this is still polyculture.
It's tens of different edible species.
If the cider apples are ripe
the trees are just in a row
and you can pick them walking the row."
Food forests centering perennial plants
require less inputs and energy to be maintained, making them
highly economically viable
There's a lot of money going on
in modern farming
but it's not going to the farmers.
They work very hard
but they have to pay the bank.
They have to pay the chemical industry.
A food forest is totally different.
We don't have those high costs.
We produce more and more food
during the growth of the system.
In our relatively young food forests
we earn €3,000 per hectare, per year
which is 8 to 9 times as much as
the neighbouring [industrial] farms."
Although seen as being new in the western world
Food forest practices stem from traditional agroforestry cultures
from around the world
Freixio de meio is a farm blending tradition and innovation
It's located in Montado, Portugal, and the ancient holm oak
and cork oak agroforest
"Montado is a cultural landscape.
It's when a landscape or the result of
the interaction of man and nature
shaped this.
We must be part of the nature
making useful things for nature
being an element of nature
and then
we can take our part with happiness.
like the birds take their part
like the bacteria uses their part."
As a reflection of the diverse ecosystem surrounding them,
the farm operates a multitude of microfactories
Processing a variety of foods from vegetables to wine to meats
to traditional acorn products
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