One of my favorite and most long-term friends on twitter is pdjmoo who tweets about all things wild, non-GMO and beautiful. Not only does she have a fantastic and informative twitter account that I highly recommend for staying on top of the latest news, but she also curates a few very informative scoop.it lists. My favorite is ALL ABOUT GMOs, PESTICIDES – Your Food, Your Health. She also runs The Natural Eye Project. pdjmoo has come through some serious health problems after a car accident, which she was able to heal through spending time in nature. The other really cool thing about her is that she spent time in Papua New Guinea like me! The reason I am bringing her up in this context is because these two fantastic videos showing ancient food forests in Morocco and Vietnam (coincidentally these are the two countries I studied food preparation rituals in when I was in college) were brought to my attention by this incredible woman (please read her story here).

These videos show incredible food forests, unimaginably diverse and maintained for hundreds of years. This is what we now are beginning to create again across our earth in the transition town and permaculture movements. Indeed this is the only way we will survive. We have a long way to go but we know what it is worth.

It is sad for me to say this as I just gave up my small plot in a community garden under the sky-train with a lovely food forest being grown there. I did have a chance to help plant a couple hazelnut trees, but I do hope to do more. In the Vietnamese forest they mention all of the natural bee hives in old logs that are in the forest. One of the sad things I have found about community gardens in Vancouver is that people are so afraid of their kids getting stung that they don’t want to have a hive. It seems strange logic. Not having a hive isn’t gonna prevent the kid getting stung and why have a garden if you don’t want a bee? I just can’t understand it.

2,000 Year Old Food Forest in Morocco

I just love how the food forest oasis is described as a living organism and when you enter into the cooler shaded places of the forest, abundant with banana trees below the dates is like entering into a different time altogether.

One of the extras featured on Geoff Lawton’s DVD “Establishing a Food Forest” the Permaculture Way available from www.permaculture.org,au

300 Year Old Food Forest in Vietnam

Cute video shows a lovely food forest that includes chickens, a cow that grazes in the forest and various other animals, the fruit is abundant, papaya, banana…spices such as turmeric and pepper grow among the trees. So fantastic.

[From youtube] This is one of the little extras on the DVD title “Establishing a Food Forest” with Permaculture teacher Geoff Lawton. Whilst Geoff was in Vietnam he discovered a 300 year old Food Forest built on 2 acres of land and still functioning well in the same family 28 generations later. More info: http://www.ecofilms.com.au/