A regenerative school farm project

Heartland is a trial project that will enable all public primary schools in the Huon Valley to have a thriving regenerative school garden and access to locally grown produce and seeds.

The project will operate on three elements:

  • Seed to Seed - students will follow the growing of produce through full lifecycles, starting with seed and finishing with more seed to share with the community.

  • Compost to Compost - students will focus on waste reduction and developing fertility through composting food and paper waste produced by the school, the garden and its students.

  • Community to Community - creating food communities around the garden by enabling farm school ‘blitzes’, seed libraries, compost clubs and celebratory events based around the growing season.

Thanks to funding received through the Tasmanian Government’s Healthy Tasmania fund and sponsorship from Clennett’s Mitre 10 Huonville, this project will be delivered from 2023-24. The project will result in documented resources made available publicly, for any school to pick up and implement based on their own specific resourcing constraints and opportunities.

Through the project, we will co-design the program with local schools to reflect everyone’s needs and objectives, design the physical space, program and curriculum design, governance, distribution, and accessible business model.

The project will be delivered in collaboration with each of the schools, Cygnet Seed Library, Milkwood Permaculture and local food system experts, and has direct and immediate affiliation with the work undertaken in the delivery of the Huon Valley Food Hub and the Huon Valley Food Resilience Strategy.

Meet our Heartland project team!

  • Heather coordinates and grows seed for the Cygnet Seed Library, a project she developed with many other Cygnet community members. She is an experienced permaculture educator, designer and consultant. Her work focuses on empowering people to better understand living systems, and how to engage in reciprocity-based ecosystem and community thinking.

    Heather helped deliver the Huon Valley Food Hub Farm Blitzes and harvest festivals, and conceived the Heartland project with Dr Emily Samuels-Ballantyne in early 2023, inspired by the Huon Valley Food Hub and the Huon Valley community.

  • With over 14 years in local government and public sector experience, Michelle brings a range of project management, marketing, strategic thinking and policy development skills and experience to the delivery of the Heartland project. With her capacity as Council’s Economic Development Manager, Michelle has led the community’s work in the local food system space for the past two years through preceding projects such as the Huon Valley Food Hub and the Huon Valley Food Resilience Strategy.

    Michelle is ‘thrilled and honoured to be continuing my involvement in this work through the Heartland pilot initiative’.

  • Heather (aka known as Heather-Belle to avoid the inevitable confusion) is passionate about building resilient communities, and brings her experience in working with community groups and not for profit organisations over the past 15 years.

    She is currently also working at Huon Valley council as Project officer, supporting the Huon Valley Food Hub project.

  • Nadia loves having her hands in the soil. She spent years learning from growers around the country before stewarding market gardens. She is passionate about growing and eating plants; about soil health and understanding the ecosystem under our feet; as well as supporting people to connect to their local food system and empowering them to grow some of their own food.

  • Eric is a teacher by trade, and a gardener by choice. After teaching or nearly 20 years overseas, he has put down roots in the Huon Valley and redirected his passion into horticulture.

    He began a two acre forest garden seven years ago, and, more recently, started the Gardners Bay Plant Co-Op with some friends. Heartland is a way to meld his two loves of teaching and gardening, as well as to provide something tangible and lasting to the Valley he now calls home.

Proudly supported by the Tasmanian Government’s Healthy Tasmania fund

Thanks also to our project sponsor Clennett’s Mitre 10 Huonville