If we do get a world-wide recession or hard times this video shows how growing your own food can help you save money and get through.
Support me on Patreon: https://www.patreon.com/selfsufficientme
Help support the Channel and buy a T-shirt/Merchandise from our Spreadshirt shop: https://goo.gl/ygrXwU
Shop on Amazon for plants: https://bit.ly/2yRFNGQ
Shop for plants on eBay Australia: https://bit.ly/2BPCykb
Blog: http://www.selfsufficientme.com/ (use the search bar on my website to find info on certain subjects or gardening ideas)
Forum: http://www.selfsufficientculture.com
Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/SelfSufficie…
Twitter: https://twitter.com/SufficientMe
Subscribe to my channel: http://goo.gl/cpbojR
Self Sufficient Me is based on our small 3-acre property/homestead in SE Queensland Australia about 45kms north of Brisbane – the climate is subtropical (similar to Florida). I started Self Sufficient Me in 2011 as a blog website project where I document and write about backyard food growing, self-sufficiency, and urban farming in general. I love sharing my foodie and DIY adventures online so come along with me and let’s get into it! Cheers, Mark 🙂
G'day Everyone! As always, most people watching this video understand my underlying point which is my desire to encourage people to grow more. So, thank you! To those who won't allow me to mention anything about politics etc all I can say to that is I'm sorry this is how you feel but at the end of the day sometimes (not often) the two subjects will cross on my channel and I will continue to convey my honest view even if it is unpopular. Don't hate me for it just disagree politely, and who knows, you might change my mind! Cheers 🙂
This is spooky watching this amidst a recession and pandemic
who's watching this during covid pandemic
Leave the politics out of your excellent garden videos, i`m a Liberal myself, We have a lot to be thankful for from both parties
Hi Mark, have seen most of your videos. Am mighty impressed with your veggie and fuit garden. Am from India. Unfortunately, am unable to do any gardening on my own for want of space and time. Well done. Please keep those videos coming.
Reducing the need to transport food and cotton from somewhere else is important people don’t think about how food production takes water and fertility from soil and it isn’t replaced when you consume and bin fruit or meat or clothing. Peru has a water crisis partly due to exporting asparagus to England for example.
A year and a half and a pandemic later, you look like a complete genius
well, this was quite the premonition…
1 for the rythm
this aged very well lol cheers rona
This has certainly aged well.
It's a shame to hear you fear monger about taxes… with all your talk about sustainability, I thought you might be a leftist.
I only have a small balcony but I plan to still pack it full of vegetable plants as much as space allows me to
Watching this video now… knowing it was posted a year ago. Just before the virus became so big and over whelming. Who knew that would happen! Your video came at one of the best times possible!! I have always enjoyed gardening. And now I feel even more confident about it!
Even more relevant in Feb '21 than when you posted it up. We have winter here – not brutal but enough to kill a lot of outdoor plants – so we bring our herbs and peppers and other small plants into the house. A great treat to be able to reach over in the kitchen and pick just the herbs one needs for a dish out of the window garden. There are many ways to work around space and environmental conditions and you are doing an excellent job in demonstrating how some of those can be used.
This video feels sort of like premonition now.
You called it Mark! Stay safe and strong!
This video predicted COVID
All that said and he had no idea what was forthcoming….spot on.
Can I get some animal protection tips? I tried to plant enough to share last year but they beat me by eating every blossom and baby green before it came to fruition. I also have fenced off a large section of the yard and they chewed right through my mesh!
Anything could happen. Even a pandemic disease. Oh…wait…that really happens 1/2 a year after releasing this video. Gardening shops were sold out here in Europe. Lucky me, I am used to grow my own veggie. Love your channel.
Love u man…imagine…i am a millenial…everything u said × 10 times.
In a family with one breadwinner good public non-profit services are important. Labour ! traditionally fought to get those policies. (They have adopted some neoliberal policies but are still better than the biz friendly parties). The carbon tax was EXCELLENT policy as it compensated consumers for higher costs. But of course if they replaced use of electricity with being more frugal, with technology, and labor (installing solar) they could finance something that would make them a profit over time. Companies were motivated to offer such solutions because they knew they could sell more of that. People that had done their homework, could pocket the win and had more disposable income.
Economy of scale.
If something is industrially mass produced the costs and performance improve dramatically especially when the technology is still new /immature / has a lot of untapped potential.
Australia has good conditions for solar, electricity prices have been more at the higher end and since it is a first world country a lot is used for cooling when there is the most solar energy available. Countries like these (also California) helped to trigger the spectacular price drop of solar panels (after China and partially Germany started that).
Batteries are just starting out, new materials (other than Lithium) and much lower costs.
For solar panel – if you double installed capacity the costs for the kWh will drop by 20 %. It is not the same for all technologies. For wind it is 14 % (more mature technology like steel, construction work, concrete is used). Now we are going storage and maybe tidal generators.
The trend for PV panesl is going on since the 1970s, and the improvment and price drop did not come from the passing of time but what was sold and installed – which triggered R & D. and that depended on government policies and pressure of grassroots – they interacted.
Things like a carbon tax or subsidies help a lot to level the playing field for renewable energy and if companies know they will be able to sell, the benefits of economy of scale and indstrial mass production and more R & D start to manifest. Then they become better, more practical and cheaper and it is easier to sell them (and the need for subsidies goes down as well).
Doubling of installed capacities means not a lot of installation in the early stage, so the price drops are the most impressive in the early years. Solar will continue to improve (but at a slower pace as doubling globally installed capacities now – versus in 2000 – are very different volumes). Batteries are now where solar was 15 years ago. That is important because batteries help to make solar more reliable and viable.
But the engagement of grassroots / consumers AND governments intervening on behalf of solar and wind power was crucial. W/o the Chinese going big on solar we would not have had that dramatic price drop, it became a posititive feedback loop.
The technology could be produced in the country (that is a matter of trade policy) and the installation work cannot be outsourced they must hire Australians for that. So that makes the economy more robust and independent from energy imports (oil) while keeping the population in the more rural areas (employment. lower cost of living if you produce the fuel for your car and energy there).
It creates jobs (also in the rural areas, where they have the space for larger installations and batteries) and the skills in the population grow. Consumers learn more as they use the systems but of course also those that install them.
Japan and Germany have little energy (some coal but little oil and gas), and it is traditionally expensive. That was a blessing in disguise because they always had an incentive to replace the use of fossil fuel with research & development, staff !, engineers, technology, machine building … jobs for humans.
That made those economies stronger.
In your area no coal is mined, but there are folks that can set up solar systems. The know-how increases. The skill of an electrician also translates to other DIY skills. Someone that knows how to set up such systems and has a good general understanding – will always have work in Australia.
It is an advantage if people can make a modest but stable living in the more rural areas and not all flock to the cities. Traffic, energy use, cars, and rent in the metropolitan areas. people stay in smaller communities that stay alive.
Public services include higher public education (parents do not not have to put money away from the one wage). Labour – and the "conservatives" or the "liberals" have always been in a tug of war regarding non-profit well funded healthcare.
Labour got it, than it was ended than Labour got it implemented again (all in the 1960s and 1970s). Now the right wants to privatize (favors for the buddies) – that is NOT good for people trying to live modestly.
Exactly right! Thanks mate!
Very good video on why you do this… totally inspired me.
You are awesome, love your videos. I live at 8500 ft in the rockies. Have a very short growing season. I have always wanted to live somewhere where I could have big gardens. Love tomatoes. I grow them here but have to watch closely when the freeze starts. Just pick them all and bring them in. Thanks for everything.