Why this Project may be different
Why this Project is successful
What might be its advantages

• it is co-ordinated and regulated by the Parish Council;
• it did not involve setting up a bank account;
• the ring-fenced fund will be audited;
• it does not require a secretary, treasurer or chairperson;
• the project is run by volunteers;
• all produce is sold in order to remunerate the fund and
  further the cause;
• the principle and long-term aim is to provide food sustainably
  for the whole community.

As a Parish Council regulated crop production project, worked by volunteers but with produce sold and proceeds reinvested, as far as we can understand this project is unique in the UK. If this is not the case we would welcome any information about any similar system.

The Tatworth Transition Ambition

Amidst a growing concern about climate change and dwindling oil resources, a showing of ‘An Inconvenient Truth’ in January 2008 led to the ‘Climate Change Action Group’ being formed in the community.

In September 2008, modern society’s almost total dependency on oil for mass food production, transportation and ever-dwindling sources of oil, was well-exposed through a showing of the DVD describing the ‘Cuban Experience of Life Without Oil’ (due to the US and worldwide blockade of Cuba from 1959, and later withdrawal of support with oil supplies when the Soviet Union disintegrated).

Recognising the pending oil crisis, the Parish Council formally adopted ‘Transition Status’ (i.e. reducing our dependency on oil) supported fully by South Somerset District Council. Through the Somerset County Council Community Fund the local County Councillor Jill Shortland gave £3000 from her allocation towards the project and the Parish Council provided £500.

Since this decision, we have had the alarming warning from the Government‘s Chief Scientific Officer, Professor John Beddington, about ‘the perfect storm’ arriving, as he believes, in about 10 to 20 years time. He reports that at our present rates of consumption, reproduction and life style there will be a convergence of energy scarcity (including oil) and food and water shortage. 70% of our planet’s water, he reports, is used for agriculture. His plea was for society to recognise these pending life-threatening shortages and to look urgently at how consumer habits can be changed.

Transition Action took two forms

Campaigning for and winning a Sunday bus service for the Tatworth Community. This started on 10th May 2009 and developing the .....

Tatworth Community Crop Production Project - ‘Tatworth Growing Together’

In a move to live more sustainably, the Parish Council ring-fenced a ‘transition fund’.

Offered to the community through an amazing set of circumstances and a very generous land-owner, the land was leased to the Parish Council. The project was launched over the Easter weekend of 2009.

We have a volunteer project manager. The whole community is free to join in our crop production process but we welcome anyone just wishing to come and chat.

The produce will be sold at a reasonable price to the community and the proceeds reinvested in furthering the project.

As its name suggests the Project uniquely brings members of the community (of all abilities) together and gardening skills are learned and shared.

Interest in being involved has been expressed by youth groups, the local police and members of a mental health support group. We anticipate that Tatworth Primary School and - a new development - Holyrood Community College will want to be involved and we are hoping the scheme may help the unemployed too.

Additional transition funds are being sought to enlarge the sustainable Community process: for example through the use of a ground source water pump and/or a wind turbine attached to our Portacabin. Photovoltaic panels are also being considered to generate electricity for pumping, etc.

Our ambition is to set up a local kerbside collection of kitchen and possibly garden waste which would be fed into an ‘anaerobic digester’. This would produce methane gas which could be used to generate electricity and also produce compost for use on the Project.

Andrew Turpin,
29th May 2009