We're leaving the farm, for good
So now I need to find out if it's possible to live in central Sydney with the values of a regenerative farmer worn on my sleeve for all to see.
I’ve been procrastinating in sharing some news with you all. But I can’t put it off any longer. My family and I are leaving the farm, and New Zealand. We’re heading back to our other home of Sydney in December. For good.
If you’ve recently signed up to this newsletter but haven’t been following our farming adventure on Instagram or via my book, then this news won’t mean much. I still intend to write about food, farming and cultural change. That won’t change, but I’ll be doing it from my desk in Sydney and I’ll be more focused on the Australian food system. The question I set out to answer in this (recently neglected) newsletter — is the food we’re growing, buying and eating making us strong or sick? – will come into sharper focus.
For those who’ve supported our New Zealand farming career this news may come as a surprise. Or not. As you may have realised it hasn’t been an easy journey. Farming never is.
The reasons for leaving are many. Some personal, others financial. Some I won’t share publicly but to say: the lease farm we’ve been living and working on is changing. The footprint is shrinking and we can’t make a living from the land we have in the short term. The lease was due to be renewed in 2025 and we intended to leave then, we’ve just decided to go earlier.
Our daughter is also starting primary school next year, and I’m going back to full time work – at a media organisation – and those jobs aren’t in small town NZ. Plus we miss our Sydney friends and family. The time is right to go.
Is this move recognition of failure?
I don’t fear failure, I’ve got pretty comfortable in its shadow. And it’s something I’m teaching my daughter to embrace. How else do you learn? Take risks, climb that tall tree, make mistakes, fall out, and then keep going.
A while ago I was chatting with food entrepreneur and former dairy farmer Robert Pekin. He too is a big fan of failure. For a while Robert ran a CSA in partnership with two others in Tasmania. But he found the system at times stifling. He wanted to change the whole foodscape, to work with a range of farmers struggling to make a profit under rigid retailer contracts and for consumers who ‘hated Coles and Woolies’. Eventually he started a food hub in Brisbane, but before he retired from his CSA he sat with an older woman who’d followed his journey, and she counselled him to slow down. ‘You’re so bullish about changing the world,’ Robert recalls her saying, ‘that no one has a chance to keep up with you’. I’ve thought about this comment a lot recently. I may have been a little bullish at times.
Robert hasn’t stopped thinking about changing the world, and his enthusiasm is infectious. He reckons the people most able to bring others along on the change journey are those who fail. Fail often and expose their flaws.
‘I think the world would just be a lot better place if we got over this idea that we have to be perfect’, he says. There is empowerment deep within a shared and humble story of failure.
We were talking about failed crops when Robert shared this insight. But I did wonder then why it is so hard to acknowledge failure when there’s so much potential in the act of telling?
To farm is to be at the mercy of nature, that is true the world over. To own the identity of ‘farmer’ is to embrace the failure often caused by markets in flux, the unbending will of nature, and the seasons, which are now so unreadable, so prone to change. To be a farmer in the age of global warming is to be very far from perfection. But in the embrace of one’s flaws, the potential for seismic change and beauty emerges.
I am no longer a farmer. I failed, often and gloriously. So now it’s time for the next chapter. Is it possible to live in central Sydney with the values of a regenerative farmer worn on my sleeve for all to see? I’m about to find out.
In other news: Last week, First Eat was awarded Best Factual series at the Australian Podcast Awards. It’s such an honour.
I’ll be back next week with the final instalment from the farm.
It’s been a joy to follow your farm stories Nicola, and I can’t wait to read about what comes next. A copy of your book sits on my bedside table - I’ve read and re-read it in lulls in my reading list - it’s a good reminder that there are lots of us with the same direction of travel, just on different journeys.
❤️ I am personally super excited for the next chapter in your life, love. Looking forward to chatting food, farms, failure and family life IRL. 🥂