Growing demand for real food

 Each day, thousands of trucks carrying foodstuff including eggs, livestock, cereals and horticultural products travel from farms around Australia to processing, packing and distribution centres. most is carted into the sprawl of cities joining food and other stuff from overseas on supermarket shelves.

Australia’s food is mainly produced in rural areas and consumed in our cities, where most of the population lives. To chase sales, many food producers crave high production by following intensive growing systems. However, top quality food is usually provided by low-volume producers using traditional farming methods with limited or no chemical inputs.The Freeranger Eggs farm at Grantville in Australia is an example of sustainable farming. The farm management plan takes a three pillars approach to how the farm operates. Animal welfare is one pillar, but equally important are land sustainability and food safety. Anne and Phil Westwood have encouraged similar free range farms to be set up around Australia.

The concept is to minimise the environmental footprint of egg production whilst maximising quality for consumers. Small scale production results in better animal health by effective disease control compared with intensive animal husbandry . It also allows the eggs to reach consumers far more quickly than industrial systems where eggs spend weeks or even months in warehouses. Chickens which have unrestricted access to pasture, plus a supplementary ration of natural grains produce eggs with higher nutritional value. Free range eggs are a good source of dietary vitamin D, each egg from hens that spend most of the day outdoors contains about 10% of the required daily value . The vitamin D is concentrated in the yolk. along with most other nutrients such as folic acid.The number of hens on our 200 acre ( 80 hectare) property varies but we run a maximum of 1000, depending on the time of year and demand.  Our eBook on how to set up a sustainable freerange farm is even more vital now the clear consumer demand for free range eggs has generated a strong increase in the number of people thinking about starting their own free range egg businesses.

Small, ethical and sustainable farm businesses can be established to service local communities.

A starting point is reading our eBook on starting a free range farm available from us for just $245. The eBook will be emailed after payment is made into our Bendigo Bank account BSB  633 000 Account 153356233​. Send your details to us at freeranger@dcsi.net.au