Increasing the amount of land for agriculture

Self-sufficiency & Survival

The year 2013 began with my New Year Resolution to write a One-Year-Blog, and this is the last month of that blog.  I have travelled through the year with readers from many different countries including as Australia, USA, Russia, Germany, Ukraine, United Kingdom, South Korea, India and Malasia. A special "Thank You" to each one of you who have given this blog over 6,000 page readings over the past 12 months! I enjoyed writing the blog for both you and for me!    

The blog – House & Garden Plus -  began with my long-lived passion to reach a greater level of self-sufficiency in my own life.  January and February blogging covered the medicinal and culinary uses of many of our current garden plants, and ensuing months covered a variety of topics that took my interest, a new topic each month. December brings us back to my initial focus on self-sufficiency and survival by looking at Wartime Britain, hoping that with a glimpse of the skills and the spirit of those who survived great challenges, we will gain knowledge that can help us to be people with both fortitude and faith along with a greater ability for self-sufficiency and survival.

At the outbreak of World War 11, 70 percent of all food consumed in Britain was imported. Such a level of imports could not continue during the war, so the nation was forced to learn very quickly how to produce food in its own backyard to feed a population of nearly 50 million people!

How was it that the people of Britain did not starve during the war years, as did the people of Germany and Russia?

5.6 million acres were added to the acreage under agriculture in Britain from 1939 to 1944,  and  innovative measures and advances in the use of farm machinery were applied across the land – all planned and implemented by Britain’s Ministry of Agriculture. 1,400 of the 300,000 or so farms in England and Wales were acquired by the government for better farm production, and the remainder were farmed by the local communities and England's war-time Farm Girls. Farming communities created a united front to feed the people Britain – those at war and those at home. Cabbages were even planted at Kensington Palace and in the moat of the Tower of London! Every bit of land in Britain – farms, fields, parks and verges – began to be cultivated so that the nation could become self-sufficient. And even German and Italian prisoners of war who were held in camps were delivered to local farms by truck each morning and collected at teatime, so that they too could make a worthwhile contribution towards Britain's survival.

HOW CAN I APPLY THE ABOVE INFO TO MY LIFE?

More than 70% of the food consumed in our household in Queensland, Australia, comes from the shop rather than our suburban garden of around 1/3 of an acre. While we do grow a few vegetables and herbs and have some young fruit trees and vines, I can start to prepare more of the ground for the cultivation of salad plants and green vegetables, peas and beans and root crops such as potatoes, sweet potatoes, yacun http://growwhatyoucan.co.uk/yacon/yacon.html, turnips and carrots.  As a beginner gardener, at this stage, I aim for success in smaller areas in our back garden that I feel are inviting me to dig them over - 

rather than being extra enthusiastic and digging up the whole lawn! 

Just as many people who survived World War 2 remember it as a time of hope and a time of pride, I hope that I will be able to apply the same intrinsic sense of hope and pride in our garden.