Longley Organic Farm's James Hutchinson imparting advice for other growers to thrive

James Hutchinson not only wants to see his farm thrive, but also impart knowledge to other producers so they can be successful.

Mr Hutchinson runs Longley Organic Farm in the Huon Valley.

He moved to Tasmania in 2001 and started planting vegetable crops at the farm around 2005.

The 4.5-hectare property has anywhere between 100 and 150 vegetable crops growing at any given time.

Mr Hutchinson said the farm uses a standardised system to grow produce.

“All of our tools, beds and practices are standardised, so that becomes quite attractive to other people – such as a broad-acre farmer that can’t get local produce,” he said.

Since starting the farm, Mr Hutchinson has been experimenting with micro farming, an intensive, small-scale agricultural method that aims to maximise production on limited land.

“I work with a group of people around the world that put that model forward, and what my business does is try to break down barriers to accessing equipment and knowledge for local growers.

Mr Hutchinson also runs another company that imports gardening and farming equipment from interstate and overseas.

He said he had always been interested in community-centred food production.

“I’ve seen a lot of people try to start these things up, and they’d fail because the people involved had no system they could reach out to that was going to provide some sort of promise of profitability.

“There are a whole lot of layers involved – we’re growing more than 100 vegetable crops a year in a small piece of land.

“There’s a lot of crop management involved, and labour is very expensive.

“We need to make sure that we have the right systems and tools in place to make the labour worthwhile.”

The farm utilises backpacker workers, mainly from Europe.

Before COVID, Longley Organic Farm produced 50 veggie boxes a week for customers.

“We don’t do veggie boxes anymore,” Mr Hutchinson said.

“If we have excess food, we might put it into other people’s veggie box systems.

“But I tend to donate a lot of the food that we have to the Hamlet café.”

Mr Hutchinson said one of his focuses was on testing new crops and ideas.

“We are trialling a product called Paper Pot, which is a transplant system that has 264 cells in a small tray, like a 60-centimetre by 20-centimetre tray.

“They are paper hexagons that open up into a long chain.

“At the moment, we’re experimenting with one that will break down fully with soil that can be certified organic.”

Longley Organic Farm is also trialling a water-saving crystal.

“They are made out of synthetic polymers.

“It’s completely organic and breaks down in the soil.”

Mr Hutchinson said he would like to see community-based food systems become more commonplace in Australia.

“I would like for a lot of what we do to be completely normalised so people don’t look at this stuff and say that it’s crazy.

“Being able to have local food that has been grown naturally, and be able to access it, is a gift.”