People who deal with horses have this expression ‘the horse whisperer’ – which is a about that here is a person who really understands horses, how they think and feel. Almost as if he or she could talk with the horse.

Here in Australia we have, in a similar way, a plant whisperer. Someone who understands the Australian landscape and its plants in a deeper sense. Peter Andrews is a landscape-restoration legend in Australia – he has been on the ABC’s Australian Story a couple of times, his videos are viewed by thousands of people on youtube, he has written two books, and it is all about rebulding a plant-managed landscape – in a way that Peter calls Natural Sequence Farming. He also travels around the country to give talks and presentations, and this is what brings him to Geelong today.

So, welcome to a Regenerative Hour where we are eager to learn what Peter Andrews is on about at this time, where we stand on the doorstep to what the United Nations have announced is going to be called the Decade of Eco-Restoration.

Landscape restoration instituteThe group of people Peter Andrews refers to that he is working together with is the TALS Institute. TALS is short for The Australian Landscape Science Institute, and on their website, you can read about what they call “The Australian Landscape Science Approach”. The website is found on www.tals.org.au

The TALS Institute proposes the establishment of a national governing body for landscape restoration that allows a regional program of landscape practitioners to be initiated “to inform farmers to take practical steps to restore our landscape and prevent droughts and bushfires as it once did.”

TALS Institute wants to underpin the program by scientific evidence and the introduction of a standards and accreditation system supported by both private and public organisations as well as the federal government – “to ensure landscape restoration can occur with minimal risk to others within a water catchment, using the best practises in design and execution.”

“The results will be astounding and create economic certainty and prosperity for agricultural Australia as well as ensuring food security for our nation,” writes TALS Institute.

After the podcast interview with Peter Andrews, we play an older interview which TALS Institute posted on Youtube, where he is standing at a pond and a willow tree at Mulloon Creek in New South Wales. This was produced by Paul Cockram from Artplan Videographics eight years ago – in 2011.

The podcast hour is rounded off with two short excerpts from ABC Australian Story’s half-hour documentary, which you can also find on Youtube: ‘How Peter Andrews rejuvenates drought-struck land’:

Published on Youtube on 29 October 2018“Is “natural sequence farming” the secret to restoring our water-starved continent? For more than a decade, two farmers have shown that parched landscapes can be revived. And finally, Canberra’s listening. Australian Story explores the potential solution to Australia’s drought crisis.” – www.abc.net.au/news/2018 

“…the path we are following is taking us downhill, possibly to destruction. Calamity does await us if we keep doing to the landscape what we have been doing. The good news is we can fix the problem. In fact, fixing it is relatively easy.