The Mongolian Industry Forestry group that visited the biorich plantation enjoyed a ‘democracy’ sausage sizzle, which my wife Gayl and I hosted. They almost didn't get beyond the clearing, tucking into their sausages and warm beer with relish.
The Magnificent Seven on the delegation weren’t actually Mongolian – I wanted them to teach me a couple of words, but they admitted to only speaking Mandarin. They’d been to Melbourne University and to see the penguins at Phillip Island and out to the Dandenongs, but as far as we could make out from their interpreter, they’d visited few actual forestry plantations here.
Despite the 'Industry' in their title, the Mongolian Industry Forestry group were not involved in any logging or commercial harvesting. Their forests are mainly conifer and their group has a large government-paid staff throughout the country, which is dedicated solely to conservation and fire protection. It seems that it was our ecological restoration focus, which had attracted their attention in the first instance.
They were puzzled that we were only a volunteer group, lacking either government funding input or management control. The President of the group (he’s the one holding the books I gave him), was an earnest fellow and exclaimed that their government had oversight over every activity.
I gave them copies of 'Recreating the Country' and Digby Race's book on Pacific Rim agroforestry, 'Raising trees and livelihoods.' They were principally interested in how we prevented bushfire (again they were staggered it was mainly volunteer run); and showed more interest in the case studies on agroforestry for smallholders in Asia than the design principles of a biorich plantation.
The Magnificent Seven on the delegation weren’t actually Mongolian – I wanted them to teach me a couple of words, but they admitted to only speaking Mandarin. They’d been to Melbourne University and to see the penguins at Phillip Island and out to the Dandenongs, but as far as we could make out from their interpreter, they’d visited few actual forestry plantations here.
Despite the 'Industry' in their title, the Mongolian Industry Forestry group were not involved in any logging or commercial harvesting. Their forests are mainly conifer and their group has a large government-paid staff throughout the country, which is dedicated solely to conservation and fire protection. It seems that it was our ecological restoration focus, which had attracted their attention in the first instance.
They were puzzled that we were only a volunteer group, lacking either government funding input or management control. The President of the group (he’s the one holding the books I gave him), was an earnest fellow and exclaimed that their government had oversight over every activity.
I gave them copies of 'Recreating the Country' and Digby Race's book on Pacific Rim agroforestry, 'Raising trees and livelihoods.' They were principally interested in how we prevented bushfire (again they were staggered it was mainly volunteer run); and showed more interest in the case studies on agroforestry for smallholders in Asia than the design principles of a biorich plantation.
