Future of Hope Page #2

days of this being possible

are coming towards an end

not only because we could have a

big eruption that could stop flights

in the Northern Hemisphere

for perhaps 2-3 years

but we will also be hampered

by the fact that we are using up

oil at a very fast rate, so we

will not be able to transport food

around the World in

aeroplanes for much longer.

The age of cheap flights I'm

afraid is about to come to an end.

I think it is very important to be

able to go out into the countryside

and see how food grows

where things are really made.

They don't grow in the supermarkets

they grow in the soil.

That's one thing that has been

happening in Iceland now

that we have been making

local groups in all parts of Iceland

like the Slow Food idea

to eat locally, eat seasonal

it's going to save a lot of energy

and it's going to reduce the pollution

caused by all this transport.

It is also ok to break the leaves off

on the field, if you feel like it's easier,

they will just compost

on the field, it's ok.

At least in the beginning people

saw me as a really strange guy

and still people are saying

'Why don't you use chemical fertiliser?'

But, for me to do

Organic it's no way back

when you see the soil, when

you see what you are growing

when you taste it, when you

taste how much sweeter and

better it is, there's no way back.

This is the natural way to do it.

of course, I sometimes think

why am I doing all of this job?

I'm not getting any money, I'm just

getting tired of all of this work.

It's something about the soil

it's something about Mother Earth

that keeps me going

After starting organic, it was

potatoes in the beginning

and then came white cabbage

and turnips and slowly more and more

like lettuce and leek, parsley

and some how I got this idea to

start growing barley and

that's where it started

to give people a taste of 'Gabriel's

Breakfast' Barleyotto, Barley Bread..

and what I've heard is that the

Barley that I grow organic in Iceland

tastes better than

Barley in other countries.

I can lead the market, yes.

Are you nervous with me

looking over your shoulders?

No, not at all.

You're doing great

You're working so fast that

the machine can't keep up

Since 2001 I've had volunteers, they

come through WWOOF, it means

Willing Workers on Organic Farms.

It's just young people from

all around the World that want

to help to build up organic farming.

I used to say it's like organic

growing of connections,

connections between different countries,

so they are making friends here

and connecting the World in a

positive way and helping me a lot

Part of my reason for coming here

at this time is what is going on

with the crisis, to understand

what's really happening

and to design systems from there

that are actually going to create resiliency

within our systems and

within our people.

So, when something really

major happens we are ready;

we are ready to feed

ourselves as best we can,

we are ready to meet at

the gate whatever giant is there.

I am certain that we have enough

geothermal heat to power our greenhouses

We are importing 70% of our

vegetables and 99% of our fruit

and in greenhouses

we can grow both

At the moment, the new power

plant at Hellisheidi spews 90%

of the energy into the

atmosphere, which is mad

we could have set up

greenhouses up there

to use the energy

to produce food.

We just need to

put our mind to it.

And I think Icelandic people

they like new trends

so once it catches on they

will take it and run with it.

We are very into that we should

eat locally but think globally.

When we started here

a friend of mine

he asked me if I was going to

waste my life growing tomatoes

but this is what I've been

doing for the past 19 years

growing tomatoes mainly.

and I think that it has gone

very well and I think that we have

reached the state where we

have shown that organic is possible

and what is interesting us very much

now is going into tropical fruits

and we have been learning

about this and visiting places

in Europe, they are also fish farming

within these greenhouses

so they are using the water from

the fish farms to water the plants

and the water is very nutritious

so it is giving food to the plants

and then at these places

that we have been visiting

they are growing fish that can eat green

so it is a very sustainable system

And this is something that we are

very interested to bring into Iceland

to grow tropical fruits with this

sustainable system, with fish farming

We see it that this pilot project

here in Iceland would be showing

that this is possible and then

we could expand it elsewhere

and using this left over energy

that we have all over Iceland.

We are a part of nature

and we are a part of

a bigger village with 7 billion people

and as this village has a challenge

I truly we believe that

we can help out and

If you look at the reason

why there is war it is very much

about natural resources

like oil, even water and

this is what we have plenty of meaning

energy and all the natural resources.

I think that these resources

could be utilised here in Iceland

to prototype sustainable solutions

in terms of how to consume

transportation in a new way

I think this gives Iceland

a fantastic opportunity.

It means that there will be

a lot of new start up companies

that will test different methods many

companies will fail others will succeed

if we can just tackle this part in

the global village we are actually

helping the planet because

we only have one planet.

The role of Iceland with the

development of new concepts

in automobiles is going to be

very important. I think there,

exactly there Iceland

can be a platform

for testing new technologies

In a small country like ours we

can go beyond the critical mass

we can develop faster I think

and again here Iceland

is an ideal testing platform,

plus that I would like to see us

develop corporations that are linked

to the development era and that some

of the value added is left in Iceland.

Well obviously, Iceland

has a lot of expertise

in renewable energy science

We know that about 80%

of our primary energy is

currently coming from renewable

energy sources and essentially 100%

of electricity generation or production

is from renewable energy sources

Iceland has a lot to

offer other countries.

There's a very good

lesson to be learnt here

How did Iceland manage to reach this

far in terms of renewable energy use

Still today we are at the forefront of

this type of education in the world

but the school was always

intended to be International

and as such pull students

from different countries

and educate them and train them

and then send them back to their

home countries to act as

this catalyst of change or hope

to concentrate on moving out

of the oil era, into the

renewable energy area.

Iceland as an example

was 100 years ago dependant

on peat and things like that

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