Man grows ALL of his food on 750m2
Summary
TLDRThis episode explores the story of Alec Pelman, who grows all his food on a small plot of land, spending only one day a month on it. Through his journey of self-sufficiency, he shares insights about sustainable agriculture, using efficient methods to meet nutritional needs with minimal resources. Alec's lifestyle challenges the conventional industrial farming model, advocating for more ecological approaches. His story highlights the viability of low-maintenance farming practices that harmonize with nature, inspiring viewers to reconsider their relationship with food production and sustainability.
Takeaways
- 🌱 A man named Alec Pelman grows all of his own food, spending only one day a month on the task.
- 🍃 Alec follows a scientific approach to self-sufficiency, using 750 square meters of land to grow wheat, beans, olive trees, and vegetables.
- 🏡 Alec built his own ecological house and doesn't rely on supermarkets for food.
- 📚 Despite growing his food, Alec works full-time in academia as a research fellow and lecturer.
- 🌍 His motivation stems from a desire to reduce his environmental impact and live in harmony with nature.
- 🌾 Alec highlights the importance of growing staples like cereals, legumes, and oil-producing plants, as they provide essential calories, protein, and nutrients for survival.
- 🐑 He explains that animal-based food is inefficient compared to plant-based diets, as it requires much more land and resources.
- 👨🌾 Alec's farming is based on ancient, traditional methods, adapted to the local climate and ecological conditions.
- 📊 He calculates his food production based on his daily nutritional needs, ensuring efficient use of land and resources.
- 🌧️ Alec's crops rely mostly on rainfall, and he emphasizes the importance of growing crops suited to the local climate for sustainable agriculture.
Q & A
What is the main topic of the video?
-The video explores self-sufficiency, focusing on how a man named Alec Pelman grows all his own food with minimal effort and time, while also highlighting ecological and sustainable living.
How much time does Alec spend growing all of his food?
-Alec spends only one day a month, or roughly 24 hours, to grow all of his food.
What types of food does Alec grow on his farm?
-Alec grows wheat, fava beans, various vegetables, and olive trees, relying mostly on rainfall for irrigation except for his vegetable garden.
How does Alec's farming method differ from conventional farming?
-Alec’s farming method is based on low-maintenance, ecological practices, relying on local varieties of crops and natural rainfall, rather than intensive farming methods. He uses principles like nitrogen fixation through beans and focuses on minimal land use.
What inspired Alec to start growing his own food?
-Alec was driven by a desire to live in harmony with nature, combined with growing environmental awareness and dissatisfaction with the damaging effects of modern lifestyles and industrialized agriculture.
Why does Alec focus on growing cereals, legumes, and oil-producing plants instead of vegetables?
-Alec prioritizes cereals, legumes, and oils because they provide the essential calories and protein needed for survival, whereas vegetables are nutritionally important but do not supply enough calories to sustain a person.
What challenges did Alec face when searching for people who grew all their own food in Israel?
-Alec initially struggled to find anyone in both Jewish and Arab communities in Israel who grew more than 30% of their calories from their own food, leading him to learn the process on his own.
How does Alec calculate the amount of land needed to grow all his food?
-Alec calculates his daily nutritional needs, including the required amount of wheat, beans, oil, and vegetables. He then multiplies these by 365 days and calculates how much land each crop needs, planning his farm layout accordingly.
What environmental benefits does Alec’s farming method offer?
-Alec’s method enhances soil health by using nitrogen-fixing crops like fava beans and reduces the need for irrigation by relying on rainfall. It minimizes environmental damage by avoiding monoculture and petrochemical-based farming.
Can Alec's farming model be scaled up globally, and what adjustments would be needed?
-Yes, Alec believes his model can be scaled globally with proper adjustments to local climates and conditions, such as growing region-appropriate crops and utilizing the seasons efficiently for planting and harvesting.
Outlines
🌱 Introduction to Self-Sufficiency and Episode Overview
The speaker is amazed by a man who grows all his food and spends only one day a month doing it, highlighting the importance of learning self-sufficiency. This video is episode three of 'Eon Nomads,' which explores ways humanity can live harmoniously with nature. The speaker describes their approach to learning self-sufficiency, starting with plans to apprentice with someone in Israel but eventually realizing they must learn on their own.
🌿 Alec Pelman’s Sustainable Lifestyle
Alec Pelman, living in C, grows all his food without relying on supermarkets and built an ecological house. A scientific study is being conducted on his farm, which reveals that Alec spends only one day a month tending to his 750 square meters of crops, including wheat, pulses, and olive trees. He explains the breakdown of his crops and how the vegetable garden, which is the only irrigated part, requires very minimal maintenance. Alec highlights the simplicity and efficiency of his system, allowing him to balance this lifestyle with a full-time job in academia.
🍂 The Dream of Independence and Environmental Awakening
Alec shares his childhood dream of self-sufficiency, influenced by the desire for independence like Robinson Crusoe. However, it wasn't until he developed a deeper awareness of environmental and social issues that he decided to take action. He grew dissatisfied with modern life, particularly the environmental harm caused by everyday actions. This realization pushed him to move towards a lifestyle focused on sustainability, starting with food production that aligns with ethical and environmental values.
🍞 The Reality of Food Production and Nutritional Needs
Alec explains the nutritional realities of self-sufficiency. He initially started growing vegetables, but realized that vegetables alone do not provide enough calories for survival. Instead, he focuses on growing cereals, pulses, and oil-rich crops, as these provide essential calories and nutrients. He notes that while an animal-based diet is an option, it is far less efficient than a plant-based one. He stresses that the balance of cereals, pulses, and oil is a universal formula for human survival across different cultures.
🍚 Cultural Diets and Local Ingredients
Throughout history, different regions of the world have developed diets based on local resources. Alec compares various global diets, such as the use of rice and soy in Asia or maize and beans in Mexico, and points out that his own diet follows a similar formula using wheat, fava beans, and olive oil. He describes the versatility of these ingredients and how they have inspired countless recipes. Alec further discusses how he adapts recipes from other cultures, such as miso and soy sauce, using his homegrown ingredients.
🌾 Efficient Food Production on a Small Scale
Alec shares how he calculates his annual food needs based on nutritional requirements and the amount of land needed to produce those crops. He grows enough wheat, beans, and vegetables to sustain himself year-round. He highlights the simplicity of this method, which has been used by humans for thousands of years. By focusing on local, seasonal crops and avoiding out-of-season production, Alec ensures his approach is both efficient and sustainable.
🌻 Wheat, Beans, and Nitrogen-Fixing Crops
Alec describes how small plots of land can produce enough food to sustain an individual. For instance, a small 2-square-meter wheat plot can produce enough bread for one person for a week. He also explains the benefits of fava beans, which provide protein and enrich the soil by fixing nitrogen. This creates a natural cycle that improves soil quality for future crops, making fava beans an essential part of sustainable agriculture.
🥙 Preparing Full Meals from Homegrown Ingredients
Alec shows how he prepares a 100% homegrown meal using ingredients from his garden: falafel, bread, olives, and salad. He highlights the versatility of his crops and shares how simple ingredients like olive oil, wheat, and fava beans can create a variety of dishes. Alec reflects on his early experiences visiting permaculture farms in Israel, noting that his own farming efforts have been more successful than expected, allowing him to achieve a high level of self-sufficiency.
☔ Rainfall and the Efficiency of Farming
Alec discusses the role of rainfall in his farming practice. Living in the Western Galilee, he benefits from approximately 750 mm of rain annually, which supports his staple food crops grown in the winter. He contrasts his situation with regions like Japan, where multiple rainy seasons allow for summer crops. Alec believes that with proper adjustments, his farming model can be scaled up and adapted to different climates.
🌍 The Global Impact of Agriculture on Ecosystems
The video concludes by addressing the global agricultural system's negative impact on ecosystems. Practices like monocropping and petrochemical farming deplete soil health. Alec's approach raises the question of how we could globally align agriculture with nutritional needs while minimizing ecological harm. The speaker argues that while large-scale agricultural change may seem utopian, the shift towards regenerative agriculture is already underway, and continuing this movement is vital for the health of the planet.
Mindmap
Keywords
💡Self-sufficiency
💡Regenerative agriculture
💡Nitrogen fixation
💡Cereal crops
💡Legumes
💡Industrialized farming
💡Sustainable living
💡Ecological farming
💡Caloric efficiency
💡Agricultural revolution
Highlights
A man grows all his food but spends only one day a month doing it, challenging the perception that self-sufficiency requires a lot of time.
He grows food on 750 square meters of land, including wheat, beans, and olive trees, using mainly rain-fed agriculture and minimal irrigation.
The majority of the vegetables and crops grown are low-maintenance, with the vegetable garden only requiring half a day of work per month.
He manages to grow enough food to be fully self-sufficient while maintaining a full-time academic job as a researcher and lecturer.
He began his journey after becoming more environmentally and socially conscious, seeking a life that reduces his ecological impact.
Focuses on growing cereals, legumes, and oil crops, which are essential for survival due to their high caloric and nutritional value.
He avoided animal-based diets because growing plant-based foods is much more efficient in terms of land and energy use.
He uses traditional crop rotation methods, like growing fava beans, which enrich the soil with nitrogen, benefiting future crops.
The approach is scientifically backed, and a research paper on his farm will soon be published.
He draws inspiration from historical agricultural methods, noting that humans have grown food for thousands of years without modern technology.
The triple formula of cereal, legume, and oil crops has been developed in various regions across the world, providing a basis for many traditional dishes.
The farm produces a wide variety of recipes from just a few staple crops, like wheat and beans, using methods from various cultures.
He calculated his yearly nutritional needs before determining the amount of land and type of crops to grow, rather than focusing on what would sell in the market.
His farming method is highly scalable and can be adapted to different climates and regions, depending on rainfall patterns.
He emphasizes the importance of regenerative agriculture, arguing that the current industrial farming practices are unsustainable and depleting the Earth's resources.
Transcripts
when I heard there's a man who grows all
of his food I thought he must spend all
of his time and effort doing it but when
he told me he spends only one day a
month doing it I thought we all could
learn something about self-sufficiency
from
him welcome to Eon Nomads where we
explore different ways in which Humanity
could live again in harmony with nature
this is episode three I hope you will
enjoy and I thought okay that's a good
plan if I I I want to do something I've
never have no experience doing so I'll
just go learn from someone who does it
who grows all their
food and uh so they're probably in
Israel I say maybe 200 people like this
and then I choose 20 out of them and
then I'll write them a letter an email
and then maybe five will respond and
I'll choose one and go and do it so I
you know sounds like good plan right
that's what you do when you you you want
to be an apprentice of someone and then
I started looking for the
200 and then I thought okay maybe 50 and
then people told me oh but it's not just
you know it's not in the Jewish societ
go to the Arab Society they like they
really are you know connected to the
land live traditionally so I went to the
Arab population and I couldn't find one
person that grows more more than 30% of
their calories and I realized okay I
have to learn it by
[Music]
myself okay so I'm Alec pelman I live in
C um I guess the reason why you're here
is that uh I grow of my food I don't buy
food in the
supermarket and I built this house
which
is I'm told is are quite
ecological and I guess that's the
special stuff about that uh draws people
to this
place actually it's very well calculated
because we made a scientific research on
this Farm not long ago and there's a
paper to be going to be published soon
about it in a scientific journal and uh
it takes about one day a month it takes
me one day what do you mean meaning 24
hours a
month so it's uh 750 m to grow all the
food out of which about 200 square m the
weat 300 square m
350 the pulses in this case in this
place it's fa beans and the trees are in
between so the trees don't take up any
space so say 50 m because the
the grain grows all the way to the tree
trunks and then the the garden is about
150 M so 750 Al together out of which
the wheat the beans and the trees the
olive trees they rely only on rainfall
no irrigation so only the wedge Garden
is being
irrigated very low maintenance most of
it so the veg Garden takes about half a
day a month and the rest another half a
day
that's about you don't need to work
every day like small amount of time like
no there are weeks that I many weeks
that I do nothing wow well I just pick
food from the garden eat it but I do
yeah there's nothing I I do yeah once a
month what do you do all the rest of the
days work
fulltime Academia no really I have a
full-time job yeah research fellow in
the techn
and I'm a senior lecturer in like um
what do you call it assistant professor
in uh in sh
College I think I had this dream as a
young boy of like I guess like many
other people not all but some people
that you know like kind of a robin zon
cruzo type of thing like you're not
dependent on anyone want and you can uh
take care of yourself build your own
house grow your own stuff but I didn't
do it with this dream anything for many
years I just dreamed like anybody else I
went through the normal
Israeli course of Life studies and
military service and then go to
travel and uh yeah but I guess traveling
also made me more attracted to this type
of life like and more unhappy with the
the ways of life that
are the common ones that most people
will go you know you have to choose a
job yeah and uh
then buy a house pay
mortgage marry have kids and
uhy
life and uh yeah I I wasn't very
attracted to it but I guess the thing
that really made me actually you know
stop everything thing and do it was a
growing environmental awareness like
ethical more environmental and social
awareness
realizing all the harm that uh the
normal way of life
is producing yeah and I felt that you
know with a like by just living being a
good person that goes about with their
lives and just the amount of damage that
it's being caused by simply living it
was uh mind-blowing and very difficult
for
me up to a stage that I felt like I I
can't do it anymore I don't want to be
part of it I'm like passively being a
part of it just by you know you're cold
you want your air condition on and
you're I don't know you need something
you have to go into the car so just
living so I went first for vegetables
which is very stupid because this
doesn't keep you alive because it gives
you about I mean people who eat a lot of
vegetables will have about 20% of the
calories from vegetables so this is not
what you you survive on if you're
thinking about survival this would be
your last thing to grow yeah you start
with you know with cereals this is and
oil and some protein legumes pulses
this would keep you running this would
keep you alive so I could you know you
could use uh instead of plant-based diet
to have animal based diet that's what I
wanted to ask and then you have to grow
10 times as
much because the middleman which is
because you have to grow the food for
your animals MH and the animal takes
about 90% of the food just for its and
gives you 10% of the energy it takes
from than so it's a very inefficient
machine in terms ofal calories and
nutrition and I think every place used
to have some animal based food but it
would be very small portion of the diet
of the calorie
intake cuz they're very inefficient very
tasty but very inefficient machine to
produce food unless you live I don't
know in Alaska or in Wales where no
vegetables grow and you know sheeps just
uh
Ro everywhere so you or if you're near
near this you gather sheep you're the
sea and then you eat fish fish yeah of
course so the more North you go actually
yeah the more you need to rely mostly on
animal Foods is it true I don't know
yeah maybe you're right I mean in tiet
for example or South yeah like they just
you have just grass growing and then you
need something that can eat that grass
grass yeah cuz you you can't feed on the
grass so you have something that can and
then you eat to whatever feds on
it yeah but here the tradition was uh we
know ever since the Agricultural
Revolution which is very new it's just
10,000 years ago it's nothing 10 20 we
have humans 200,000 years and they only
realized that you can actually put the
seed in the ground only
recently first they just thought okay
it's you could play God and you could
decide where to where some something
should grow and where it doesn't so
that's a fairly new technology we use
[Music]
this uh like formula of cereals
beans and some oil
tree has been developed in every place
on the globe independently of one
another so if you're in China
say you'll have rice as a cereal you'll
have uh soy as the protein uh
source and you have a soy
oil right this is the one of the most uh
widespread oils in the
world again this would be the staple
food if you went to I don't know Mexico
you'll have maze as the as the cereal
and beans as the
protein and corn oil
so the maze would be used for the oil
avocado yeah it could be avocado
sunflower of course but uh and this
would be the main like the Staples food
and the source of the calories so the
same formula as has been applied
here so from the things that you grow
which are
vegetables um fa beans wheat and olive
oil yes how many recipes can you make
with that
how many things can
interestingly as I said yesterday this
is the formula that has been developed
in every place on the planet so some
cereal and some pulse some
legum and some source of oil and some
vegetables so that's the staple food so
people had to surv ever since the
Industrial Revolution people had to
survive on this
triple formula so they had to invent
many
recipes at each and every place
including in the Middle East so in the
Middle East we have plenty of dishes
that are based on these three
ingredients so you'll have the even just
the wheat you can make you can eat it
like rice you can just cook it as it is
and eat it or Mill it into
flour or use the Samina which is the
center of the but what I do when I m the
the wheat I se it whatever comes through
the seeve is flour whatever doesn't
that's Sam mulina and you can make all
sorts of um porridges eggs cakes uh
KU uh bug it's wheat that was cooked
dried until it's completely dry and then
crushed so it makes it much more readily
edible all you have to do is to add some
boiling water wait for 20 minutes and
it's food so this is only from the one
ingredients which is wheat and you know
you can and the same goes with fava you
can eat it as it is boiled like cooked
or make faaf or make Kos or you know
whatever so we have already plenty of
recipes but now we know one another all
over the world and we know other
countries so what we can do we can go to
other culture like Japan and ask them
what do you do with your legumes which
is soy soybeans and take all their
recipe and convert them to
our um pulses which you showed us before
as the as I yeah there is like this is
miso based on instead of rice and Bary
it's instead of rice and so sorry rice
and soil yeah it's uh based on chickpeas
and barley and the same goes for this
soy
sauce and hibiscus for tea and this I
talked about it already wheat whe wheat
whe wheat uh fa bean flour some uh corn
that was left and dried on the Kernel
chickpeas chickpeas that were grown here
and some dried uh um cherry tomatoes H
zucchini Dy zucchini corette Dred
zucchini the sun this is these are green
peas M this is a nice uh thing because I
use it for demonstration where people
come to ask questions and let say if you
eat this in a day mhm you get you can
survive healthily on this triple okay
this is the triple this is the amount
you need daily so this is like 50 g of
oil and about 200 g of beans mhm one 40
or so uh grams of
Wheat and this is like 2,000 calories
out of which 50% come from carbs 20%
from protein and 30% from
o most Farmers would go the other way
around and say
okay what do people
buy how much will I get for it and then
what shall I grow
but here the calculation was the other
way around at first I
calculated what's my daily nutrition
need and then I multiplied by 365 days a
year so I knew how much I needed a year
so I needed 50 kg of weight 90 kg of
beans 20 kg of oil M and
about 300 to 400 kg of vegetables then I
knew okay
then I calculated how much land each one
will need and then I I planted
everything according to this so nobody
does this
nobody what what kept me confident that
this is a viable option is that I knew
that people used to do it for thousands
of years you don't have to be very it
come it's not rocket science and it is
very simple it's just you know water Sun
good soil
plant seasonally do it it's in season
and not out of season if you grow local
varieties you know I don't I wouldn't
grow rice here because that would be
failure after failure after failure but
if you grow wheat it's been here for so
long before us yeah it's local it knows
it's you know it doesn't need you just
spread it and you know live it be and
then come back when it's ready
[Music]
so I guess this uh square is about 2
square m with uh little bunch here of
wheat which is one loaf of bread and you
need about two of those a week so that's
amounts to about 100 loaves a year which
is times 2 m each well 200 square m very
small area and that's enough for all the
wheat all the cereal you need for year
so that's the Bava beans I eat it green
for about 2 weeks when it's edible green
and then it dries out and then I wait
for it to dry completely CU you don't
want any moisture
inside so that it can store well in a
jar and then it can keep for for years
and years in this
state the the best ever source of
protein or plant-based protein uh 30%
protein which is a
lot and uh also it's an amazing plant
because this is a nitrogen
fixer
so when I saw I plant say a wheat after
I harvest the wheat you have much less
uh nitrogen in the soil than before
because the wheat used all the nitrogen
in the soil whereas with beans it's the
exact opposite you put the bean and then
after the bean has is being harvested
the soil is richer with nitrogen than it
was before so the next Plant to be
planted here will enjoy all the nitrogen
that been fixed into the soil and
nitrogen is very important for plants so
I think this is uh the magic plant the
the plant of
life it gives the soil the thing that
the soil needs most for agriculture
which is nitrogen and gives our body
what we need most which is protein
because carbs is very easy to get in
nature and oil is also rather easy but
protein is the difficult thing mainly
from
plant you I have a 100%
uh uh homegrown
meal this is
falafel and bread and olives and
mayonnaise made of olive oil and aqua
FAA the the water that were used to cook
the the fa beans that went into the ffer
and salad green salad from all fresh
ingredients from the garden and also
that's made of made mainly coriander
garlic hot pepper and some
spices and that's about
it cuz first at first I went to some
permaculture farms and this type of and
they they buy 95% of the so in Israel
yeah that's what I met there back then
when I did it it was like 15 years
ago um I don't know about today I guess
it's not very different and and I went
for it and and uh it went much much
better than I thought I thought I'd have
much more
failures I did have some
but I always had enough I think I only
bought wheat
twice uh when wild boar ate it and but
that was the only time out of I've been
doing it for 12 years now most people I
think ask them how much do you think it
would take you to they would say
fulltime job for sure and you say one
day in a month funnily enough scient and
people who are you know researching this
for all of their lives that they will
give you the same answer that firstly it
will take a lot of
land and a lot of water and a lot of
time and a lot of training so you have
to learn potato that's a profession once
you've done that now you have to learn
onions once you've learned onions now
you have to go into peace then by the
time you finished all of that you're 70
years old
and you have no strength to actually
execute all your
plans so
uh but yeah it takes much which is not
true yeah which is very
untrue there's a lot of rainfall luckily
in this part of the of the country it's
the Western Galilee we have about 750 mm
a year which is not much less than
London uh so there's a lot of
rainfall just spread over only the
winter it's only in the winter of course
therefore most of my food my staple food
has been grown in the winter and keps
mhm dry all year round and then I
consume it all year round but it grows
only in the winter when in the rainy
season as you for example if if it was
Japan for example you you have two rainy
Seasons so you can
grow uh here I grow only in the way like
so 600 M are being used one season a
year like only in the winter if you had
summer rains you could grow in the
summer as well so you could yeah exactly
double the crop or half the land for the
same crop so instead of uh 600 M you
have only 300 M plus the one so you will
end up with 500 M square meters instead
of 750 so it depends on the climate and
it is a model that can
be uh up
scaled but with the the the appropriate
adjustment to each and every
[Music]
clim out of all the lands on Earth 35%
is used for
agriculture but the way in which we use
these lands to produce our food has
proven to be hugely detrimental to the
health of our ecosystems practices such
as monocrop
and petrochemical farming are depleting
the soils from organic matter and
microorganisms so I can't help but think
what if we asked ourselves the same
question Alik asked before sewing the
seeds on his
farm what is our Global nutritional
need and then plant accordingly to
supply this need in the most efficient
in the ecological way possible how will
our world look like if we did that many
people believe it's utopian to expect a
global agricultural change but really
change is happening all the time the
current mode of industrialized farming
is itself less than 100 years old and in
the rate in which it's depleting our
soils change is the only option on the
table if we look at the next 100 years
time scale many people and Farmers
realize this and the movement towards
regenerative agriculture is becoming
bigger by the
day overall we must recognize that the
only real longterm values we have on
this planet our healthy ecosystems
fertile soils and clean water
[Music]
you
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