Conservarea biodiversităţii şi dezvoltare comunitară în Transilvania
Fundatia ADEPT Food Barn as a useful model for other regions
On 18 March 2010, 114 farmers from Harghita County visited the ADEPT Foodbarn in Saschiz. The representatives of various Farmers Associations and Women Farmers Associations from across different parts of the sekler (szekely) area of Transylvania were interested to see at first hand how the Foodbarn works, and puts money into the community. The Food Barn is also an educational tool for children: a group of 32 children from Harghita aged 8-12 visited the Foodbarn on 7 April 2010. We hope that this will help pass on the message to the next generation about the importance of, and links between, historic landscapes and traditional foods.The group organized by the Harghita Country Council received information regarding not only the production and marketing of traditional food products (like jams, pickles, syrups etc.) but also about the local benefits of traditional land management.
The small-scale farmers from the mostly Hungarian speaking area just east of the Saxon villages are threatened by similar problems to the ones encountered in Tarnava Mare: the low price of cow milk and/or the difficulty of selling it.
By meeting the EU’s food safety and hygiene regulations rigurously, Food Barns such as the one in Saschiz can boost income for local people as they provide an authorized facility for creating and preserving added value traditional food products.
There are numerous town halls, composesorat (common ownership associations) and NGOs in the sekler area that are eager to replicate the Food Barn project carried out by Fundatia ADEPT. We hope they succeed in doing so.
The Food Barn is also an educational tool for children. A group of 32 children aged 8-12 visited the Food Barn on 7 April,2010.
The youngsters came from several different schools in Harghita county, in the mostly Hungarian speaking sekler (szekely) area of Transylvania. The group toured various parts of the Saxon Transylvania, curious to know more out about the natural and cultural heritage found in the villages of the region, which is in many ways similar to the sekler landscape.
The children learnt about the value of the grasslands and forests of the area, and the growing importance of local food products following traditional recipes.
Their interest in the Saschiz Food Barn gives us hope that the message passed down to the next generation regarding protecting and conserving these exceptional landscapes is not lost, and can be carried forward succesfully in the future.
20.03.2010
< back to news
Prince of Wales visit to Saschiz on 23 May 2009
In 2008 and 2009, His Royal Highness The Prince of Wales visited the village of Saschiz, in south-east Transylvania, to meet local producers. In 2009 he opened a model food processing unit.
Known as a “food barn”, this simple conversion of a farm courtyard barn will enable small-scale producers in the area to sell their traditional recipes more widely, while meeting the safety and hygiene regulations set out by the EU.
Funded by Fundatia ADEPT and working closely with the local community of Saschiz, the food barn is a first of its kind and has been given official approval by the National Food Safety Authority (ANSVSA) to be used in the production of local products for retail sales in Romania and abroad. The flexible set-up of the food barn welcomes both individual and group producers for a variety of products.
The food barn is the result of the combined wish of local communities, the Romanian Government and the European Commission to preserve local and traditional foods, providing an economic future to the small-scale farming communities that make them and thus protecting the landscape in which they live. Fundatia ADEPT hopes that other communities will be encouraged to replicate this model.
After unveiling a plaque to commemorate the event, His Royal Highness emphasised the need to ensure the survival of Romania’s remarkable rural culture and civilization, drawing reference to how Transylvania combines an extremely rich wildlife with natural and high quality food made by local producers. The Prince of Wales stressed the importance to value and protect these low-energy agricultural systems as they are a practical response to the global economic and environmental crisis.
View film of speech given by HRH The Prince of Wales at Saschiz.
