I owe you all an apology for being absent for a few weeks. Well, I’m back (briefly, to check in), but regular publishing will resume in early September. In the meantime, there are a few things that demand further thought…
Anyone who has been consuming mainstream media in whatever form over the last few weeks, cannot have failed to hear about the forthcoming food inflation, and security concerns. The story goes that various natural disasters (fires in Russia for example) have caused a large reduction in crop yields, resulting in higher prices, and some governments declaring that they will not export. As the population continues to grow, incidents such as this will have an ever bigger impact. The short message: expect more of this. You are not helpless however, so don’t be disheartened. Take action now to store additional food, and implement plants to increase your own future production.
Also in the news, speculation and political posturing on the forthcoming UK Government spending cuts. You may have been able to work out my views on this from a couple of previous posts, but if not, here goes. I believe Government is fundamentally incompetent, and our political process is not in the best interests of the people who pay for it (That would be taxpayers like you and I). The present system, which has evolved over many years through fiddling by various flavours of political party is overly complex, sometimes punishes the wrong people, rewards the wrong people, and is open to abuse. I am in favour of individuals taking more responsibility for their own lives, and Government getting the hell out and focusing on the things that Government are best placed to deal with.
The last Labour government are not solely to blame but they did an immense amount to create an invasive “big Government” that we neither need, nor can afford. I won’t claim to be a big supporter of the Conservatives or Liberal Democrats either, but I have to hand it to David Cameron and Nick Clegg. So far they have me cautiously impressed. The proof of the pudding however is in the eating, and they have a long way to go to kill off the unnecessary wastage (take a look at the number of quangos that have grown up over the last ten years, to say nothing of public sector pensions, and in some senior civil servants cases unjustified ludicrously high salaries), and I’m sure many measures will be unpopular. Just remember however. Our country is in serious debt and due to the quantitative easing that has taken place, your money and savings are now worth significantly less than they were a couple of years ago – That’s inflation. It’s not prices going up. It’s your money going down in value. Will the current Government do a good job? The jury is out on that one. Time will tell.
Finally, a quick update. I mentioned back in July that we’d found our ideal home, and in addition to a holiday, that is what most of August has been about. After finalising the purchase, there has been some work to do before we can move in, but (finally) moving day looms large, and we’re excited about the extra opportunities for self sufficiency that the new property offers. It also gives us more room to demonstrate some of the techniques we talk about here at Self Sufficiency World, so look out for more “How to…” articles, reviews, and recipes.
In light of the recent tragedy in Cumbria, the UK’s influential parliamentary Home Affairs Committee has announced that it will conduct an inquiry into Firearms Control. The Committee has called for written evidence from interested parties. Anyone can make a submission and the British Association for Shooting and Conservation (BASC) is encouraging all those who participate in shooting sports to do so.
Whilst the various shooting organisations, including the BASC will be making submissions, it is important that individuals participating and supporting the shooting sports do likewise.
All submissions should be original and should be submitted before 27 August 2010. Submissions should contain your name, telephone number and address, and can be made by email to homeaffcom@parliament.uk either as a Microsoft Word or rich text document. It is suggested that you include details of the type of shooting you participate in, the reason it is important to you, and how long you have participated.
At SelfSufficiencyWorld we firmly believe that the recent events in Cumbria, like previous tragic events in Dunblane, Hungerford and elsewhere, are some of the most horrific and shocking tragedies that can impact on our society. We do not however believe that firearms are the cause of such devastating events. A firearm is a tool. Like a screwdriver, a hammer, or a golf club it has a purpose, and it can be used to productive ends, or, like a screwdriver, a hammer or a golf club, it can be misused, sometimes in horrific ways.
Facts show there is no relationship between gun crime and responsible firearms ownership. Indeed it is widely recognised by both the Police and the Home office that the shooting community is extremely law abiding. At SelfSufficiencyWorld we fully support responsible shooting sports and urge those of you who are respectful law abiding shooters, who I am sure also condemn the misuse of firearms, to make a submission.
Despite what some of the mainstream media would have you believe, shooting is an important part of rural Britain, and as we have highlighted previously, it is an Olympic sport which Britain excels at. This is despite the law ludicrously requiring some pistol disciplines to train abroad. It is also important to the British economy, and the rural environment as a whole. As responsible shooters we all have a duty to protect the sport, and also to continue to make it the safe sport that it is today.
We firmly believe that the current laws have already gone too far in restricting legal and responsible firearms ownership, but we are also eager to ensure that the public at large feels, and remains safe with regard to gun crime.
We fully support the BASC and further detailed information can be found on their website: http://www.basc.org.uk/
We urge you to make a factual submission, and we equally urge the inquiry to fully understand the weight of the responsibility that rests with them.
It will soon be the time of year when blackberries are ripe for picking. I love blackberries, but I’ve never tried making Blackberry Jam, so this year I decided to give it a go. Raspberry and Strawberry jams are my favourites, but you can preserve pretty much all fruit and vegetables by turning them into preserves such as jam or chutney.
Here’s a simple (you won’t believe how simple!) jam making method:
1.Preparation
You need to ensure your fruit is in good condition and is not over ripe. It needs to be young, firm, and without any damage or bruising. If you intend to use fruit for jam making, do it as soon after picking as possible. Wash the fruit and cut larger fruit into uniform smaller pieces.
2. Weigh your fruit
I suggest you have a minimum of 500g and a maximum of 2kg. Less, and it’s not worth making, more and it will be harder to get it to set.
3. Make sure you have an equal amount of sugar
So, if you have 1kg of fruit, make sure you have 1kg of sugar.
4. You can use Pectin (optional)
Pectin will be available from local shop and it helps your jam to set. That said, fruit contains pectin so it’s not really necessary in most cases. If you do use it, follow the quantities on the packet, and add it when you add the sugar.
5. Heat your ingredients
Take a large pan and gently heat the fruit and sugar, stirring continuously. You’re looking for the sugar to dissolve. Eventually you will achieve a smooth consistency. Keep stirring, you’re looking for it to congeal, which is the first sign it is close to being ready.
6. Testing it’s ready
Scoop out a small amount of the mixture using a teaspoon and put it to on a cold plate(chill it in the fridge first). It should thicken, and develop a skin which wrinkles after a minute or so. If it does, it’s ready. If it doesn’t, keep the mixture on the heat and retest until you can pass the test.
7. Storing
Once the jam is ready, spoon it into clean sterilised jars*, which should be hot when you do this. Tap the jars to get rid of any air bubbles and seal them immediately. If you are using metal lids, pop a waxed paper disk (ie grease proof paper) on top of the jam before securing the lid. Store in a cool dark place and it should keep for a year.
*Just like making wine and beer, you need to sterilise your equipment and your storage jars, to protect your finished jam and ensure it stores well.
1. Your own fruit and vegetables taste better than shop bought produce.
They really do! Maybe it’s because they are fresher, but I find my own produce has a much “stronger” taste than the plastic wrapped produce from the shop, or even that sold at farmers markets.
2. Your home produced food has not been sprayed with chemicals.
You know where your food has come from and you know how it’s been treated during it’s growth.
3. Your garden can be the ultimate convenience store.
Nipping out to the garden to pull some carrots or cut some herbs is a lot quicker, a lot less hassle, and a lot more enjoyable than negotiating the car park and checkout queues at your local supermarket!
4. Freshness.
Your food is not suffocated in plastic and left in a crate or on a shelf for days.
5. Your Health.
Fresher food = more vitamins and nutrients = a healthier you! Tending your own garden is a physical activity. It keeps you active and fit.
6. Independence.
Become independent of the various interdependent “systems” that produce, process, store, ship and sell food. If they fail or falter you won’t notice!
7. Entertainment.
This is the comedy spot! Your produce is not required to “conform to the norm” as supermarket food is. You can use every last funny shaped carrot (after having a good giggle of course!)
8. Well being.
Working in the garden brings you closer to nature and gives you a sense of achievement. This to me is the real “soul food”.
9. Zero food miles.
Whichever way you look at it, avoiding shipping food around the world is a good thing!
10. Be Sociable/Build relationships.
Share what’s spare. Make or cement a friendship by giving some surplus produce.
The weather has been pretty hot this week, and if the weather-guesser is halfway accurate it’s set to get hotter through the weekend. It’s great to be outside and in the countryside with weather like this, but as I look at the vegetable garden, it does rather focus the mind on water.
All living things need water, and quite a large proportion of their mass is composed of water, and yet, there is comparatively little water on this small planet of ours. True, three quarters of the Earths surface is covered in water, but slightly more than 97% of it contains salt! This leaves slightly less than 3% which could be considered fresh water. Most of that is not easily accessible, as it’s frozen in places like the polar ice caps!
Now, you can go for sometime without food. It might not be comfortable, admittedly, but you can go for some time. Not so with Water. If you don’t get water you dehydrate quickly, and ultimately you die.
Given the growing population, which has an absolute requirement to hydrate itself, and the need to grow food for itself (which also requires water), I’m surprised no one has taken action to preserve some of that water in the polar cap so that it doesn’t just melt into the oceans and become salty! I don’t mean stop the icecaps from melting, because that’s just nature doing its thing, but if they are going to melt, shouldn’t we be capturing some of that most valuable liquid!?
Anyway, enough of the “big picture” problems…act on the things within your immediate control first.
If you’re growing some of your own food, and you don’t have a water butt, or method of capturing rainwater, then I suggest you move that to the top of your “to do” list. It’s amazing how much rainwater you can capture off a relatively small roof of a shed or garage, but if you can, why not use one of the many kits you can buy to capture the rainwater that falls on your house? After all, having it hit your roof, travel down to the guttering, and then into the sewer is such a waste, when you can intercept as much of it as you can and use it for free in your garden. Believe me your plants will prefer it to mains tap water (if you do have to use tap water to water your plants, let it stand in buckets or watering cans for a day or so before using it if you can).
Don’t forget your own water needs either! I remember as a kid when the local water company told us the tap water was not safe to drink for 24hrs, we struggled a little as there was not so much bottled water around as there is today. Similarly, those people severely affected by the flooding a few years ago had water problems of a different kind. In some areas the amount of flood water caused the sewers to back up, contaminating the drinking water. The authorities responded by placing water bowsers on the streets, however some fool decided it would be fun to urinate in them! (I don’t know if they were ever caught but I sincerely hope they were!) The morale of this story is to maybe be prepared with a contingency plan in case your water supply is compromised. Bottled water that you store, then use and replace periodically would be a sensible preparation.
Water. The most precious of liquids.
So we’ve talked about how debt is bad and it needs to be killed off. We’ve highlighted the need to minimise your Tax footprint, and we’ve provoked a bit of thought about where we spend our hard earned cash.
So let’s say for the sake of argument that we’ve cleared all our debt (or at least we’ve got to the point where we have a reasonable level of mortgage which we are taking steps to pay off early), we’re not wasting money overpaying our taxes, and we’re ensuring that we aren’t squandering our hard earned cash on trivial purchases.
SO WHAT DO WE DO WITH THAT SURPLUS INCOME WE’VE CREATED?
Well, a valid use would be to use it to help pay the mortgage off early, because that is the best option for financial freedom, however, lets park that point for a second.
Our country, many of the individuals in it, and many other countries in the world are in a bad way financially right now. That is mostly down to overspending (often on things we don’t need or can’t afford), and a lack of financial reserves (that’s savings to you and me). We’ve also not got a huge number of tangible assets to fall back on, as successive governments have squandered them. Perhaps the biggest crime is when between 1999 and 2002, the then Chancellor, Gordon Brown sold off half of Britains gold reserves at a time when Gold prices were at a low point. This isn’t the only example, but it’s certainly one that stings when you think about it.
That’s an unforgiveable situation to be in and one that as an individual committed to Self Sufficiency, you must take action to resolve. You need two things: Savings, and tangible assets. Lets look at some of these:
Immediate Emergency Fund – “Cash on Hand”:
I strongly believe you need a cash emergency fund that you can get your hands on physically. Whether you store it in a safe, lockbox, or take other means to secure it, you need to have a small fund of cash (£500 – £1000) that you can get to without having to go to a cash machine.
Long Term Emergency Fund – “Cash Emergency Fund”:
This is what a lot of financial advisors and virtually every authority on finance will have told you in the past. Make sure you have cash savings equivalent to three months income stored somewhere where you can use it if you have an emergency. I’ve modified this slightly. I think you need at least six months equivalent of your essential expenditure in a bank account that you can get to if you need it.
Savings:
These are your normal long term savings that you need to build and nurture. If you haven’t used your ISA allowance, then wrap them in an ISA to protect the interest from the taxman, but keep a close eye on interest rates as ISA rates may not always keep pace with savings account rates.
Pensions:
I suggest you have one, and I suggest you pay into it, but DO NOT PUT ALL YOUR SAVINGS INTO YOUR PENSION. As soon as you put your hard earned money into a pension, you lock it away until retirement. What happens if you need some of that money in the meantime? That said, a pension should be part of your Self Sufficient savings and investment portfolio. They can be tax efficient, and if you are currently working, and your employer pays in, they can be very worthwhile. With annuity rates as they have been recently, and given the state of the economy I have genuine concerns as to whether they will be a good method of saving for retirement, and therefore I think it is important to have some of your income invested in a pension, and some in other investments.
Precious Metals:
I think it makes sense to have some of your funds invested in Gold and Silver. Both offer a hedge against inflation and given the fragility of the global economic environment, and the potential for rampant inflation in the not too distant future, anything that protects your wealth against erosion due to inflation is a good thing. The ratio of the prices between Gold and Silver is out of kilter at the moment meaning either Gold is overpriced, or silver is underpriced. The reality is probably a mixture of the two, meaning it’s not a good time to buy gold, but it could be an excellent time to pick up silver here and there. You can invest in precious metal funds, mining stocks, or physical gold and silver. Physical precious metal that you control is the best bet in my book.
Land/Property:
For me this is the ultimate investment. If you own rural land, particularly if it has a property on it that you can live in, then this is perhaps the best asset you can have. It is a finite commodity. We aren’t going to magic up more of the Earths surface than we already have. In the future land will become increasingly valuable, and land that can produce food of some sort will become more difficult to purchase.
Other assets:
There are other tangible assets that you can invest in, and I would encourage you to consider what these are. Think of things that you can purchase and use, and which hold their value, or which pay you back in some way on an ongoing basis. In many ways your garden could be considered an investment, particularly if it contains perennial plants that produce food for you. Items you can buy as a hedge against future inflation also count. Don’t go mad here however. This is NOT an excuse to spend. Think carefully about whether you are “spending” or “investing”.
This isn’t an exhaustive list, but it covers the major points that are worth investigating further. An important piece of advice that we’ve all heard is “don’t put all your eggs in one basket”. I think that is as valuable a piece of advice now as it has ever been. Try to diversify your savings and investments. Don’t put everything in a pension. Don’t leave everything in cash. DO TAKE CONTROL OF YOUR OWN FINANCIAL FUTURE.
We’re back after a short break, but what on earth happened to the weather? When it starts to rain, after a week of scorching hot sun you know British summertime has arrived!
Our three part series on “Ten practical steps to becoming more self sufficient” generated a lot of interest, but still no comments! So far, we’ve had one comment posted, and based on our site analytics and the use of our contact form, we know we have an increasing number of readers. We can only conclude you are a shy crowd! C’mon get involved! The more we talk, the more we all learn!
In particular, and based on feedback, point 28 “Alternative Investments” generated significant interest and therefore I thought we’d explore self sufficiency from a financial angle in more detail.
As I’ve said several times, if you want to be remotely self sufficient you need to clear your debt. I think that message has got across loud and clear.
You also need to legally minimise your tax footprint. We’ll deal with that another time.
Right now I want to share something very important with you.
This is probably one of the most important financial things I’ve learned. I learned it at an early age and my daughter (she’s nine) has already learned it. Despite that, we all forget this simple lesson and therefore it’s time for a reminder. It is powerful…yet simple, incredibly important…yet obvious. I really hope this article begins to make you ask yourself some questions, and if you do that, and are brutally honest with yourself, this may be the most important article you read in your life!
Here’s a statement that will put you in the right mindset:
“It’s not the person who has the most income who is necessarily the wealthiest. It is the person who hangs on to the biggest proportion of his or her income”.
Let’s explore that a moment.
As people’s income increases, typically so do their outgoings. Quite often this is because we spend our money on “treats” for one reason: “because we deserve it after all our hard work”.
Really? Do we? Do we REALLY deserve to spend our hard earned income on a piece of clothing (sorry ladies), or an electronic gizmo (men, you know this is you!) with a limited life? Think about it. Do we REALLY?
NOW THINK ABOUT IT AGAIN!
NOW THINK REALLY HARD ABOUT IT YET AGAIN!
The average person spends the majority of their time each week working. That is lost time, spent on a worthy endeavour, but it’s probably not something you’d choose to do unless you are one of the enlightened and lucky people who is living their dream, and is passionate about what they do! Good for you, if this is you! We’re all trying to get to where you are.
So for those hours spent, you get paid an amount of money. Your job over the next month is to work out how you can hold on to as much of that money as possible. This is your escape route. This is your opportunity to work towards a happier self sufficient life.
Why are you doing this? Well, every pound you save is a seed. It has an opportunity to be invested in something that can provide you with freedom and a benefit for the rest of your life.
How much does that Starbucks coffee cost? How long does it last?
THINK ABOUT IT.
Preservation is the key to storing your produce until you need to use it. There are many ways to process your produce, such as pickling, smoking, and freezing, however one that seems to have lost it’s popularity in the UK, but which is well used in other parts of the world is dehydrating.
Dehydrating is the slow drying of your produce to remove the moisture in order to allow for better preservation and long term storage.
This is a simple process, however there are a few rules to learn, and a number of techniques to master in order to be successful.
One of the best resources for learning about dehydrating is Dehydrate2Store.com. Tammy who created this site and the associated YouTube channel knows pretty much all there is to know about dehydrating and long term storage of food.
I need to declare my limitations in this area: Having always loved, but felt equally challenged by seasonality, I thought I ought to make some attempt at learning the art of preservation. One of the tasks I’ve set myself is to learn how to dehydrate. I’ve learned a lot from watching Tammy’s videos not least of which is that the quality of your equipment is crucial. To this end I recently purchased an Excalibur dehydrator, which from my research I believe is THE dehydrator. I fully intend to practice with this piece of kit in order to perfect the technique.
I encourage you to check out Tammy’s site and in particular her YouTube videos which contain a wealth of knowledge and experience concerning dehydrating. I will document my progress and post details of the results!
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