During the 1970s, the UK organic movement was revitalised by a generation of young radicals. Influenced by Rachel Carson, Fritz Schumacher and John Seymour, and by the 1973–4 fuel crisis, they sought an ecologically viable alternative to large-scale farming and market-gardening. Their commitment generally exceeded their practical knowledge, and they endured considerable hardship for the sake of their principles. Many fell by the wayside, but the survivors are now the respected elders of a movement whose high profile is the result of their work over more than forty years.
Iain Tolhurst – Tolly, as he is generally known – is one of the most remarkable members of the ‘Seventies Generation’. Unlike his chiefly middle-class contemporaries, he is from a working-class background: he is a builder and a gifted woodworker. Back to Earth is a selection of the many articles he has written since 1981. From them, we learn of his love of the natural world and of the experiences as a farm worker that led him to question agri-business methods. His employer, though, let him use half an acre of land for organic vegetable and fruit production. Attending a Soil Association conference in 1977 inspired him to gamble on his powers of self-sufficiency, and the following year he and his wife Lin moved to a bleak holding in Cornwall. They lived in a caravan, planted trees, improved the soil and became the UK's first organically-certified strawberry growers.
He was active in the Organic Growers’ Association (founded 1980), which provided an alternative to the Soil Association for those concerned with the practicalities of food production and marketing. The OGA was swallowed by the Soil Association in the mid-1990s, but the Association's subsequent swoon into the arms of consumerism left growers feeling ignored. Tolly explains the re-emergence of the OGA in 2006, as the Organic Growers’ Alliance.
In 1988 he moved to the Oxfordshire estate of Julian Rose and took over its derelict walled garden, eventually turning it into the much-visited showpiece it is today. He succeeded in establishing a stock-free system, proving wrong those who maintain that animal wastes are essential to organic methods.
Iain Tolhurst writes, as one would expect, from a producer's viewpoint – sceptical about ‘Joe Public’, with his expectation of cheap food on demand, and about the organic movement's niche within the supermarket system. He has actively promoted direct marketing, and describes the commercial success of his Box Scheme.
Much of the book concerns the techniques of organic food production, set in the context of Tolly's thoughts on issues such as food waste, climate change, the weather (a favourite theme), agro-forestry, EU regulations and his travels to other countries. There is plenty of detailed advice for the practical grower. To the historian, the book offers an essential insight into the experiences of the Seventies Generation. Above all, it shows what it was actually like to be a dedicated grower, and it reminds those of us who consume organic food of the skill, adaptability and sheer self-discipline that go into its production.
