The Himalayan farm in the Pennines

THE Pennine hills can be cruel, but one man is proving they can be tamed, with a little help and advice from Himalayan peasant farmers.

Anthropologist Ben Campbell, who teaches about sustainability in different cultures at Durham University, has spent 20 years studying and befriending the inhabitants of a tiny village called Thare, in the Rasuwa district of Nepal. He is now using the knowledge he has gathered there to transform a steep, windy hillside above Todmorden.

By installing windbreaks, building terraces and planting a combination of British and Himalayan crops, Ben Campbell has created his own version of the Nepalese hill farm. He is enjoying considerable success – the family is now self-sufficient in onions, potatoes and other vegetables.

When the Campbells arrived in Todmorden, Ben immediately began putting his thinking about indigenous agriculture into practice. "My experience with farmers in Nepal taught me how much altitude made a difference for successful growing in challenging places," he says. "I was intrigued how it would be in the Pennines."

He invited two peasant farmers from Nepal to help him landscape half-an-acre of his steep garden. It was the summer of 1998, one of the worst on record, but the Campbells and their visitors were undeterred. "At Todmorden Show they were absolutely amazed at the size of our livestock," says Ben.

"They loved the horse riding. They've been so kind and hospitable to me. I wanted to be able to return their generosity."

They created five terraces across a south-facing hillside, and enjoyed a summer of English life. "We're ritual friends, we've been through a ceremony of ritual kinship.

"Their children call me dad and that's reciprocated.

"People who call my friend grandfather call me grandfather. Because of this kinship bond you have to be hospitable."

By looking at the oak trees that grow on the site, the Nepalese advised what would grow at this altitude.

"They were very confident the land would be suitable for potatoes and yaks. These farmers know what to grow in unfavourable conditions, and that's the challenge."

In Nepal the hill terraces are watered by heavy monsoon rainfall. Their structure is simple, with a bund in the form of a low mud and stone wall holding in the soil and moisture.

Much like the Pennine winter, in the cold months the ground freezes every night. But unlike Pennine hill farmers, many Nepalese farmers are semi-nomadic, moving up, down and along the mountains as conditions change.

Ben's modified Himalayan hill terraces are supported by rough dry stone walls, and even a few breeze blocks. He gardens organically, double digging the inner edge of the terrace and adding compost and goat manure to improve soil fertility.

"My advice for these difficult conditions is to grow windbreaks and try to keep the sheep out. When I first got here it was a lot of work fencing and putting barbed wire round and planting trees for the windbreaks."

The first year was backbreaking. A year after his friends had returned to Nepal, Ben found himself struggling in sometimes appalling adverse weather conditions. "It all seemed very gloomy, and that only the slugs were enjoying it."

Support for the family came in the form of help and friendship from WWOOF – Worldwide Opportunities on Organic Farms. "Making new friends and hearing about their experiences helped us to realise how many people are doing something similar. You hear how people have found their way to growing food. We could have felt quite isolated but the WWOOFers gave us that social side. A lot of hard work has been done by me and by WWOOFers."

Cash-free work exchanges are vital to all farming cultures, he says. "In Africa there's a saying that you should welcome any stranger, give him a roof over his head and food for three days, and then hand him a hoe. It's not coming out of nowhere. How do farmers cope? Everybody needs help. That's cross-cultural."

The exchange should be fair, he adds. As well as his expertise in anthropology, gardening and goat husbandry, Ben offers organic food, access to hill walks and a warm welcome.

In return he expects a hard day's work. "As the original name suggests, Willing Workers on Organic Farms (the original WWOOF acronym] should be willing workers."

The Campbell family has extended the terraces and cultivated them with a five- year rotation of potatoes, roots, legumes, brassicas, and plants that are sensitive to frost. They have planted soft fruit and an orchard around the beds, and they keep goats on the hill above the terraces and chickens in the valley below.

"Twelve years ago there hadn't been much growing here. The previous owners had kept ponies and a few hens. Now Nepalese wheat is doing well here, and Tibetan naked barley – that's the one they make Tibetan medicine beer from.

"All the onion family do extremely well. Carrots and radishes seem to enjoy it a lot. Himalayan mustard greens is in heaven, it's found its Shangri La. And the salads are fantastic. My speciality is a homemade pesto from all the prolific herbs like marjoram, sorrel, parsley, sweet cecily, chives or garlic."

Mustard greens brought as seeds from Nepal are at home in Todmorden. Amaranth imported from Nepal was not a success but amaranth bought from catalogues was.

Another successful import has been the Himalayan turnip, a traditionally important crop in the Himalayas which, according to JK Rowling's Harry Potter stories, has magical powers.

"It's being inspired by what they grow and eat," says Ben who enjoys swapping plants at Calder Valley Organic Gardening Society. "We can use the turnip tops as a vegetable. In Nepal they love using greens. If they haven't got greens in the gardens they'll go in to the forest and emerge with armfuls of wild alternatives to spinach. They eat loads of nettles too."

Now the family enjoys a range of vegetables from the terraces. General maintenance of the beds takes an average of six hours a week. "It's very little land really, quarter to half an acre. But it's productive enough to always have something available to put together a meal from your own patch. And the freezer holds produce from the previous summer.

"People say this land is only good for sheep and cattle. That's the normal knee-jerk response from agricultural economists. It's something movements like Transition Towns and our own Incredible Edible Todmorden are helping to dispel."

CW 24/4/10