JOHN Champagne is a familiar figure around Bega; apart from anything else, his hat makes him stand out in the crowd.
But it hasn’t always been that way.
When he was 21-years-old he was a suit and tie man, in and out of a company car driving around Melbourne with “short back and sides flogging plastics”.
He did that for five years.
Hard to believe?
Well, perhaps.
But it was shortly afterwards when John found his real calling.
He had travelled overseas with his wife Sharon, then returned and began a gardening business, some of which was permaculture based.
“I’d always had an interest in it, but when I did a course at Chiltern in central Victoria everything changed for me,” he says.
He attributes his interest in different forms of agriculture to his father.
His parents were Flemish, from the northern part of Belgium, and John was born in the Congo where his father worked in agriculture.
When independence came to that country, John said his dad flipped a coin between Australia and Canada.
“It came down Australia and we found ourselves in Ouyen in the heart of the mallee country in Victoria,” he says.
“We went from the jungles of the Congo to the desert of the mallee.”
After a year or so the family moved to Talangi in the Dandenong ranges where his father worked on the potato research farm for seven years.
John remembers his father becoming involved in the biodynamic agriculture scene and when he was ostracised because of his then “alternative” beliefs, the family moved to Canberra where John’s dad became heavily involved in tree planting schemes.
He was also one of the founding members of the Canberra Organic Growers Association.
After his course, John says he knew that Melbourne wasn’t the place for him, Sharon and his young family.
“We were dreaming a bit then,” he said.
“We wanted to build a mud brick house, grow our own food and get back to grass–roots.”
They planned a move out of the city after selling the gardening business and house.
However, a friend, Vries Gravestein, rang and asked him to run the permaculture exhibition at the Melbourne Show.
Although overawed, John did it and was helped out by a group called Permaculture Melbourne.
One man was involved in charity work so John joined the team.
But after 12 months doing volunteer work and having a “daily grind with no pay and a wife and kids at home” John made the move to Bega in 1992.
“We came here mainly because of the Mumbulla School as we wanted a Steiner education for the kids,” he says.
“And because land was cheap.”
John believes that permaculture is a framework for working on “all kinds of solutions” in life.
“People think it’s just about chooks and veggies and mud huts,” he says.
“But it’s a thinking tool; it’s about bringing together all the sciences like ecology, building, agriculture and many others.
“It’s about living within limits and bringing together all elements of life.
“It came from two words - permanent agriculture - but developed into permanent culture, with people realising you can’t have a sustainable agriculture if your culture isn’t sustainable.”
John said permaculutre is not all about self-sufficiency: “It’s not all about you – it’s about engaging your society as well.”
Which is one of the things that excites John about the Transition Town project.
“We can really make a difference in Bega,” he says.
“We can become a self-reliant region that meets many of its needs locally – which is what it was back in the 1920s and 30s.”
John works as a consultant on permaculture, teaching in Sydney, Apollo Bay and Canberra as well as locally.
He says he will continue to spread the permaculture word.
And the hat?
“I started wearing it because I didn’t like things dropping on my head,” he laughs.
“Now it just stays there.”
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