WWOOFing (Willing Workers On Organic Farms) is a great way to learn about sustainable living, to travel around a country, mix with the locals, develop networks with other WWOOFers and have an ‘intercultural eco experience’.
It works like an exchange WWOOFers volunteer their help to organic ‘host farms’ and in return receive food, accommodation and opportunities to learn about sustainable living and organic lifestyles.
Its easy to join, you just pay a small fee for a book which lists all the host farms in the area and then arrange your experiences with the places that interest you most.
I used the WWOOFing book to travel around the east coast of Australia for three months. There was a great variety of things to do – including hand pollinating fruit trees, cutting down banana stalks and spending time with a retired host who now has WWOOFers on his yacht!
For six weeks I stayed at a tropical fruit orchard in the Tablelands. Their main produce was custard apples, although they had a great big vege garden which fed the family and they had between 4-12 WWOOFers over the time I was there. Custard apples aren’t very good at self fertilising so we were taught how to collect the pollen and then how to paint it onto the flowers to ensure the next harvest was fruitful.
After a few hours of work we would load into the van and check out the local sites and events in the local community. One such occasion was a movie night in the community hall where everyone brought blankets and pillows then sat to watch the premiere of Lord of the Rings – complete with a pot luck desert at half time!
Another of my favourite memories was the bananas. Living in a tropical environment is not complete without banana palms and we always had stalks of bananas hanging in our living room (100-150 bananas ripening on each) - a never ending supply of my favourite fruit! Home made banana cake and banana ice cream were often on the menu :)
All in all I met heaps of really interesting people, learnt some great ideas about making a sustainable household and had a heap of fun doing it!
Id love to hear about anyone else’s WWOOFing experiences in New Zealand, or in other countries!
To find out more about WWOOFing log on to www.wwoofinternational.org.
Comments
Good on you, Tink. Glad you had a great time on your WWOOFing adventure.
I have never WWOOFed but I have met a lot of people from other countries who have come to New Zealand and are travelling around using the scheme. In fact my brother met his Canadian wife while she was WWOOFing here - and now they are married with a couple of kids!
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Submitted by Skyla on 4 December 2009 22:41:00
I am also a volunteer in a local organization for sustainability development based in Auckland. We never triend WWOOFing because we are only a year old and new to the world of sustainable development. We are working on some programs that will basically teach the comunities in Auckland. We make some research for programs through professional custom papers, journals and articles related to sustainability development. Luckily, there are some other groups and individuals who are willing to help us out. This year, we will try to join WWOOFing so that we could gain new information related to this. Thanks you for informing us. =)
Submitted by aliyaconan on 19 March 2010 15:11:14
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Submitted by aman on 8 May 2010 21:33:21
I´m listed on WWOOF Brazil that is part of a world-wide effort to promote the concept of organic farming, sustainable agriculture and responsible consumer habits. As part of this effort, host farms offer WWOOF members the opportunity to learn by doing. As a guest in a WWOOF farm my learning experience is being extremely useful for my current projects (otimização de sites, relogio de ponto, desentupidora, acompanhantes, lampadas, transportadora) and it´s based on participating in the daily chores of running the farm. In doing so, I can learn a variety of techniques employed by member farms including organic farming, Permaculture and Biodynamics. In addition to learning about organic farming, I could also learn about the local ecology and culture while getting to meet fun and interesting people.
Submitted by Marcossp on 20 May 2010 00:12:27
WWOOFing holidays is a fantastic way for particularly the fit, but I have experienced some mature people who actually used there experience to good use as a cook and housekeeping. It really works and has an added bonus of you living and sharing with people of different countries. Wonderful and a well regarded concept. I first heard of this scheme some 10 years ago.
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Submitted by RobertJames on 24 May 2010 20:46:30
All info there is great for everybody to know that Willing Workers On Organic Farms is a great way to learn about sustainable living, to travel around a country, mix with the locals, develop networks with other WWOOFers and have an ‘intercultural eco experience’. To me, I am happy to read and get useful news about this service.
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Submitted by lovely22 on 28 July 2010 20:32:19
This organization is very cool. A friend of mine did a 4-week volunteer job in a rural Korean village, and it was awesome that she had a choice of staying in 4 different ones, and was able to tour all of them for free. I've heard that Korea has the most purest colloids in the world! I'd like to see the operation in NZ, and hopefully get some time off work to do a "tour of duty"!
Submitted by DoraB on 28 August 2010 04:33:16
The best thing about WWOOFing is that you can fulfill your passion of touring different places while working for the development of a sustainable environment. It's really appreciable. Sydney Hotels
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