More than just milk and honey

We went to the Geoscience Australia open day a few weeks ago. From what I gathered, these are the folks who are mapping out Australia. This includes crazy things like flying over every bit of Australia checking magnetivity (or something like that) to figure out what rocks are underground and prevent unnecessary exploratory mining. They also have a large room that is constantly monitoring for earthquakes and tsunamis. And they also seem to set out to have the best rock collection ever which is on display in case anyone is interested. But really it doesn't matter that they do interesting things, because what I really want to say is that they gave us a free land use of Australia map which I was overjoyed about and now we stare at it while we eat our meals. And our dinner conversations have become much more geographic. And this map has reinforced something I was already impressed with about Australia.

Australia is the driest continent in the world. It has many deserts. And after studying our map extensively we can also vouch for the fact that it has a lot of semi-arid areas with shrubs. In fact, seventy percent of the continent can be classified as arid or semi-arid. While there are interior lakes many are salt lakes. And so the statistics and reputation really make it seem like a big barren country. And yet it is not at all.

Australia produces an incredibly vast and diverse set of crops and is nearly self sufficient providing for 93% of the daily Australian food supply (yes I am just going to quote statistics and not reference them because I feel like it). The range in latitude means that everything from sugarcane and mangoes to cherries and olives are produced in abundance. Those niceties of life - wine, cheese, truffles, olive oil, sugar, beer, cocoa/chocolate, nuts - yup we've got them locally in abundance. Fruits - pretty much all of it from mangosteens to currants and apples. Grains might use up a good percentage of the fresh water supply but check. Cattle and dairy superabundance. Seafood aplenty including mass production of seaweed and a high potential for whaling if it ever comes back into style. Salt - if only it were still equivalent to money Australia would be dominating the world economic scene. Even non edible resources like electricity are plentiful thanks to solar power. Really it might be easier to create a list of things not produced in Australia. I think it really is admirable how plentiful and self-sufficient a country this is - especially as we move into mango season.

Land Use of Australia

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