NINE months after beginning Loop:Frome’s mission to rethink our town’s resources, their international prize-winning film ‘Soilful’ was shown last week to businesses and partners at the Gallery at the Station.
Loop:Frome emerged when a passionate group of Fromies started asking what happens to food waste after it gets scraped off our plates and chopping boards?
The answer is that the town was leaking valuable nutrients via its discarded eggshells, potato peelings, coffee grounds and all manner of healthy by-products and leftovers. And so Loop:Frome was born, with a mission to redirect all this goodness from landfill and incineration back onto the town’s land in the form nutrient-rich Living Soil.
“Soilful is an inspirational, informative, and artistic film, melding music, visuals and composty goodness,” says the group. “Shot by the talented Eoghan McDonaugh from Habitus Insight, produced by Loop’s own Benjamin Still, and featuring animation from Robin Lane, the film had picked up the Best Short film Award only a few days before at The Climates film festival in Frome. This project can act as a springboard for expanding Loop’s work in soil health, circular economy and beyond.
“The screening event also served to bring together the wider family who provide the food ‘waste’: Lo Rapitenc, Hamper, Nook, Frama, Lungi Babas, Sweet Bee, Riverhouse and Edventure: alongside the owners of Frome’s first Compost Creation Station, built by Loop at the Medical Centre. We were also greatly pleased to have our funders Be the Earth present.
“Even more of an accomplishment for the Loop:Frome team, and this family of providers, is that lab analysis of the first Living Soil produced some of the best results ever seen: “….you had the full spectrum of the ‘beneficial aerobic soil food web’ present which included Fungi, Bacteria, Nematodes, Flagellates and Amoebae”.
“Each of the businesses were presented with the liveliest party bag ever – each gram of their Living Soil containing around 70,000 species of bacteria, 25,000 species of fungi and around half a million beneficial protozoa.
“Loop:Frome will now look at how best to distribute this soil-saving substance, which can act as a spectacular soil improver, and repair soils to reduce erosion and capture vast amounts of CO2.
“Soilful and our first batch of Living Soil is the foundation for a whole new expansion of Loop:Frome’s project. Moving forward there are plans to continue building more ‘Compost creation stations’, resulting in a network of regeneration hubs throughout Frome. We also have another Ridan composter on the cards, meaning more collections for more businesses, and lots more up our composty sleeves.”
To see the film and find out more visit www. loopfrome.org
Picture: One of Loop: Frome’s 100% electric cargo bikes (made in Frome by Cycles Maximus)
