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LOCKDOWN Issue 2020
LO C A L E CO N O M Y
Local really is lekker, now MORE THAN EVER With the world on the brink of a new economic order brought on by Covid-19, some communities are already reaping the benefits of trading locally. What is happening in Chatsworth, writes Greg Ardé, might offer some pointers
M
ade in Chatsworth” is the label independent publisher Anivesh Singh gave to a mini-movement that relies on hyper-local micro-projects. It is a cottage industry for now, but it is a good illustration of what social commentator George Monbiot observed at the start of lockdown. He wrote an online piece entitled Zombie Love Story, about the horror films getting it all wrong. “Instead of turning us into flesh-eating zombies, the pandemic has turned millions of people into good neighbours.” As I recently wrote in www.newframe.com, some might say this warmth and co-operative ethos was always alive and well in Chatsworth. Made in Chatsworth predated the pandemic, but it seems a brilliant response to the global crisis that has upset supply chains and multinational monopolies.
Chatsworth was established in the 1950s to segregate South Africans of Indian origin who were forcibly relocated there. The area was a farm named Chatsworth by a Brit named Samuel Bennington, to commemorate an area near Derbyshire in England. Former academic and author, Kiru Naidoo, whose family was moved there from the Magazine Barracks in Somsteu Road, wrote the book Made In Chatsworth under publisher Anivesh Singh’s Micromega imprint in January. One reviewer described the book as “located in the ‘kasi stories’ genre pioneered by Eskia Mphahlele, Bloke
