The instantly recognisable host of ABC TV show Gardening Australia, Costa (he says that’s how everybody addresses him) has an almost zealotry drive when it comes to producing food.

Perhaps he can point to his Greek grandparents.

“My grandfather was a market gardener and they believed in economy — so while you don’t need a lot, it’s how you economise, my grandmother used to say,” Costa said.

“She came out (to Australia) with nothing and she built it up.

“My grandfather would grow it and she managed a little shop.

“We’re talking about a woman building a business and being a businesswoman in the late 1940s and 1950s — that was not a woman’s place.

“Growing up, my grandmother did not want to know where I was going, she wanted to know what I was going to eat.

“That’s the difference; you don’t just eat to live, you live to eat as well.”

Much of what his grandparents taught him as a child was reinforced when he went to live in Europe after graduating with a degree in landscape architecture from the University of NSW.

“The thing I loved about living in Europe is that when apricots are on then it’s apricots week and all the menus have apricots on them or whatever is in abundance or whatever the week is (named after),” he said.

“It is symbolic and about celebration.

“We’ve lost that, because you can get a mango, for example, all year and people don’t care. But people are now realising that their food matters and because you’ve got more access to information you’ve got a generation that can access that information quickly and they’re not being sold the dump and they are asking questions and they want to know more.”

Costa believes growing food can help contribute to a better society by helping people alleviate stress, becoming more aware of their environment, growing self-esteem and building stronger communities by coming together through concepts such as community gardens.

The progress in schools is pleasing.

“What I see as I go around the country, and this excites me no end, is that at the moment I’m going to schools and you have a school captain, a vice captain, a house captain, a sports captain and now I’m seeing in a lot of schools, a sustainability captain,” he said.