An art group called Fallen Fruit promotes the idea of public fruit trees for general consumption by all. But on a trip to Madrid to plant trees, the government refused their intervention, saying that trees were architecture for the city, not food.
Bite-It
February 2010
A C.I.P. Film
A group of Katimavik youth volunteers set out into North Vancouver and Vancouver to find out some answers about environmental initiatives on the subject of food security. They interviewed Mark Bomford, UBC Farm; Emanuel Langlois, Katimivik Participant; Heather Johnstone, Edible Gardens; Michael Levenston and Sharon Slack, City Farmer; Chef Scott Rowe, Salvation Army; Nicole Robbins, Organics@Home; Melanie ter Borg and Karen Morton, ecourbia.
Commonwealth Orchards Project- Glasgow. Photo by Local Action on Food
Urban orchards plan starting to bear fruit
By MARK McLAUGHLIN and MICHAEL BLACKLEY
Edinburgh News
01 March 2010
It has planted the seed of an idea which has the potential to blossom across Edinburgh.
The unlikely creation of a fruit orchard in one of the most deprived areas of the city is set to be followed by projects city-wide.
The city council-backed initiative could see school grounds, parks, allotments and even back greens used for growing fruit
The Evening News told last year how a community initiative had led to an orchard with apple, pear, plum and cherry trees being created in Wester Hailes.
Now council staff are working with two separate organisations to investigate more sites.
Mark Turley, director of the services for communities department, said: "The aim is to provide a range of managed orchard sites for the benefit of local communities. A range of council staff are advising and assisting with back green development, and also with the planting of fruiting species of trees and bushes."
One of the organisations involved is the Scottish Children's Orchard, which has piloted a scheme in Glasgow. Over the last three years it has established a network of people interested in developing Edinburgh projects.
Chairman John Hancox said: "We've run a lot of workshops explaining the context of what we're trying to do. We've planted school orchards, such as one at Ferryhill Primary School, as well as other orchards for local community groups.
"We've also done work with the Botanics, the Edinburgh Mela multicultural festival, an apple day at the Scottish Parliament and planting in Craigmillar."
"The main aim of the project is to create 'fruitful cities', ideally with a fruit tree on every street that children can plant and watch grow. As the children grow the tree grows and they're able to watch its development, then bring their own children in the years to come and pick fruit from it.
"Part of the agenda is to try to get kids to realise that fruit grows on trees, and that freshly picked fruit always tastes better. It changes their attitude towards fruit and gives them the benefit of the fruit's nutrition. It's also about getting people active and having a stake in the local environment.
"I planted a tree in George Square in Glasgow and every time I walk past it I take a great deal of pride in my achievement. I want the people of Edinburgh to have a similar sense of achievement, and to one day walk past a tree they've planted and say, 'I did that'."
See Scottish Children's Orchard website here.
See Orchards for the 21st century. Scotland's fruit orchards have largely disappeared, yet John Hancox, Director of the Children's Orchard, believes orchards will have a new and vital place in our future.
How can we support local business owners who want to make bright green changes? One of our favorite techniques: The CarrotMob.
Using social networks, CarrotMobs coordinate with the store and each other to show up and make massive purchases to reward the business's proactive green steps. In Seattle, for example, a CarrotMob arranged a deal with the Pike Pub & Brewery. On Earth Day, the CarrotMob showed up for food and drinks. In return, Pike Pub put 25 percent of all sales back into providing a mini-energy retrofit and other improvements for the location.
A great idea -- a mob of people coming together for the collective good. So why isn't that concept applied elsewhere?
Well, time has now come to introduce Crop Mob - a group of young, nomadic farmers who partner with local, sustainable farms for a days worth of volunteer efforts.
According to Cropmob.org:
"Crop mob is primarily a group of young, landless, and wannabe farmers who come together to build and empower communities by working side by side. Crop mob is also a group of experienced farmers and gardeners willing to share their knowledge with their peers and the next generation of agrarians. The membership is dynamic, changing and growing with each new mob event."
In four days since the New York Times coverage of a Crop Mob event at Okfuskee Farm in Silk Hope, North Carolina, social media outlets have been blowing up with coverage. A recent twitter post, for example, highlights the success of the mob, and the eagerness by folks to get back in touch with the land: Holy Cow! 90+ rsvps for edible earthscapes mob tomorrow.
And thanks to the original mobsters, other cities such as Seattle, Wash., Atlanta, Ga., and Madison, Wisc., now have a central online presence to connect wannabe mobsters with volunteer opportunities on local farms.
What is great about this effort lies in the connections being made between those involved. Farms receive extra hands to help out in the fields, and volunteers take away knowledge on sustainable farming practices. With the average age of today's farmer on the rise, crop mobs exemplify simple, unique ways to help on ways to diversify the field of agriculture by intimately involving the next generation of farmers.
Photo credit: Flickr/heacphotos, Creative Commons license.
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(Posted by Sean Conroe in Food and Farming at 11:27 AM)
Activists in Seattle have created a community garden on empty land to help provide food for the city's needy.
Photo by Erika Schultz/ The Seattle Times
Becky Warner (center, with tiller), a former software engineer, works with Alleycat Acres volunteers at a plot of land the group is developing into a neighborhood-focused urban farm on Beacon Hill. Warner is pursuing a career change into agriculture.
Alleycat Acres, a new urban-farming collective that ultimately hopes to turn bits of unused land into food sources for needy Seattle residents, kicked off its efforts on a plot across from Beacon Hill's Jefferson Golf Course.
By Marc Ramirez
Feb 28, 2010
Seattle Times
The seeds were planted with enthusiasm, sweat and bright-eyed optimism. Task by task on a sunny springlike Sunday, volunteers stepped up on a plot of land across from Beacon Hill's Jefferson Golf Course.
Someone to help build a retaining wall? Check. Someone to smooth over beds of composted soil? Check.
"Who wants to man the rototiller?" asked Scott MacGowan of Alleycat Acres, a fledgling urban farm collective with a simple mission: to turn unused city spaces into gardens providing nourishment for needy local residents.
More hands shot up, and before long, the mostly 20-something crew members were in the mud, preparing this rectangular knoll overlooking Lake Washington in the distance for its eventual rebirth as an urban farm.
"If we can find vacant lots, why not put urban gardens in them and get food to people?" said Sean Conroe, coordinator, or "lead alleycat," of the 11-member, nonprofit collective brought together by green-minded professional interests.
The Beacon Hill site is the first of what Alleycat Acres hopes will be many such volunteer-run gardens throughout Seattle, mostly in areas whose residents lack access to healthy produce. The effort is among a growing urban-farming movement nationwide, including Seattle, where city officials have named 2010 "the year of urban agriculture."
