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I love suburbia not for what it is, but
for what it could be. While most other houses on my street have grass
lawns, my yard sprouts zucchinis, tomatoes, pomegranates, kale, spinach,
apples, figs, guavas, almonds, garlic, onion, strawberries, and more.
Over 500 plant species all in all. We grow more than 3000 pounds of food
per year on a plot of land the size of a basketball court—enough fruits
and vegetables to feed my family of four year-round. Our house is part
of a growing global movement of people involved in urban farming.
The simple act of planting a garden can shape issues like economics, health, and politics at the same time because food is an essential focal point of human activity. As the urban farming movement grows, here are five ways that it will transform our world
1. Renewed local economies. Local neighbor-to-neighbor commerce generally doesn’t happen in our communities. Residential areas almost never include common spaces where community exchanges might happen. Likewise, because selling homemade bread to your neighbors is illegal in most areas, the law discourages community commerce, and instead encourages you to purchase from the supermarket chain.
In my own community, the urban farming movement has reinvigorated local commerce. Instead of buying oranges, I now trade pumpkin for oranges from my neighbor’s tree. If urban farming continued to grow, it would cause a massive and positive economic disruption by introducing local food production that would compete with the corporate mainstream on price, quality, convenience, and level of service.
2. Environmental stewardship. Industrial agriculture is a major source of fossil fuel pollution. Petrochemicals are used to fertilize, spray, and preserve food. Plastics made from oil are used to package the food, and gasoline is used to transport food worldwide. Urban farming unplugs us from oil by minimizing the transport footprint and using organic cultivation methods.
While industrial agriculture often maneuvers to avoid paying for environmental externalities, urban farmers directly bear the ecological costs of their actions. This makes urban farmers better stewards of their land because they draw their nutrition from it. Rather than using chemicals that destroy soil biology, urban farming culture stresses sustainable organic techniques that enrich the topsoil.
3. A focus on local politics. Urban farming makes it clearer and easier for people to be involved in local politics by bringing issues that directly affect neighborhoods to the fore. Local regulations become far more relevant to the day-to-day life of a person attempting to cultivate their own food than most issues normally discussed on CNN. The growth of urban farming has already resulted in large-scale legal pushes like the California Cottage Food Act, which will allow people to legally sell certain homemade goods like jams and breads. Other neighborhood issues such as the raising of chickens, beekeeping for the production of honey, or the chlorination of water are already in the sights of urban farmers and environmentalists alike.
4. A revolution of health and nutrition. Increased awareness about the negative health effects of food from the industrial food chain is itself a big reason why urban farmers grow their own food. When you feed your produce to your family, you’re less likely to douse it in poisons. Local food has more freshness, flavor, and nutrient retention because it goes through less transportation and processing. As the urban farming movement grows, it will mean more accessibility to nutritious local food and more time spent doing the healthy physical work of gardening. This could result in less obesity, less chronic disease, and decreased healthcare spending.
5. A flowering of community interaction. Urban farming is a lifestyle inherently centered on community. Growing food is, after all, a cooperative effort. In my own community, I see that the knowledge of how and what to grow is exchanged, seeds are swapped, labor is shared, and the harvest is traded. As urban farming grows, a stronger interdependence within communities is likely to result as local food systems bring more community interaction into people’s daily lives.
The most important movement of our time. Although there are many other notable initiatives today, the influence of urban farming is uniquely widespread because more people live in cities than rural areas and food is a central necessity that affects everything at once. The seeds of change are already being planted in homes like mine across the world. For these seeds to grow and blossom, we need to demand more local food so that the market for urban-grown produce expands. We also need to put pressure on our legal system to allow easier local trade and more local food production.
Imagine if we grew food instead of grass. Every community is a local food economy waiting to come to life. The answer to climate change, the health crisis, and the recession economy is right outside your door. I’ll meet you at the garden fence.
Photos courtesy of Ro Kumar, editor of localblu.com, a blog covering urban farming and sustainability.
The simple act of planting a garden can shape issues like economics, health, and politics at the same time because food is an essential focal point of human activity. As the urban farming movement grows, here are five ways that it will transform our world
1. Renewed local economies. Local neighbor-to-neighbor commerce generally doesn’t happen in our communities. Residential areas almost never include common spaces where community exchanges might happen. Likewise, because selling homemade bread to your neighbors is illegal in most areas, the law discourages community commerce, and instead encourages you to purchase from the supermarket chain.
In my own community, the urban farming movement has reinvigorated local commerce. Instead of buying oranges, I now trade pumpkin for oranges from my neighbor’s tree. If urban farming continued to grow, it would cause a massive and positive economic disruption by introducing local food production that would compete with the corporate mainstream on price, quality, convenience, and level of service.
2. Environmental stewardship. Industrial agriculture is a major source of fossil fuel pollution. Petrochemicals are used to fertilize, spray, and preserve food. Plastics made from oil are used to package the food, and gasoline is used to transport food worldwide. Urban farming unplugs us from oil by minimizing the transport footprint and using organic cultivation methods.
While industrial agriculture often maneuvers to avoid paying for environmental externalities, urban farmers directly bear the ecological costs of their actions. This makes urban farmers better stewards of their land because they draw their nutrition from it. Rather than using chemicals that destroy soil biology, urban farming culture stresses sustainable organic techniques that enrich the topsoil.
3. A focus on local politics. Urban farming makes it clearer and easier for people to be involved in local politics by bringing issues that directly affect neighborhoods to the fore. Local regulations become far more relevant to the day-to-day life of a person attempting to cultivate their own food than most issues normally discussed on CNN. The growth of urban farming has already resulted in large-scale legal pushes like the California Cottage Food Act, which will allow people to legally sell certain homemade goods like jams and breads. Other neighborhood issues such as the raising of chickens, beekeeping for the production of honey, or the chlorination of water are already in the sights of urban farmers and environmentalists alike.
4. A revolution of health and nutrition. Increased awareness about the negative health effects of food from the industrial food chain is itself a big reason why urban farmers grow their own food. When you feed your produce to your family, you’re less likely to douse it in poisons. Local food has more freshness, flavor, and nutrient retention because it goes through less transportation and processing. As the urban farming movement grows, it will mean more accessibility to nutritious local food and more time spent doing the healthy physical work of gardening. This could result in less obesity, less chronic disease, and decreased healthcare spending.
5. A flowering of community interaction. Urban farming is a lifestyle inherently centered on community. Growing food is, after all, a cooperative effort. In my own community, I see that the knowledge of how and what to grow is exchanged, seeds are swapped, labor is shared, and the harvest is traded. As urban farming grows, a stronger interdependence within communities is likely to result as local food systems bring more community interaction into people’s daily lives.
The most important movement of our time. Although there are many other notable initiatives today, the influence of urban farming is uniquely widespread because more people live in cities than rural areas and food is a central necessity that affects everything at once. The seeds of change are already being planted in homes like mine across the world. For these seeds to grow and blossom, we need to demand more local food so that the market for urban-grown produce expands. We also need to put pressure on our legal system to allow easier local trade and more local food production.
Imagine if we grew food instead of grass. Every community is a local food economy waiting to come to life. The answer to climate change, the health crisis, and the recession economy is right outside your door. I’ll meet you at the garden fence.
Photos courtesy of Ro Kumar, editor of localblu.com, a blog covering urban farming and sustainability.
PoorRichard, this is great!
ReplyDeleteBeginning last year, we decided to tear up around 30% of an acre of sunny front lawn for a garden. We didn't ask for anyone's permission or opinion since our town has a 'right to farm' ordinance and no one can stop you. Sure it looked awful for a few months while we built the infrastructure but in as little as the first year, the neighbors took curious notice. We did our best to make it look as nice as possible and that had an impact. Everyone was impressed by how quickly it took shape.
We had an amazing first year so we gave out surplus veggies for free and that was a kicker. We've now met everyone within a short jogging distance and inspired some neighbors to tear up chunks of their lawns too. Even some McMansion-ites from a nearby subdivision got into it and greet us regularly driving by in their giant Escalades. The weird old guy around the corner in his tiny red Fiero stops for a chat almost daily in the summer which cannot be ignored. Seems like he's loosing his marbles, but he's harmless.
We are on the quietest road in the area so everyone jogs and walks their dogs on our street. We basically trade strains, stories, advice, status updates and surplus during the season. Emphasis must be given to how we started this only a year ago.
We also got hit pretty hard by Sandy and having been better acquainted with the neighborhood made the disaster seem less acute. We could all share and laugh at the power being out for yet another week and help each other clear out driveways of blown down trees rather than stress about it.
It's strange for us since my wife and I are very shy (essentially hermits) but it's amazing how far toward bond building a little generosity and good will with simple veggie garden goes. And I mean just a smidge of simple cost-less gestures. An important trend indeed and it's so quick and easy to accomplish that literally anyone can do it whom's town / city busy bodies don't interfere.
Cheers PR and much luck strengthening your web of super-local trade and community as well. It's much more fun than I'd ever have suspected.
I recently found your blog!! This topic is close to home for me as I love farming and I am seriously concerned about where modern agriculture is leading the world. I am firmly set in my beliefs. People in general taking an interest is a step in a positive direction. My farm is reasonably well environmental I use as little herbicides ect as possible and my main tractors burn propane wich emits much less pollution. Plust is more or less equals costs if burning diesel. The machines we need are quickly being destroyed in this new world which is buried in debt. I am a college student and I also study economics and fiscal matters. If things don't change we are in serious trouble. I could go on and on about this.
ReplyDeleteIT'S NATURES POETRY IN MOTION.
ReplyDeletewhat if :
How wonderful to have a premises -
In town & up the street & around the corner -
Solar Powered - Rain Water Derived -
Organic Hydroponic SALAD GREENS -
You sit down to lunch at your local eatery, knowing that the green & red & yellow stuff on your plate smothered in delicious, organic dressing, was just picked - 5 minutes from where you are.
&/or you take your shopping basket for a walk around to the neighborhood & "buy while it is still growing" vegetables for dinner that night.
Anal retention is a disease & the community spirit is the cure.