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An urban farmer ‘changemaker’ in India

Linked by Michael Levenston


Dr. B.N. Vishwanath. Photo by Charles Kothary.

‘Oota from your Thota’, which in Kannada means ‘food from your garden’

By Divya Sreedharan
The Hindu
Oct 13, 2012

Excerpt:

In the mid 1990s, Dr. B.N. Vishwanath, a gardening enthusiast went public with his passion. Grow greens on your terraces and your balconies, he urged his fellow Bangaloreans. Not many listened. Bangalore, then, was a sleepy city of sprawling bungalows and well-tended gardens. As the city grew, the bungalows disappeared and space began to be measured in square feet. What Dr. Vishwanath said all those years ago finally made sense.

Today, the agriculturist is considered one of the pioneers of urban farming in India. Founding trustee of the Garden City Farmers Trust (GCFT), his message is the same: “Eat what you can grow in your garden” or Oota from your Thota (OfyT).

“At organic gardening workshops, we tell participants to set up RWH systems and convert their kitchen waste into compost. That reduces their carbon footprint. And we tell them to buy seeds only for the very first time and thereafter, to grow their own,” Dr. Vishwanath says. Now, seeds of interest in OfyT are being sown in neighbouring cities such as Chennai, Hyderabad and Thiruvanathapuram.

Bangalore being an IT city, OfyT is growing thanks to innumerable blogs, web sites and the GCFT Facebook page. Two former techies in particular, Meera K. and Vincent Subramaniam, have played a prominent role in spreading the word as founder-co-editors of Citizen Matters, a Bangalore-specific community news platform. They are gardening enthusiasts too. Meera has a small terrace garden. Vincent has fruit trees and a kitchen garden.

OfyT came into being as a workshop/exhibition in August 2011, as part of the Kitchen Gardens International Day celebrations. Five editions have been held since. The next OfyT event will be in held Bangalore in November 2012.

Read the complete article here.

Also see: Gardening in the Garden City. And A hobby which can beat price rise.

2 comments

1 Vishwas { 10.16.12 at 9:33 am }

I admit we all need to join hands to change Bangalore and need to do every bit possible. Bangalore is not the same it used to be a decade ago.

I have attended this workshop and its a different thing we learn. I urge every one to just attend this workshop once.

Thanks Sir BNV for seeding the seed in us for gardening!

2 v.s.vijayakumar { 11.27.12 at 4:42 am }

Dear Mr.B.N.Viswanath,
Sir i saw your GCFT article in BLORE MIRROR PAPER today dated 27- 11- 12 & i am much interested in doing the roof garden at my house measuring 40 by 30 . can i have your contact no. so that i can contact you for furthur clarifications and to start up ( roof -garden ) the same at my residence.
I AM EAGERLY AWAITING TO HEAR FROM YOUR END.
Thanking you, Yours Faithfully,
V.S.VIJAYAKUMAR
9844738754

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