Category — europe

Forthcoming at: Agriculture in an Urbanizing Society – International Conference on Multifunctional Agriculture and Urban-Rural Relations The Netherlands 1 – 4 April 2012

By Nathali Lehmann Schumann and Michael Heasman
Global Nutrition and Health, Metropolitan University College
Copenhagen, Denmark

Abstract only:

This paper presents evidence on the policy challenges facing urban agriculture in the cities of Vancouver, New York, London and Copenhagen based on an analysis of relevant policy documents and in-depth interviews with experts in each city who are directly involved in the implementation of policy related to urban agriculture. Despite progress in each city, the research suggests the extent of the role of urban agriculture is not fully understood or defined and that it is rare to find stand-alone policy documents. Instead urban agricultural policies are usually embedded within wider policy initiatives such as on the environment, sustainability, planning or ‘green’ city policies.

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A brief glimpse of urban agriculture projects in Catalonia beginning at minute 18:25 of the film and ending at 20:40. Simply drag the slider button along to the chosen start time and press the play button.

From the film: Another Life Is Possible – Homage to Catalonia II
By Joana Conill, Manuel Castells and Àlex Ruiz

Catalonia, Spain comprises four provinces: Barcelona, Girona, Lleida, and Tarragona.

A documentary, a research project, a story of stories about the construction of a sustainable, solidary and decentralized economy. Weaving nets that overcome the individualization and the hierarchical division of work. Thousands of people every day all over the world. Here and now.

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Nikos Gavalas and Alexandra Tricha tend to their snail farm in Chios, Greece. Photo by Eirini Vourloumis.

The couple are joining with an exodus of Greeks who are fleeing to the countryside and looking to the nation’s rich rural past as a guide to the future.

By Rachel Donadio
New York Times
January 8, 2012

Excerpt:

At a troubled moment when the debt crisis has eroded the country’s recent economic gains — perhaps irrevocably — there is much debate about whether a return to the land or the sea is a step forward or backward.

Ms. Tricha knows where she stands. “My parents were from the countryside. They were farmers when they were young. I studied to avoid becoming a farmer. They were teachers. And then their daughter studied and then went back to being a farmer,” she said. Nevertheless, she added, “for me it’s like going forward, because I think we neglected the land.”

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Cartoon of a food productive house garden. Dig for Victory campaign. June, 1943. Source: Spartacus, 2011.

Using Social Practice Theory To Assess How Transition Norwich Can Upscale Household Food Gardening In The City Of Norwich

By Dionysios Touliatos
Thesis – Master of Science
School of Environmental Sciences University of East Anglia University Plain Norwich
© 2011 Dionysios Touliatos
August 2011

Excerpt:

The choice of household gardens

According to Jeffcote (1993) urban household gardens in the UK represent a significant percentage of the total surface of a city, occupying more than ten times the area of protected nature reserves (Loram et al., 2005). The UK is the country with the highest number in private gardens per capita of any nation in Europe (Alfrey et al., 2004: 9) but only 20% of garden owners grew food in 1996 compared to 35% ten years earlier, with lawn and flowers being the dominant theme (MINTEL, 1999). Thus, it can be argued that a significant potential of food production in terms of quantity lies in household gardens.

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The above video is the complete 60 Minutes report.

Black and white truffles are the world’s most expensive foods, and they are coveted by chefs and criminals alike.

By John Platt
Mother Nature Network
Jan 09 2012

Excerpt:

Truffles are “being trafficked like drugs, stolen by thugs, and threatened by inferior imports from China,” said correspondent Lesley Stahl on the program that aired Jan. 8.

Black truffles from France cost more than $1,000 a pound. Italian white truffles are even more valuable, bringing in around $3,600 a pound. The price represents not only their rarity but how difficult they are to find, as well as how much haute cuisine diners are willing to pay for just a few truffle shavings on their pasta or burgers.

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The conference will be held in Dutch

From Guido van Rijkom:

We have attracted a large number of good speakers to the conference, both from city governments, entrepreneurs, housing agencies, etc. I am also very happy to announce that Wayne Roberts (Toronto Food Policy Council) will be our keynote speaker that day.

The conference will be held in Dutch and it is mainly for a Dutch audience (some from Belgium, maybe some from Germany).

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The success of their mini-garden has inspired the Fresh from the Roof team to turn this flat roof into an urban field. In total their farm will cover 7,000 square meters, the size of a football pitch. By Frisch vom Dach.

“This is a gap in the market and we want to close it.”

By Jess Smee
Spiegel Online
Dec 5, 2011

Excerpt:

It is hardly a logical spot for a farm, but three Berliners have earmarked a massive former factory roof for an unusual urban agriculture venture. The sustainable set-up will produce both vegetables and fish for local residents and could be a model for future city farms as the world continues to urbanize.

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“Orto Errante” in Italian means wandering garden

By Silvia Cioli
Zappata Romana
Nov 16, 2011

The event on October 15th was organized in less than a week. Zappata Romana was asked by the Rome Occupy to put up an edible garden in the square near the tents next to the Basilica of Santa Croce in Gerusalemme.

Zappata Romana called the people who take care of the many shared gardens in the city and the response was surprising – more than 20 groups joined and came to the appointment.

The idea was that Zappata Romana would build containers (painted recycled market wooden boxes with hemp bags and coloured garden markers) for the different contributors. The gardeners would bring earth and plants.
In one afternoon the garden was built with the enthusiastic help of everyone, passing by citizens included.

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Sweden, which is the the home of garden schools, takes the lead and has 2,000 of them.

Scientific American Magazine
Oct 27, 1900
Scientific American, the oldest continuously published magazine in America, began life on August 28, 1845.

From a Department of State pamphlet:

In France school farms increased rapidly, and in 1852 there were seventy, the number allowed by law.

The following are some of the advantages of the system: The children obtain an intimate knowledge and intercourse with nature, they learn about the cultivation of fruits and vegetables. It educates boys beyond the tendency to pilfer fruits and flowers in orchards, and instills in children a fondness of rural life.

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Roman Gaus is founder and CEO of UrbanFarmers AG, a pioneering Spin-off from the University of Applied Sciences(ZHAW) in Wädenswil

Urban agriculture has been real for decades, starting with the industrialization of Western Europe in the 20th century. Urban agriculture has been also well practiced in poor economies such as Cuba, where it serves as an important way of self-reliance. Today, with conventional agriculture “Big Ag” being at a cross-road in terms of its ecological impact on the environment and the increased food demand of a population growing to 9bn people by 2050, urban agriculture may very well be one key of a solution for the 21st century.

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Park Supermarket Park is a spatial development model for a Landscape Supermarket situated in the Metropolitan parks of the Randstad.

By Beth Carter
Smart Planet
September 28, 2011

Excerpt:

Dutch design firm, van Bergen Kolpa Architecten, has plans to build a 4,000 acre park in the middle of Holland’s most populous area, the Randstad, that includes Amsterdam, Rotterdam, The Hague and Utrecht.

This mega-park will also be a fully functioning farm.

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(Excellent video. Mike)

Calls on Government to put food growing on the curriculum and make land available for allotments

Excerpt:

In his acceptance speech Kelly told the story of how an incident in a supermarket 5 years ago opened his mind to the problems in the food chain – discovering that the garlic he was about to toss in to his trolley was imported from China. “In Ireland we produce enough food each year to feed 34 million people and yet we still import €5 billion worth of food each year,” he said. “It just doesn’t make any sense, and it has a direct impact on people’s health, communities, Irish jobs and the environment.”

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City Harvest Festival, London. See more photos from the event here.

You Local Guradian
26th September 2011

Excerpt:

A farm in Colliers Wood has scooped the title of best in London for the second year running at a festival of city farming and community gardening.

Volunteers from Deen City Farm beat their nearest rivals Surrey Docks and attributed their victory to great teamwork and animal handling skills.

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Small portion of 17th Century Pictorial Map of Galway. See full map image here.

Shantalla scheme will make up to 30 garden plots available

By Dara Bradley
The Connacht Sentinel
September 13, 2011

Excerpts:

Plans for city garden allotments are beginning to bear fruit.

For years garden allotments were an aspiration for Galway City Council but at last concrete proposals have emerged that could see between 25 and 30 plots available for public use later this year.

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An urban garden located on the site of a demolished building with an array of graffiti as a backdrop.

Stadsboeren maken gemeenschappelijke, mobiele moes-, fruit- en bloementuinen in een stedelijke omgeving. Deze paradijstuinen voldoen allemaal aan de volgende voorwaarden:

• De tuinen worden gebouwd op braakliggende binnenstedelijke bouwterreinen (woonbuurten).

• De tuinen hebben een mobiele constructie en zijn verplaatsbaar naar andere locaties.

• De paradijstuinen zijn open voor het publiek om te bezoeken en te tuinieren.

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Understanding the recent trend in food production activities within the limits of a developed nation’s capital

By Peter de Lange
Master thesis in the program Environment and Resource Management
University Amsterdam
Aug. 21, 2011
69 pages

Abstract

Urban agriculture, the practice of growing food inside a city, can play a significant role in a cities food system, especially in feeding the urban poor. Its presence varies greatly across regions, however, and it is predominantly seen in Asia and Africa, where it is often practiced out of necessity, in order to feed families or gain much needed additional income.

Urban agriculture is not confined to developing countries, however, and, in recent years, is becoming increasingly popular in cities across the United States and Europe. One such city is Amsterdam, the capital of the Netherlands, where especially community gardens have sprouted up in the last three years.

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The Tempelhof project stands in contrast to Germany’s strictly regulated traditional allotments

Deborah Cole
Jakarta Globe
September 02, 2011

Excerpt:

It’s sunflowers instead of planes and kale instead of kerosene at legendary Tempelhof Airport, site of the Berlin Airlift and now home to one of Europe’s biggest and most unusual urban gardens.

Launched by a dozen “pioneers” in April, the Allmende Kontor plot now has about 300 people growing fruit, vegetables and flowers between the former runways of the airport, which closed nearly three years ago.

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Sylvie Laurent-Begin is in charge of 60 Paris Community Gardens. We spoke to her in Vancouver.

Just by chance, we met Sylvie Laurent-Begin and her husband Christophe at “Grow”, a small garden on False Creek. Sylvie is Deputy to the Paris Vice-Mayor in charge of Parks and Gardens. Christophe her husband is president of Potager des Oiseaux in le Marais neighborhood.

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Urban gardening in Paris: the greening of bollards, which are placed in areas to prevent vehicular access.

Potogreen

Excerpt from Gavroche, June 22, 2011

Ces derniers temps les poteaux anti-stationnement sont au centre de toutes les attentions, en effet après les « potobos », les « poteaux cyclopes » et les poteaux végétalisés de la rue Dénoyez à Belleville, voici que débarquent dans les rues du 2ème arrondissement les « potogreen », bientôt peut-être des « poteaux roses » rue Sainte-Croix de la Bretonnerie?

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Inauguration du jardin de l’Univert. Crédit photo: Nad Charvier.

Paris compte près de 70 jardins partagés

Ces parcelles de terrain gracieusement mises à disposition par la Ville de Paris sont devenues en quelques années les lieux de rendez-vous et de détente préférés des jardiniers amateurs de Paris. Gagnés sur des friches urbaines (jardin de l’Aqueduc ), aménagés sur des toits de gymnase(le Jardin sur le Toit ) …des jardins fleurissent au sein de la capitale.

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