Published by City Farmer, Canada's Office of Urban Agriculture

"Older" New Pages on City Farmer's Web Site

Urban Agriculture - Squamish, BC, Canada

"The Agricultural Land Reserve (ALR) is a conventional indicator of productive capacity. There are large portions of ALR lands outside the district in the Squamish River Valley (over 2,800 ha), and smaller areas within the District of Squamish (364 ha). At average BC field crop yields 12 and per capita consumption 13 this smaller area of land within the district (both ALR and non ALR lands) could theoretically provide Squamish with all its annual vegetable needs."
Posted February 28, 2006

How To Be a 21st-Century Smallholder

"Any kind of livestock you keep can be symbiotic with your food-growing activities. Pigs are much better than humans at clearing and fertilising ground ready for planting. Chickens will peck away at soil pests and apply a light coating of manure to a cleared vegetable bed. Bees will provide free pollination services and ducks will eat your slugs."
Posted February 25, 2006

City Farmer's 2006 Classes - Introduction to Organic Food Gardening

Learn how to grow your own vegetables in an urban environment. City Farmer's hands on organic food gardening course includes: site selection/design/soil preparation seed sourcing and starting; planting/harvesting/composting; organic gardening techniques/natural pest control; container gardening; waterwise gardening.
Posted Novemeber 15, 2006

Supporting And Encouraging Food Security Within Urban Agriculture Initiatives In Gaza Refugees Camps

"The beneficiaries, 81 families in total, have received intensive technical training in different aspects of UA and organic farming and brochures related to it in order to cultivate their own crops in backyards in their houses or small greenhouses (40m2 or 20m2) on their roofs, which have been provided and totally equipped by the own project." Posted February 20, 2006

Urban agriculture in the Gaza Strip, Palestine

"Ashour al-Lahm, a Gaza farmer, explains how plants and animals are traditionally part of Palestinian urban society: ÒÉ fish-ponds, chicken gardens, pigeon cages, spinach and mulukhia, green pepper, mint, palm trees, olives, vines and lemon trees; they represent a continuation of inherited traditionsÓ . Household gardens have long held an ornamental function of bringing shade and beauty to a place, besides the function of food supply." Posted February 20, 2006

Livestock Keeping in Urban Areas - Kenya

" The study showed that in order of importance, the livestock keepers, rated livestock for the following reasons: as an asset, food, subsistence, income and even gifts/social status. The products consumed were meat, milk and eggs. Animal manure was used on the farms and a small amount sold. Animals also provided draught power for tillage and transport. " Posted February 16, 2006

The Next Profit Frontier for Green Roof Companies is --- Food From the Roof

"The hydroponic farm on the atrium of the 800-bed Changi General Hospital in Singapore. The bare concrete of the atrium roof was a problem in that it diverted sunlight into nearby wards - to cause objectionable glare and heating. The rooftop hydroponics, growing cherry tomatoes and herbs, solved the problem and created a rooftop farm that now supplies patients with healthy fresh food. Another Singapore hospital is about to go even further in food from the roof." Posted February 12, 2006

From the Desk of Jac Smit - "Urban Agriculture"

Jac Smit will be contributing his thoughts here from time to time. "Jac has contributed to plans for agriculture in cities as diverse as: Abidjan, Asmera, Bogota, Dar es Salaam, Karachi, Philadelphia, Vancouver and Washington DC. Some of his most satisfying urban agriculture effort was in refugee camps in India, Bangladesh and the Ivory Coast." February 10, 2006

Vancouver's New Pesticide Reduction Bylaw - January 1, 2006
"As of January 1, 2006, the use of outdoor pesticides on lawns and in gardens will be regulated by section 5.17 of the Health By-Law No. 6580. Application of pesticides, including insecticides, herbicides, and fungicides, will be restricted. Certain conditions will need to be met before pesticides will be permitted provided they are listed in Schedule A to the by-law."
You can read about the new by-law on the Grow Natural web site:
Pesticide Use Restriction By-law for 2006
and read the by-law here:
PDF of HEALTH BY-LAW NO. 6580
This PDF is 39 pages long. See section 5.17 (pages 28, 29) and Schedule A (pages 37, 38)

Growing Well in Dar es Salaam (Tanzania): The Potential of Urban Agriculture in Improving the Lives of At-Risk Youth

"Given the scarcity of public investment in child welfare in African cities today, a conceptual and practical analysis of programs that support the physical well-being of street children and youth who formerly resided in rural areas is urgently needed. This paper discusses efforts towards social inclusion of former street youth in urban agriculture using two programs in Dar es Salaam (Dar), Tanzania as case studies." Posted February 2, 2006

Urban Agriculture in Napa - Academic/Theoretical Design Exercise

"In Napa, small fragmented farms are encouraged. Residents, small businesses, and city offices can make a profit by cultivating underused land parcels with food producing landscapes and bringing crops to the Napa City Crop Clearing House. Here's how it works!" Posted January 26, 2006

Philippine City Preparing Legislation To Set Up Policies For The Establishment Of Allotment Gardens

"The city government of Cagayan de Oro, Philippines, is presently preparing an ordinance that will give tax holidays and other incentives to landowners who make their areas available for allotment gardens. - Aside from benefiting from incentives, Acenas said, the lot owners would protect their properties against squatters and have a major role in environment protection. " Posted January 26, 2006

Migration and Home Gardens in the Brahmaputra Valley, Assam, India

"In rural northeast India, home gardens are ubiquitous landscape components. In addition to the cultivation of vegetables for consumption and sale, home gardens are often sites where certain selected and valued plants collected from nearby forests are grown. Bamboo is the most versatile local plant resource. It is used for house construction, roofing and fencing, baskets, handicrafts, furniture and fishing net poles, while the young shoots are edible." Posted January 26, 2006

Interdisciplinary Graduate Program Focuses on School Food Gardens

"FEED project is focusing on learning gardens on site at several Portland Public Schools to educate children about nutrition and healthy food and simultaneously engage students in hands-on learning experiences in creating edible gardens, growing food, preparing and eating meals, and composting and recycling." Posted January 24, 2006

A Primer on Backyard Meat Rabbit Raising Practices

"Rudolph's Rabbit Ranch is the name given to my hobby of raising meat rabbits for my family's personal consumption. A backyard meat rabbit operation can be a great idea for someone interested in having healthful, drug-free meat. In addition to providing a family with a quality of meat unparalleled by that found at the grocery store, such a project can involve all family members. Even children can help in chores from breeding to the dinner table." Posted January 10, 2006

Chicago is Home to an Estimated 70,000 Vacant Parcels of Land

"Urban farming and rural farming share some similarities. One, of course, is the goal to grow a product for consumption. The fundamental difference between urban agriculture and rural farming is land, specifically, the way in which that is acquired. Urban options include partnership with a municipal agency to gain access or outright purchase. The latter can prove to be very expensive, as land values in urban centers such Chicago are relatively costly." Posted December 19, 2005

Composting Toilet Installed in Philippine Community Garden

"Inaugurated recently in the allotment garden in barangay Macasandig, Cagayan de Oro City, this toilet is the ecological sanitation or "ecosan" toilet, which allows the re-use of human waste into fertilizer, "closing the loop," so to speak, of the waste cycle. The waste will be treated using tried and tested European technology, and will be used to fertilize fruit trees in the allotment garden." Posted December 17, 2005

Allotment Gardens in the Philippines

"On December 11, 2003, the first allotment garden of the Philippines was officially launched in barangay Lapasan, Cagayan de Oro City. Meanwhile, this number has grown to four self-sustaining gardens located in different urban areas of the city, enabling a total of 32 urban poor families the legal access to land for vegetable production. A fifth garden for 14 additional families is presently being established in barangay Kauswagan." Posted December 17, 2005

Two 'Farming in the City' Annotated Bibliographies from Urban Harvest

"An Annotated Bibliography of Urban and Peri-urban Agriculture in Uganda by Sarah N. Kimeze and An Annotated Bibliography of Urban and Peri-urban Agriculture in the Philippines with Emphasis on Metro Manila by Dr. Constancio C. de Guzman. These publications contain a list of citations from articles, books, documents, reports, and theses on urban and peri-urban agriculture in their selected locations followed by a brief description on the content." Posted December 16, 2005

Family Gardens and Pigeons in Gaza Refugee Camps

(In French) "In Gaza agriculture is more urban than rural. The project aims at setting up family gardens and breeding pigeons within 50 dwellings in each of 8 refugee camp in the Gaza Strip (Palestine). It also aims at putting in public spaces in each camp." Posted December 13, 2005

Montreal's Community Gardening Program

"Responding to its citizen's requests, the city of Montreal created 76 community gardens with 6,400 allotments since 1975. These serve some 10,000 people a year, which makes the program one of the most significant in North America. (Since the merge in 2002, the number of gardens within Montreal is now 97 community gardens and 8195 allotments.) ... An estimated 10,000 people, or about 1.5 per cent of the city's adult population, take advantage of this program..." Updated January 15, 2007

See City Farmer's Fabulous Coldframe

Graham Clark built this attractive and useful mini-greenhouse for us. The used skylights (double glazed so you get two for one) cost us only $25 at a used 'stuff' store. Posted December 4, 2005

The Winter Cache Project

"There are many community gardens, backyard plots, and farmer's markets offering good local produce in the summer. However with Maine's short growing season, come winter, most everyone is dependent on out of season, imported food. The Winter Cache Project seeks to address this problem through a cooperative community based effort to grow, store, and preserve our own food for the winter months." Posted December 2, 2005

In Mongolia, Community-Grown Vegetables Fill a Big Nutritional Gap

"... during the Communist period, it was prohibited even to have a garden, because it was regarded as private initiative. So people don't think they can grow vegetables themselves or they think that growing cabbage is more difficult than raising sheep. But now things are changing very quickly ..." Posted November 25, 2005

Swedish Hydroponic Rooftop System

"This summer, and continuing through the winter, we have had a project on a rooftop in Stockholm city. We call this project Rooftop Allotment gardens. It connects to a tradition of small allotment gardens in Sweden, originally created in the times of the first world war to make it possible for city people to grow their own food. Nowadays, there is normally no shortage of food in our country so the new Rooftop Allotment Gardens are more for soul replenishment." Posted November 24, 2005

City Farmer TV

With all the buzz about watching video on Apple's latest Video iPod, we decided to start our own TV show. These short clips will bring you up close and personal with the kind of work we do at the Vancouver Compost Demonstration Garden. See how we trap rats in a compost bin and plant our cold frame with overwintering salad greens. You can watch these short films on your computer but you'll want to download the latest version of iTunes and Quicktime. Updated November 21, 2005

Garden Warriors of 'Yesteryear' - Photos Slideshow

We are building on the ideas and work of past generations. These photos are from the Library of Congress, Prints and Photographs Division, Washington and one from the Archives of Canada, Ottawa. Posted November 15, 2005

School Children Gardening - Photos 1914-1918: Slideshow

These wonderful photos are in the Library of Congress, Prints and Photographs Division, Washington. They remind us that earlier generations were as excited as we are today about the potential of teaching kids about food gardening. Posted November 7, 2005

Excerpt from "The Economy of Roman Palestine" - 'Agriculture in the City'

"Safrai came to the conclusion that there were approximately 2,600-3,100 plots surrounding the city. The size of the city was approximately 300 dunams and based on the accepted population density of 30-40 people per dunam, there were no more than 3,000 families in the city, assuming that every family received a plot." Posted November 6, 2005

US Victory Garden Film WW2

(Film plays for 20 minutes on-line!) A farm garden is portrayed in the film but the same message was sent to city residents. "The Holder family in Maryland lays out a quarter acre Victory Garden during World War II. Most of the gardening work is done by Grandpa Holder and his teenage grandchildren Rick and Amy and from the looks of the film, it's backbreaking. There's the early garden of peppers, tomatoes, pole beans, potatoes, asparagus and sweet corn. Then, there's the late garden with beets, squash, late potatoes, late cabbage, kale, collard greens and three rows of turnips. To save gasoline, they use a horse and plow and humble farm implements. It's anything but organic. We see every kind of pest, worm and disease that can affect the garden. Rick sprays various noxious looking chemicals on the vegetables without wearing a face mask or gloves. A victory garden is like 'a share in an airplane factory', the film's opening tells us. It's also a 'vitamin factory' that will keep Americans strong. The film ends on a patriotic note. 'No Work, No Victory!' Bear that in mind all you Victory Gardeners and 'Work! For Victory!' A no-nonsense, non-idealized look at what it's like to have to really grow your own food." Posted October 29, 2005

What Have I Learned in Five Years of City Gardening That We Can Use for Decades of Success?

"I am happy to find that, from a city boy who didn't like salad or know what a Jerusalem artichoke was, I have gardened, farmed, chatted, read, and meditated my way to some information and perspectives that will serve me forever..." Posted October 18, 2005

Growing up with Chickens, Geese, Turkeys and Rabbits

"Geese can be quite aggressive, especially if they have goslings. However, one day we found our dog Sandy, (Shepherd/Collie cross) lying in the pen with about a dozen goslings crawling all over her and Alice (the sweet) was not upset about it!" Posted October 15, 2005

Community Food Security and the Landscape of Cities

"The proposed community gardens would use only 1.1 percent of the residual spaces in the community. Backyard gardens and community gardens could provide two to three percent of local consumption needs, probably up to five percent if participation rates increased or if community garden development were expanded." Posted October 10, 2005

City Farmer's Bugshops - The "5Ps" : Slideshow

"Pollinators, Predators, Processors, Pests, Parasitoids. Photos © by Maria Keating" Posted October 4, 2005

No Green Acres? Try Skyscrapers

"Where many might see a pile of garbage, Lior Hessel sees, of all things, an organic farm. Those storage containers would be ideal housing for miniature farms, he believes, stacked one upon another like an agricultural skyscraper, all growing fresh organic produce for millions of wealthy consumers." Posted September 28, 2005

Fallen Fruit

"Fallen Fruit is a website run by people who encourage you to grow fruit on the perimeter of your property and allow others to harvest it. They also have maps of Los Angeles neighborhoods that are bearing lots of free fruit. After discovering an arcane Los Angeles city law that makes any fruit overhanging on sidewalks public property, three professors founded Fallen Fruit, a mapping project that promotes access to the city's free and forgotten oranges, bananas, and apricots." Posted September 25, 2005

Changes Ahead In Urban Agriculture

"Rooftop greening and rooftop food production are likely to become interlinked parts of post-Kyoto Treaty agreements of many nations moving in unison.I think it is now obvious that these twin technologies can be expected to play a big role in creating an advanced soilless culture of food that brings aquaculture into a vital synergy with horticulture based on recycling urban organic wastes..." Posted September 10, 2005

Will Power

"Growing food, growing minds, growing communities: that's the agenda of former basketball player Will Allen, whose organization, Growing Power, teaches inner-city children about the rewards, the challenges, and the science of farming."
Also see Growing Power - Chicago Park District's Urban Agriculture Demonstration Farm Posted September 10, 2005

Urban Agriculture Featured in "2005 San Francisco Collaborative Food System Assessment"

(large PDF) "Within San Francisco County's 31,360 acres of land, there are several large green spaces and 59 community gardens. Over 800 community gardening plots are tended by nearly 700 community gardeners. Within the San Francisco Unified School District (SFUSD), about 25% of the 119 schools currently have a school garden. Community and educational gardens range in size from a few planter boxes up to a few acres." Updated October 14, 2005

"Urban Farming" radio interviews

"Tezo is a community organizer and one of 350 urban gardeners who helped form the South Central Farmers coalition after their garden was sold. Tom has been keeping honeybees in San Francisco for over 10 years. Michael Olson is the Author of 'MetroFarm'. " Posted September 10, 2005

"Bantam Menace": On-line Film About Chickens in the City

"A student documentary about a young man who owned pet hens illegally in Vancouver." Posted September 9, 2005

Innovations in Near-Urban Agriculture: Can farming persist in the urban shadow?

"These micro scale 'grass roots' efforts are expected to make farming viable in the shadow of the city by increasing the contact between the consumer and the farmer, regaining the sense of community on the urban fringe, producing more per acre, and increased land stewardship through environmentally sound farming practices." Posted September 9, 2005

Harvesting Food Grown With Compost: Slideshow

"What is compost worth? Here is a sample of one day's harvest from our Compost Garden. A cornucopia!" Posted August 29, 2005

Down a Green Path: An alternative vision for a section of east Detroit takes shape

"Instead of trying to return Detroit to its industrial glory days, Adamah's creators and a small group of community activists promoting it see the east side's empty lots and forsaken buildings as a chance to set the stage for development in the 'post-industrial' age. As such, the project leans heavily on agriculture. Plans include greenhouses for tulips and vegetables, grazing land and a dairy, a tree farm and lumber mill, community gardens and a shrimp farm." Detroit Urban Agriculture Groups Updated August 18, 2005

Bees Keep City Blooming

Founding City Farmer director, Kerry Banks, writes about beekeeping in Vancouver in 1978. "The bees, of course, make it a good place to grow things. "I don't know of a single area in the city where you can't find bees," says Bill, and he points to the lushness of vegetable gardens and fruit trees throughout the city as evidence. Since bees will normally forage only a mile or so from home, it is reasonable to assume that there are more than a few backyards in Vancouver that are not all that they appear to be." Updated August 17, 2005

Bringing Soul Back to Wai'anae: the Mala 'Ai 'Opio Farm (in Hawaii)

"What the youth have accomplished thus far, and what the farm has come to represent for the community, render the justification for not only diversifying the functions of urban agriculture, but also integrating it into land use policy." Posted August 8, 2005

FAO Supports School Gardens: Education and Nutrition go Together - support by farmers and parents is essential

"Since 1997, over 150 school garden microprojects have been supported by FAO's TeleFood programme in more than 40 countries. Larger FAO technical cooperation projects are under way, including capacity-building for long-term national school garden programmes." Posted August 5, 2005

Scarborough Urban Farm - Farewell to Fink's Farm

"Now, tall condominiums, a factory, plaza and high school stand coldly on the corner. Only 35 acres of Mike's Pick Your Own Vegetables remain on the east side, hidden amongst the blockade of urban development. It is one of the last farms in all of Scarborough, though the farmhouse is gone." Posted August 3, 2005

Singapore's New Business Opportunity: Food from the Roof

"A survey by Ngee Ann Polytechnic students found that four suburban areas of northern Singapore (about one fifth of the total) had about 212 hectares of apartment and commercial rooftops to grow fresh vegetables, using inorganic hydroponics. About 39,000 tonnes of vegetables a year could be produced from the 212 hectares." Posted August 3, 2005

Farming in Urban Areas Can Boost Food Security says FAO

"Urban and peri-urban agriculture can help improve food security in several ways: growing food at home or via a cooperative reduces the cost burden of acquiring food for the poor, puts more food within their reach, and reduces seasonal gaps in fresh produce. Also, by increasing the diversity and quality of food consumed, it can significantly improve the quality of urban diets." Posted July 26, 2005

Using Compost to Start a Food Garden: Step-by-Step Slideshow

"Compost is an essential ingredient for making fertile soil. We've used it for 25 years at our Demonstration Garden. Sharon digs over-wintered leaf mulch and compost into the beds. She seeds some plants indoors in flats. First she adds sifted compost." Posted July 25, 2005

Development of City Farms by Street Children: Mumbai, India

"A project to improve the socio-economic condition of destitute children through integrated environmental management: The pilot project would be conducted in a city school to create a farm within its premises with the involvement of street children. The street children would be given technical training to implement the technique. The farm produce, preferably flowers, fruits or vegetables, would be sold in the retail market through the school." Updated July 20, 2005

Training Course on Urban Agriculture in the Middle East-North Africa Region, to be held in September 2005 in Beirut and Amman

"Food production inside and around urban areas is an ancient activity in the Middle East and North Africa (MENA) region. While these traditions have suffered from various negative pressures on them, crop cultivation and animal husbandry remain common throughout the region's cities. Urban agriculture (UA) in the MENA countries is hence at present a highly varied and widespread activity, yet it endures for the most part without recognition by planners, agriculturists, policy-makers, researchers." Posted July 5, 2005

The Diggable City Project - Making Urban Agriculture a Planning Priority

"Prepared for the City of Portland: Completed by students in the Master of Urban and Regional Planning program at Portland State University, the Diggable City Project was an attempt to take an inventory of vacant, publicly-owned land in the Portland area, and to start a conversation about how that land might be used to support urban agricultural activities." Revised July 30, 2005

Victory Community Garden in Kabale, Uganda

"This garden project is the beginning of the development of sustainable local answers to problems of land fragmentation and subsistence farming. The gardens have been developed to work within the Ugandan Government's economic and ecological policies; such as to encourage market gardening and to protect soil from erosion and degradation." Posted June 29, 2005

Agropolis - The Social, Political and Environmental Dimensions of Urban Agriculture

"This book presents the first findings of original field research projects funded by IDRC's AGROPOLIS International Graduate Research Awards on Urban Agriculture. Countries studied include Cuba, Argentina, Botswana, France, the UK, Zimbabwe, Ivory Coast, Togo and Tunisia. Together, these studies examine concrete strategies to better integrate 'city farming' into the urban landscape." Posted June 25, 2005

American Community Gardening Association Conference Aug 11-14, 2005

"The 2005 conference is being held at the West Bank of the University of Minnesota. Over 3 and a half days, there will be over 50 hands-on workshops, 22 tours to Twin Cities diverse community gardens and other green sites, a reception at the Weisman Art Museum, keynote speakers, a film festival, banquet, silent auction, and special program for children aged 7 to 12. " Posted June 20, 2005

Entrepreneurial Urban Agriculture

"The farm grows beets, carrots, potatoes, lettuce, herbs, melons and 30 varieties of tomatoes and sells its produce to local chefs of high-end restaurants and to the public from an on-site market stand. This method of distribution ensures that a profit can be made, by selling to restaurants willing to buy fresh, local and readily available produce for high prices, while also catering to the lower-income and selling the produce right in the community for affordable prices." Posted June 16, 2005

High-tech Basement Farm in the Heart of Tokyo

"We see this space as a showroom of farming in the midst of a metropolis," said Keisuke Nemoto, manager of the PR. "We do not aim to grow produce here to put on the market. We created this place so that people could know more about farming, and to increase the number of 'fans of farming,' so that -- eventually -- we can promote job opportunities in that area." Posted June 15, 2005

Topsoil on the Bottom Floor

"Deep below Tokyo's crowded streets, in the sub-basement of a skyscraper, a flower grows. So do rice, fruit, vegetables, and herbs. Pasona O2, a former bank vault in the bustling down-town Otemachi district, is a square kilometer of soil-based and hydroponic farmland, lit by LEDs and fluorescent lamps, with temperature, humidity, and carbon dioxide levels controlled by computers." Posted June 12, 2005

Participating in Urban Gardening, or "City Farming" - Results of an Online Survey conducted by City Farmer

"City Farmer conducted an online survey over the course of 4 years. The survey asked respondents about their interests and experiences with gardening in urban areas ("city farming"). The survey garnered 500 responses at the time of writing. Each respondent was asked 19 different questions about their experiences with gardening. Only a small selection of questions were analyzed for this study." Posted May 30, 2005

Film: "Seeds in the City" - The Greening of Havana

"Seeds in the City tells the remarkable story of how the people of Havana have pulled themselves back from the brink of disaster. Faced with food shortages and widespread hunger, city dwellers began growing food on rooftops, in schoolyards, and in front of office buildings. Now there are thousands of urban farms in a city better known for its music, dance and nightlife." Posted May 30, 2005

Design for Food: Landscape architects find roles in city farms.

Short excerpt from the June issue of Landscape Architecture Magazine "There are many different ideas about what constitutes an urban farm. Michael Levenston, executive director of City Farmer, one of the oldest North American organizations devoted to urban food production, says: "An urban farm can be a pot of herbs grown on a balcony or a large market garden. If it involves something you eat, and you're growing it in the city, I'd call it an urban farm." Posted May 28, 2005

Economic aspects on the use of Biotechnologies and Bioengineering in Urban Agriculture by African Households

E-symposium June 1-14, 2005. 7 papers on-line including: 'The Economic Impact of Urban Agriculture on homegardeners in Ouagadougou'; 'Role of local authorities and urban planners in Kampala in facilitating the practice of urban agriculture for households and the landless'; 'How to use a Dry-creek bed technique to achieve waterharvesting of urban agriculture plot' Posted May 19, 2005

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Wise Water Use at our Demonstration Garden: Step-By-Step

Reducing water use in the garden and managing stormwater runoff are priorities at the Vancouver Compost Demonstration Garden. Posted May 8, 2005

Egyptians Plant Vegetables on Rooftops

"Although the idea of planting rooftops isn't new, it has only been carried out in Egypt recently. Dr. Ayman Farid Abu Hadid, director of CLAC, says the idea began 15 years ago at the Agricultural Unit in Egypt's Ain Shams University. The Egyptian scientists at Ain Shams University had been designing new methods of agriculture to suit Egypt's densely populated cities for exhibitional purposes. Then, two years ago, the Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO) adopted the idea and carried it out in many developing countries such as, Kenya, Senegal and Columbia and suggested it be applied in Egypt." Posted May 6, 2005

Sowing and Reaping on Borrowed Land: Garden City Harvest's Community Gardens

19,000 word Masters Thesis - "Community gardening had immediate and tangible effects, such as decreased grocery bills, more control over the food one consumes, and the attainment of gardening skills and knowledge. Most gardeners hade a positive outlook on their experience, highlighting community building, access to land and resources, attainment of knowledge and participation in the production of their food as the most valuable aspects of their experience." Posted May 2, 2005

Natural Gardening Posters in Chinese

We've translated five large gardening posters, featured at our Demonstration Garden, into Chinese: backyard composting, worm composting, waterwise gardening, natural lawn care and grasscycling. Posted April 29, 2005

City Farmer's Step-By-Step Photo Guide to Natural Lawn Care

"No pesticides. No wasted water. No air pollution. No trucking grass clippings to the landfill." Posted April 20, 2005

City Farmer's Isabelle Speaks from the Garden

(Needs Real Player on your computer, 46 second clip.) Isabelle tells CBC why she likes to work at our Demonstration Garden." Posted April 13, 2005

City Farmer's Step-By-Step Photo Guide to Composting in a Backyard Bin

"Alternate layers of green and brown materials; keep the layers 2" - 4" deep. Common green (nitrogen) materials are grass, food scraps (uncooked fruit and vegetables, coffee grounds, filters, tea bags and egg shells) (wet), garden trimmings. Common brown (carbon) materials are, fall leaves, straw and newspaper strips (dry). Chop up larger materials for faster decomposition." " Posted March 31, 2005

A Bug Lady's Observations at Vancouver's Compost Demonstration Garden

"Today I saw mothflies in the composter. They are neither moths nor flies, but are members of the the same order as aphids. In the compost they are not considered pests, but their numbers can skyrocket. When that happens the best thing to do when opening the lid is to keep your mouth closed. To reduce the numbers, cover the top layer of the compost with baking soda and a newspaper." Posted March 28, 2005

Health Benefits of Urban Agriculture - Public Health and Food Security

PDF "Research shows that gardening is a preferred form of exercise across age, gender, and ethnicity. Overall, older persons do more gardening than younger ones. Even moderate forms of garden exercise increase muscle strength and endurance in activity-reduced persons including pregnant women, cancer survivors, and those generally sedentary." Also a one page handout for public health officials is available here: Factsheet: Health Benefits of Urban Agriculture - Public Health and Food Security Revised April 5, 2005

Urban Farming May Well Hold The Key To The Future Of Detroit

"Farming fits Detroit's history. The city started as an agricultural settlement, with long narrow farms stretching inland from the river. Then as now, Detroit is built on good, fertile ground. And while nobody's suggesting turning downtown's skyscrapers into grain silos, we may eventually face the choice of letting that empty land continue to sprout weeds and tumble-down houses, or putting it back to work growing tomatoes and grazing cattle." Posted March 22, 2005

City Farmer's Step-By-Step Photo Guide to Worm Composting

"Harvesting: You can dump the entire contents of the bin onto a large plastic sheet and separate the worms manually. Most children love to help with this process and you can turn it into a fun lesson about worms for them. Watch out for the tiny lemon-shaped worm cocoons which contain between two and twenty baby worms! By separating the worms from the compost, you save more worms for your next bin." " Posted March 21, 2005

City Farmer's Step-By-Step Photo Guide to Making a Dog Waste Composter

"Collect the dog doo and drop it into the hole. Sprinkle a packet of septic tank starter on top of the dog doo and add a litre or so of water. Cover the hole with the lid. Within 48 hours, the septic tank starter, which is non-caustic, and promotes natural bacterial growth will have begun its work and you can add more dog doo. You can then begin to add it daily." Posted March 17, 2005

Urban Agriculture, Garden Allotments in Zurich, Switzerland

"Garden allotments consist of sizeable pieces of land divided into a series of small parcels which are used by individuals and families as a place to grow a wide array of flowers, vegetables and fruit. In Zurich, they are often found abutting or adjacent to forested areas, creating an urban landscape that in parts looks more like the country than the city. Each allotment usually features a small shed or miniature 'house' which is used to store gardening equipment and other items such as barbeques for summer recreation. They are not supposed to be used as residences, but in practice many do use them in this way in summer time for short periods." Posted March 17, 2005

Urban Youth's Urban Agriculture Display, Wins Best Garden Display at Prominent Garden Show

"Sleeping in parks is one way to get close to plants, certainly. Not long ago, for a short period in his young life, this was the extent of Nick "Squirrel" Plesha's relationship with urban foliage: a place to crash. Yesterday, as he stood near the Best in Show gold medal he helped win for Seattle Youth Garden Works, a non-profit that turns homeless and impoverished kids into accomplished gardeners." Posted March 13, 2005

CFSC Urban Agriculture Committee: North American Initiative

"Members of the Committee envision their primary tasks to be: 1. to advocate for the creation and adoption of public policies to better facilitate and support the future of urban food production; 2. to promote the benefits of sustainable and organic urban agriculture, specifically among non-government organizations addressing the heath and welfare of urban residents; and 3. to bring urban agriculture to the attention of potential financial supporters, such as local and national philanthropic foundations." Posted March 8, 2005

Ethics Of Urban Agriculture: Farming Within The Human Settlement By Jac Smit

"My grandfather said 1,000 times [in Dutch] 'Eat your plate young one.' My parents assigned me a ten-by-ten foot square vegetable plot the spring after second grade. Slow or picky eating brought the reminder that children in India were starving. When I brought home my unfinished school lunch [an Indian child in mind] I was sent to bed without dinner." Posted February 28, 2005

Agro-Psychosocial Programme For Tsunami Affected In Coastal, Urban & Suburban Western Sri Lanka

(995KB) i) Training on small scale value-addition processes in food processing technology for additional fish harvests. ii) Establishment of mushroom cultivations as leisure activity in homesteads for psychological relief and additional income. iii) Initiation of "Plant Protein Food Crop" cultivations in urban homesteads. Posted February 20, 2005

Karl Linn - Community Garden Builder Dies

"He was in the business, quite literally, of creating rootedness: where a garden flourished, Mr. Linn believed, so, too, would a community. His gardens are noted for their use of native plants, bubbling fountains, colorful mosaics, benches positioned to encourage face-to-face contact and, above all, their involvement of neighborhood residents. Mr. Linn's work on one Bay Area garden was the subject of a documentary, "A Lot in Common," broadcast on PBS stations last year."
Posted February 14, 2005 2005

Revealing the Social Dimensions of Open Space Cultivation by Older Women in Harare - Advancing a Social Planning Discourse For Urban Agriculture

"Findings from this research have been used to develop a gender-aware history of women and UA in Harare. Other key findings show that the forms of organisation for open space cultivation (SOSC) developed by older women have been historically unacknowledged, ignored, and impeded by those with decision making power, most often male elites."
Posted January 26, 2005

25 Years of City Farming, 1978-2003 - City Farmer's Story

In 1978, a group of young environmentalists working at the Vancouver Energy Conservation Center stumbled across a book called The City People's Book of Raising Food by William and Helga Olkowski. It described in everyday language how the authors grew all their own food right in the middle of the city of Berkeley. This inspiring book led us on an exploration of urban food production, which continues today, twenty-five years later.
Posted January 24, 2005

Growing Cities: Cuba's Experiment With Urban Agriculture During the "Special Period"

Given UA's recent successes this research seeks to understand how and why UA emerged as it did in Havana and to address the question: is UA in Havana sustainable? Also, this research evaluates the capacity for the Cuban model of UA (in Havana specifically) to provide a development framework for other countries.
Posted January 24, 2005

Tours of Urban Agriculture Sites in Vancouver, BC

Visitors coming to Vancouver have a wealth of interesting urban agriculture sites to visit. Perhaps the most important sites, from City Farmer's perspective, are people's home gardens. Back lanes are useful for studying urban agriculture. They display the private back yards of homes, making it is easy to see what gardeners are growing.
Posted January 24, 2005

The Learning Garden

The Learning Garden is a model example of how school gardens can transform the lives of students and teachers and the environment of their community. Today, the agricultural plots are filled with organic food grown by the high school students. The garden has a large medicinal plant section for educational purposes, a pond with a water garden and waterfall, and a California native plant and cacti garden.
Posted January 22, 2005

Family Business Gardens: Agricultural Options in Remodeling & Modernising Tsunami Devastated Townships in Sri Lanka (2.8 MB large file)

Dr. Thilak T. Ranasinghe, Director of Agriculture (Western) Sri Lanka

From Disaster To Economic Opportunities: "On 26th December 2004, the Boxing Day, "Tsunami Seismic Waves" caused enormous and incalculable damage from Northern, Eastern, Southern and to Western coast townships of Sri Lanka."

"It is obvious that the most needed and immediate requirement is to alleviate the suffering of affected people by providing medicine, food, shelter and other basic necessities. Then we need to begin work on economic reconstruction with sincere intentions. By so doing, it is essential to provide land, housing, drinking water and the like to resume normal life of people. Thus, we must think about urban agricultural options to enable those people to become involved in suitable production opportunities. These types of options facilitate improvements in mental levels and physical fitness of those affected people."

While relocating homes in less vulnerable areas the Concept of Family Business Garden (FBG) provide several ways of involvements mainly through appropriate adoption of "Living Structures" in remodeling homesteads in townships. Living structures, for instance, initially assist to regain the lost-mental satisfaction and in turn physical fitness through nutrition. Both aspects then pave the way to attain entrepreneurship goals in sustainable economic development in townships."
Posted January 7, 2005

UNFAO proposal for simplified hydroponics in Sri Lanka

This proposal was sent to us by Peggy Bradley, Institute of Simplified Hydroponics Posted February 2, 2005

Harvest in the City

"And such productive urban agriculture is not limited to the developing world: in Moscow, two-thirds of families grow significant amounts of their own food; London produces roughly 16,000 tonnes of vegetables annually (and 10 per cent of its honey consumption - a bonus derived from the huge number of flowering plants in the city - urban hives generally are more productive than their rural counterparts). " Posted January 6, 2005

Plots of Paradise

"Across Canada, a community gardening boom is seeing urban dwellers turning empty lots and rooftops into patches of green. Today, Canada is one of the most highly urbanized countries in the world, with almost 80 percent of its population living in urban areas. Backyards are shrinking, and a yearning for a patch of green among city dwellers has helped to fuel a community gardening boom across the country in recent years." Posted December 29, 2004

No 14: Urban and Periurban Aquatic production - Call for Contributions:

(PDF file) - Urban Agriculture Magazine - "Urban aquatic production captures a broad array of activities, varying from catching fish by using nets in the Kolkata wastewater fed wetlands and lagoons to high tech Tilapia culture or large scale cultivation of edible aquatic plants in Ha Noi and Phnom Penh. There are various environmental and social benefits. The additional food provision and income to urban livelihoods, low-cost wastewater treatment, and management of wetlands and drainage of stormwater ..." Posted December 9, 2004

Microfarm Project using Simplified Hydroponics and Fertigation in the Lerma Chapala Basin, Mexico

"The microfarm is designed for a family using a hectare of land to produce from 40 to 140 kg of agricultural products a day. The farm uses simplified hydroponics and Israeli fertigation techniques to reduce the amount of land and water required to grow produce." Posted December 7, 2004

The Women's Garden Project and Gardens in Prisons

"An inmate working in a prison garden can learn job skills, contribute to the common good by growing food for others, and find a focus for their lives post-release. The new Women's Garden at a Corrections Canada facility near Vancouver, British Columbia was inspired by one such program that has run with great success in San Francisco for over a decade." Posted December 2, 2004

Modern Environmental Initiatives in Urban China

"Urban dwellers make use of these waterside parks in China in a myriad of interesting ways that makes life in China's cities dynamic. Rather than building these parks purely for linear movement, designers have created a wide, undulating promenade that traverses a series of distinct outdoor spaces. This functions as a public corridor giving access to a series of variously sized semi-public rooms that encourage diverse uses." Posted November 26, 2004

Eat Here: Reclaiming Homegrown Pleasures in a Global Supermarket

Worldwatch publication (PDF. see Urban Farming pages 89-102) "These neophyte urban gardeners were not farmers moving into city to raise crops, but instead established urban families who decided there was a market and started raising food. In other words, the same needs that had given rise to urban farming in ancient times had reappeared in a modern incarnation." Posted November 11, 2004

Chasing a Fish-Farming Dream

"Fish farming is not new in and around New York City. Until a few years ago, residents in Morris Park, the Bronx, bought tilapia from a small fish farm in the basement of a commercial building, and a small tilapia farm is tended by inmates in the Bayside State Prison in Leesburg, N.J. Dr. Schreibman has grander dreams. 'I envision fish farms all over the city,' he said. 'The city is losing out. We have to wake up and see this could be an economic boon. It could create jobs.' " Posted November 11, 2004

Aquaculture in our City

"Introducing urban aquaculture to the neighborhood could convert it from a center of blight and depression into a thriving, sustainable community. This can be accomplished by doing the following: * Convert abandoned warehouses into aquaculture facilities * Grow hardy, popular fish like tilapia using sustainable techniques * Provide jobs to local community members at facilities * Use some of the fish to feed the local homeless and hungry" Posted November 11, 2004

New York Aquaculture Industry: Status, Constraints And Opportunities: White Paper

80 page PDF. "The type of aquaculture that currently has the most major potential economic impact is indoor food fish aquaculture in a controlled environment, similar to how the broiler industry has evolved. Today the finfish of greatest promise appears to be tilapia, which are currently being successfully raised and marketed in upstate NY. Tilapia accounts for more than 50% of the economic output for finfish production in New York State." Posted November 11, 2004

8 Months Traveling Through 5 Continents, Eco-filmmakers Visit Our Garden

"Emily Bailey and Kate Logan from New Zealand are currently travelling the globe looking for inspiring sustainable projects. Their film called "Kotahi te Ao" means 'there's one world' in Maori." Posted November 5, 2004

Sharon Slack's Home Food Garden

"We rebuilt the carport, put a greenhouse on the front, and stairs up to the roof. I now have a roof-garden. I use a few small wooden planters, and the rest are plastic pots, about 18" in diameter. These are much lighter than the wooden ones, which will be replaced in time. In these pots, I grow my year's supply of garlic, and most of my cooking onions." Updated October 15. 2005

Urban Agriculture and Women's Socio-Economic Empowerment: A Case Study of Kiswa and Luwafu Areas in Kampala City

"Although women are said to be prospering in this informal sector, a number of constraints characterize their survival strategy. This sounds like a contradiction because despite the problems they encounter, most of those involved in urban agriculture are not ready to quit the practice." Posted November 2, 2004

Edible Landscape Project Turns Slums into Gardens

"'Making the Edible Landscape,' a three-year, $1-million effort, this month begins re-engineering cities that are the traditional centres of food consumption into organized hubs for food production. Edible's objective is to change the attitudes of key decision-makers - architects and designers, municipal politicians and managers - by demonstrating ways that agriculture may be legitimized and integrated into urban planning and housing design." Posted October 29, 2004

Record Long Distance Driver Visits Our Garden

"Adventure Traveler Garry Sowerby visited us on his cross Canada environmental journey, Mission Green. Gary holds 4 Guinness World Records for long distance driving including the 1980 World Circumnavigation by Car "Around the World in 77 Days". The GMC Yukon he has driven across Canada is fueled on cellulose ethanol made from straw, the same straw we use in our worm bins, as mulch on our garden beds, and to build our cob shed." Posted October 18, 2004

Lynchburg's Urban Farm

"The 6.5 acre farm and its nine glass greenhouses totaling over 70,000 ft2 will provide an opportunity to implement workforce development and job training opportunities targeted for disabled and disadvantaged individuals. The farm will also provide educational opportunities for all citizens through classes on composting, care and maintenance of plants, lawns, trees, etc.Ê" Posted October 3, 2004

Vancouver's Worm Program Written-up in Der Spiegel Magazine

"Der Spiegel magazine published a story about Vancouver's worm composting program in their well-read magazine on page 182 of issue No. 39, dated September 20, 2004. Their circulation is around 1.1 million and the magazine is distributed in Germany, Switzerland and Austria, as well as all over the world at foreign language newsstands." Posted September 26, 2004

Microfarming Techniques for Yak Producers in the Tibetan Area of Muli in SW Sichuan, China

"A microfarm is a one-hectare family farm that produces food and agricultural products using simplified hydroponics, fertigation and aquaculture. The first field of 435 m² can produce 1 ton of corn, 2 tons of corn fodder, 0.5 ton of broad beans, and a winter crop of alfalfa, wheat or other cover crops suitable for forage." Posted September 19, 2004

Agropolis Themes for 2005 for Masters, Ph.D., and Post-doctoral Research Proposals

* Youth and UA * Training Methods and Materials for Capacity-Building in UA * The Role of Organizations of the Urban Poor in UA * Ecological Production Systems for UA * Green Urbanization (sustainable, ecological, and equitable urbanization in the public, private, and community sectors) * The Contribution of UA to Post-Conflict/Post-Crisis Reconstruction Posted September 15, 2004

Urban Gardens of Caracas, Venezuela - Swords Into Ploughshares

"As part of the progressive social reforms President Chavez has been implementing in Venezuela, a system of communal and hydroponic gardens has been developed in the inner cities, in the slum areas and on army bases. See Carmen Victor's documentary photographs of the communal gardens in Caracas." Posted September 14, 2004

Worm Bins Turn Kitchen Scraps Into Compost

National Geographic's web site features a story on Vancouver's wormbin distribution program. Their on-line site publishes roughly 60 stories a month, and has on average 1.3 million readers a month. This is wonderful coverage and shows the world our City's commitment to a healthier environment. Posted September 14, 2004

22 August 2004 Was International Kitchen Garden Day

"Kitchen Gardeners International (KGI) is a new non-profit network whose mission is to celebrate home-grown, home-prepared foods in their many international forms and to promote their role in building a healthier, tastier, and more sustainable food system. In doing so, KGI seeks to connect, serve, and expand the global community of people who grow some of their own food." Posted September 6, 2004

Cob Oven Cooking Event at City Farmer

Played on CBC radio on August 29, 2004 ... the City Farmer show, recorded on location at the City Farmer garden in Vancouver. Guests include James Barber, Eve Johnson and Assefa Kebede cooking in the cob oven..." Posted September 5, 2004

Micro Eco-Farming: Prospering from Backyard to Small-Acreage in Partnership with the Earth

New Book: "Micro eco-farms fill in spaces that larger sized farms don't attend to. They use back yards, vacant lots, or their family's own small acreage. As they grow in number, it is anyone's guess as to what type of new economical foundation they could create." Posted August 12, 2004

An Urban Food Garden in Malaga, Spain

"Esta es una historia real que demuestra que es posible cultivar un huerto "ecol�gico" en tu casa, casi sin importar donde vivas. Tan sólo necesitas sol, agua y, lo más importante, algo de interés, entusiasmo y amor a la naturaleza. Un tomate criado por tí de forma artesana y natural (sin pesticidas, ni herbicidas, ni abonos químicos) tiene el indescriptible y fantástico sabor de la satisfacción personal." Posted August 12, 2004

Continuous Productive Urban Landscapes - Designing Urban Agriculture for Sustainable Cities

New Book: "The first book on urban agriculture for architects, landscape architects and urban designers. Over 230 images give the reader a clear visual idea about the impact of this pioneering subject. Urban design is shown in practice through international case studies. Chapter One: Carrot and City: A New Urbanism. Chapter Two: Pro Urban Agriculture. Chapter Three: Open Urban Space." Posted August 9, 2004

Environmental Youth Alliance - Urban Agriculture in Vancouver

"EYA youth worked with the Strathcona Community Garden Association to build a Community Nursery so plant material will be more readily available for local urban agriculture projects. Phase one of the project involved the construction of a lockup nursery building in order to securely store plant material and supplies." Posted August 5, 2004

A Mini-Farm Trip to Uzbekistan 2004

"This country is self-sufficient in food and only imports tropical fruits such as bananas. They are more expensive than at home so very few can afford them. Every house has a garden and as you fly over the country all you see is gardens and minifarms." Posted August 5, 2004

Urban Agriculture on the Rooftop

"Rooftops are places of fantasy and imagination - places that sit above the din and chaos of the city, engaged with and yet apart from the city's motion. Rooftops yearn for the sky and yet are grounded to the city through the buildings which they top. What better place could there be for a garden? Or even better, a garden and a source of food?" Thesis in PDF format Posted July 15, 2004

Grow Veggies and Herbs From Your Condo in Vancouver

"Freesia is offering a garden terrace with about 60 personal plots. For an additional $2,800 on top of the selling price, a buyer can purchase one of the 1.5-metre-square gardening plots and a small tool locker." Posted July 12, 2004

Urban Farmers as Extension Domain: The Case of Atteridgeville,(Pretoria, South Africa)

"The article identifies and explains three extension domains among urban farmers among the informal settlements of Atteridgeville. These consist of home gardeners, community-project gardeners, and users of open urban spaces. ... The paper concludes by calling for closer involvement of government and public extension in urban agriculture in the study area because urban farming mainly benefits the poor." PDF download. Posted July 9, 2004

The Rooftop Garden Project - Montreal

"This summer, Alternatives, Santropol Roulant and a range of other partners are building a major demonstration garden on the roof of the University of Quebec's TélTéUniversitTé (TelUQ) building. This 500 square meter garden, situated in the heart of the densely populated Plateau-Mont Royal neighbourhood, will be coordinated and maintained by Santropol Roulant volunteers, providing vegetables for their meals-on-wheels service." Posted July 7, 2004

The Planner in the Garden: A Historical View into the Relationship between Planning and Community Gardens

"A historical review of community garden programs in the United States since the 1890s reveals an ambivalent relationship between community gardens and the planning profession. On one hand, garden programs are praised and supported as local action to serve environmental, social, and individual objectives. On the other hand, because they are perceived as opportunistic and temporary, community gardens are largely ignored in long-range planning. (Journal of Planning History, May 2004) Subcription required for full text." Posted July 6, 2004

Intercultural Garden Projects in Germany

"In Berlin, Munich, Leipzig, Gottingen and Dessau, the initiators were faced with different starting conditions.... And there are passages; passages between origin and host country, between past and present. Here migrants can participate, make use of the knowledge they bring along, get to know new entities, ideas, mechanisms." Posted July 1, 2004

Edmonton, Alberta, Community Gardens

"Currently there are 29 activeÊcommunity gardenÊorganizations. One site has 25 individual sites bringing the total to about 54, and there areÊanother 4-6 community gardensÊin the planning stages. In 2000, a survey indicated there were over 800 families gardening." Posted July 1, 2004

BBC World feature - A Growing Trend - on Urban Agriculture

" 'A Growing Trend' highlights exactly that: how different methods of producing food - small-scale, organic, natural farming and urban agriculture are on the increase. While alternatives to large-scale agriculture are often born out of necessity, these methods are proving to be highly effective at meeting nutritional and economic needs and at the same time helping to build communities and protect the environment." Posted June 18, 2004

RUAF's Urban Agriculture Video

" A ten minute clip is now available on-line. Shot in four cities, in Dakar (Senegal), Hanoi (Vietnam), Dar Es Salaam (Tanzania) and Cuenca (Ecuador)", the video has been produced to facilitate a greater understanding of urban agriculture among policy-makers, urban planners, NGOs, sectoral organizations and other people who can make a contribution to the integration of urban agriculture into urban planning policies, plans and development programmes. Posted May 23, 2004

An Exploration of School Gardening and Its Relationship to Holistic Education

"My paper includes an integration of diverse disciplines, past personal experiences, and an exploration of school gardening as a potential vehicle for holistic education. It explores the commonalties between the disciplines of urban agriculture, ethnobotany, horticulture and human culture, landscape architecture, environmental education and holistic education. " Posted May 23, 2004

Choosing Best Plants For a Dry Summer

"Gardening - A drought tolerant label may not be enough to guarantee survival. Judith Cowan getting ready to plant a Garry oak in the waterwise garden at City Farmer. It is a boulevard garden half a city block long, and Cowan favours mostly native plants such as Rosa woodsii." Posted May 23, 2004

Virtual Tour of City Farmer's Demonstration Garden

This virtual tour was created by Graham Clark in April 2004. You will need QuickTime and the On2 codec installed to view the tour. This software is free and can be downloaded once you click on the link. If your QuickTime software and browser won't play the tour, go to this site and download the On2 QuickTime plugin. On2 Plugin Updated September 13, 2005

The Eglu: A Chicken House for City Farmers.

"Fresh, great tasting food and a healthier lifestyle. Keeping chickens that lay delicious eggs is easy and fun. The Eglu is the world's most stylish and innovative chicken house and is the perfect way to keep chickens as pets. If you live in the middle of a city, in the suburbs or in the countryside, you can start living the good life." Posted April 14 2004

The Vertical Farm

"An entirely new approach to indoor farming must be invented, employing cutting edge technologies. The Vertical Farm must be efficient (cheap to construct and safe to operate). Vertical farms, many stories high, will be situated in the heart of the world's urban centers. If successfully implemented, they offer the promise of urban renewal, sustainable production of a safe and varied food supply (year-round crop production), and the eventual repair of ecosystems that have been sacrificed for horizontal farming. " Posted April 8 2004

A Pattern Language For Community Gardens

"Community gardens are a powerful phenomenon in America today. They represent one way for citizens to satisfy, of their own accord, the need for meaningful community. Based on my experiences visiting seven gardens and talking to dozens of gardeners, I would testify to the success of these gardens in fulfilling these needs." Posted April 7 2004

L.A. Should Cultivate This Rare Urban Seed

"In fact, the garden is an inspirational story - about urban environmentalism, livable cities and the creation of community. Under the auspices of the Los Angeles Food Bank, a group of mostly Latino immigrants, with annual incomes of less than $20,000, built what is now one of the most impressive community gardens in the nation." Posted March 28 2004

Edible Cities from Gobar Times in India

"We cityfolk consider ourselves to be very smart. Not so, discovers Gobar Times. The modern city has a garangutan appetite and is frightfully wasteful. It takes more than it gives. It ingests tonnes and tonnes of cereals, meat, vegetables and fruits grown in rural areas far and wide; chomps, chews and digests all that foodstuff; converts some of it into human energy; burps, and then spews the remaining all out as organic garbage and sewage." Posted March 28 2004

Urban Agriculture Network - Western Pacific - Monthly Newsletter

"Urban agriculture is one counter-measure to food terrorism that must now be considered and developed. ... Good business people know that behind most threats lie opportunities. The threat of food terrorism is an opportunity in disguise for global urban and peri-urban agriculture." Posted March 24 2004

Urban Gardens: Persistence and Change

"This publication is based on a research project which aimed to examine the socio-cultural and biophysical dimensions of urban homegardens in Baguio City, northern Philippines. Includes: the multiple roles and functions of homegardens especially for households along the urban margins; how the urban environment helps shape and is shaped by local homegarden systems; the contribution of local knowledge to the management of homegardens under socio-economic and agroecological transitions." Posted March 19 2004

Food Security in Cuba

"There has been a proliferation of backyard gardening, the so-called patios, propelled by campaigns led by a mass-based neighborhood civic organization, the Committee for the Defense the Revolution (CDR), and reminiscent of the victory gardens movement in the United States during the Second World War. By the summer of 2003, the number of patios in production had exceeded 300,000, with a goal for the future of over half a million patios, primarily aimed at increases in fruit production." Posted March 19 2004

Call For Contributions, Urban Agriculture Magazine, No. 13, Special Issue On Urban And Periurban Forestry

"During recent decades, Urban Forestry has been developed as integrative and interdisciplinary approach encompassing the planning, establishing and management of those urban green areas in which trees are the main element, such as woodlands, parks, gardens, cemeteries, derelict land and former industrial sites, and roadside and square plantations." Posted March 3, 2004

Georgia Center for Urban Agriculture

"Agriculture is a common denominator that connects rural and urban Americans. Agricultural activities in urban and metropolitan areas of the U.S. are significant in terms of the amount of area used, the numbers of jobs provided, and the gross farm sales earned annually when compared with traditional agricultural activities in rural areas." Posted February 28 2004

Simplifed Hydroponics and Urban Agriculture in Uruguay and Ecuador

"Simplified Hydroponics has provided real solutions for low-income families and impoverished communities in many parts of the world. MARTIN CALDEYRO describes one innovative project in Uruguay that has improved family health and living standards, and is a model for other communities in Latin America to follow." Posted February 21 2004

In The Real World, Poor People Practise Urban Agriculture

According to a needs assessment by the Millennium Development Goals Hunger Task Force, all problems of food security in poor countries would be solved if the rich world spent US$70 billion per annum, or 0.3% of its GNP, on addressing them, mainly by building infrastructure. The fact is, they don't, and they are probably not about to do so. Meanwhile, in the real world, poor people practice urban agriculture." Posted February 19 2004

Urban agriculture: What limits?

Don Okpala, Chief of UN-HABITAT's Urban Economy and Finance Branch and Acting Director of its Monitoring and Research Division, comments in Habitat Debate, December, 2003. "In the ongoing debate over urban agriculture, UN-HABITAT focuses on food security and income enhancement for urban populations. The agency is not opposed to urban agriculture as such. But its view is that the practice must be subject to certain conditions and limitations. " Posted February 19 2004

NASA Paper Speaks of Urbanization and Agriculture

NASA says "Though cities account for just 3 percent of continental U.S. land area, the food and fiber that could be grown there rivals current production on all U.S. agricultural lands, which cover 29 percent of the country. Urbanization follows agriculture. Throughout history, highly productive agricultural land brought food, wealth and trade to an area, all of which fostered settlements." Posted February 18 2004

City Farmer's Waterwise Garden

"Waterwise gardening is not synonymous with xeriscaping. Waterwise gardening is a more appropriate explanation for gardening in mesic climates like Vancouver and incorporates the collection and storage of rainwater, soil health, maintenance techniques and the choice of appropriate plant species to create healthy, beautiful gardens. " Posted February 14 2004

Using EM Bokashi in Composting on Saltspring Island

"Personally, I'm not sure how much better bokashi compost is for your garden than plain-old compost, but I can say that stuff does break down very fast in the soil, and that when I dig in the area a month or two later it is absolutely WRITHING with earthworms. Huge masses of them." Posted February 6, 2004

Urban Agriculture Reaches New Heights Through Rooftop Gardening

"A Montreal-based development organization is experimenting with a gardening system called "rooftop simplified hydroponics"ÊÑ a system adapted from the group's experiences in the developing world. During the winter of 2002, with the support of Canada's International Development Research CentreÊ(IDRC), a researcher from the development organization, expanded her knowledge of hydroponics in other countries. She worked with the University of Casablanca in Morocco and the Institute for Simplified Hydroponics in Mexico." Posted February 3, 2004

ACGA Conference: "Gardens of Diversity, Growing Across Cultures" Friday October 1 - Sunday October 3, 2004 Toronto, Ontario

American Community Gardening Association (ACGA) - Themes: Community Development, Conservation and Restoration, Diversity, Entrepreneurial projects, Food Security, Horticulture, Innovations, International activities, Politics and Public Policy, Professional and Organizational Development, Research, Special Needs, Youth, Children, School Gardens. Posted January 28, 2004

Organic Farming in Pakistan

"Organic Products, Social Qualities With Equal And Fair Trade Its Constrain And Future, Composting As An Organic Fertiliser, Producing Pesticide Free Fruits And Vegetables, The Characteristics Of Rabbit Farming, Chiku or Sapodilla The Neglected Fruit of Sindh, Gender Issue In Rural Development Of Sindh In Pakistan." Posted January 21, 2004

City Farmer's "Grow Natural" Gardening Series for 2004

" Growing Grub: An Introduction to Organic Food Gardening, Cob Oven Cooking Classes, June's Bugs, The Grass Class, The Water Tour, Backyard Composting, Wormshops, Soil Secrets, Art in the Garden." Posted January 20, 2004

The Economic Rationale Behind Community Garden Bylaws

"A single owner would not be able to access land as cheaply as a CGO may access land. CGO's are often able to extract low cost leases from the municipalities that control the land, due to the fact that they are not-for-profit (which may explain the selling rule) and because they are composed of many voters." Posted January 18, 2004

Regional Training / Workshop On Urban And Peri-Urban Agriculture, APRIL 25-30, 2004
KATHMANDU, NEPAL

"This training aims to sensitize development practitioners to achieve greater awareness in the Urban and Peri-urban Agriculture (UPA) development process and equip participants with tools for analysis to promote UPA through linking urban-rural for food security, reducing the urban garbage and their pollution by recycling them through composting with women's empowerment and participation and make policies and programs more equitable for women and men. " Posted January 12, 2004

Does Irrigated Urban Agriculture Influence the Transmission of Malaria in the City of Kumasi, Ghana?

"To verify the possible impact of irrigated urban agriculture on malaria transmission in cities, we studied entomological parameters, self-reported malaria episodes, and household-level data in the city of Kumasi, Ghana. A comparison was made between city locations without irrigated agriculture, city locations with irrigated urban vegetable production, and peri-urban (PU) locations with rain-fed agriculture." Posted January 10, 2004

Urban and Metropolitan Agricultural Prospects

Jac Smit, a pioneer urban agriculturalist, wrote this paper in 1978. "North American metropolitan agriculture is likely to have smaller production units, similar to family farms. It is unlikely to have lower production costs, particularly when one includes the cost of overcoming soil and air pollution. However, marketing costs are likely to be much lower with savings in transport, packaging, middlemen and wastage losses." Posted December 17, 2003

Farmer's Celebrate 25th!

"Twenty-five years ago, City Farmer executive director Michael Levenston and fellow environmentalist Bob Woodworth were asked by the then ministry of energy and mining to study ways for city dwellers to conserve energy. " Posted December 1, 2003

Heavy Metal Concentrations in Urban And Peri-Urban Gardens of Dzerzhinsk and Nizhny Novgorod, Russia

"The general heavy metal concentrations in the study area, however, was significantly lower than e.g. in Berlin, Hamburg, Moscow or London, which was attributed to less traffic and potential leaching due to sandy soil texture." Posted December 16, 2003

City Farm Boasts Quality and Jobs - A Tomato Grows in Chicago, and Beets

"The two-thirds-acre City Farm, a Resource Center project, with 1,500 tomato plants and nearly year-round growth of carrots, beets and other root crops, has added some green to the otherwise concrete environment of Cabrini-Green. More plants will take root in the area as the city announced Monday that the urban farm will expand to a nearby one-acre vacant lot." Posted December 1, 2003

Urban Sustainability Tours at City Farmer's Garden

"City Farmer's garden has been open continuously since 1982 at 2150 Maple Street in Vancouver. We demonstrate urban agriculture and various "green" technologies, all of which can be practiced by residents in the city. Urban Agriculture, Backyard Composters, Worm Bins, Water-wise Garden, Natural Lawn Care, Rain Barrels, Compost Toilet, Country Lane, Cob Shed, Garden Gates and Animals in the Garden."

Mayor of Vancouver Proclaims November "City Farmer Month"!!

"AND WHEREAS City Farmer is recognized as one of the leaders in providing service and information out to the world about urban agriculture, waste reduction and sustainability;.NOW, THEREFORE, I, Larry Campbell, Mayor of the City of Vancouver, DO HEREBY PROCLAIM the month of November 2003 as "CITY FARMER MONTH" in the City of Vancouver."

Livestock Keeping in Urban Areas

"Studies have revealed that more than 20 000 households in Bamako keep livestock in town, and thousands more people supply them with inputs or marketing services; over one-third of households surveyed in Harare keep livestock, mainly chickens but also rabbits, pigeons, ducks and turkeys. In Dar-es-Salaam urban farming is the second largest employer after petty trade and labour, and 74 percent of urban farmers keep livestock; and even in densely populated Cairo, 5 percent of households keep animals, especially chickens and pigeons. " Posted November 20, 2003

Lead Levels Of Edibles Grown In Contaminated Residential Soils: A Field Survey

"Some edible portions of the leafy vegetables and herbs, however, were found to have lead levels that, if consumed, could contribute to the total body burden of lead. Therefore, urban gardeners should test the lead levels in their soils and develop strategies to ensure safety.". Posted November 20, 2003

Cawston Community Garden in Kelowna BC

"Three plots are designed for wheelchair access (6'x2') and 10 plots are designed for general access (4'x4'). The Committee will be alloting plots based on need and availability.". Posted November 16, 2003

January 31, 2004 Application Deadline for the AGROPOLIS Awards

"AGROPOLIS International Graduate Research Awards in Urban Agriculture - application forms can be obtained from the Cities Feeding People website in English, French, and Spanish and also in Arabic (not yet posted)". Posted November 11, 2003

Urban Agriculture in Kano, Nigeria - Three Reports

They are: "Feeding Africa's urban poor: urban and peri-urban horticulture in Kano, Nigeria", "Urban agriculture under threat: the land security question in Kano, Nigeria", and "Water, land and health in urban and peri-urban food production: the case of Kano, Nigeria". Posted November 2, 2003

Feeding Africa's Growing Cities Into The 21st Century: The Potential Of Urban Agriculture

"From a survey of literature and detailed empirical evidence from Kano and Dar es Salaam, this paper presents a framework for analysing urban agriculture and proposes a number of policy recommendations which could possibly enhance its future sustainability." Posted November 2, 2003

Urban and Peri-Urban Agriculture - A briefing guide for the successful implementation of Urban and Peri-urban Agriculture in Developing Countries and Countries of Transition

FAO's "Food For the Cities" web page links to a number of excellent reports in PDF format. As well as the title shown above by Dr. Alex Drescher, there are three other files by the same author titled: "SOFA - Special Chapter on Urbanization "Urbanization - Linking Development Across the Changing Landscape" Updated October 26, 2003

Kenya - Experts Call for Urban Farming Policy

"According to Eric Kisiangani of ITDG "officially sanctioned and promoted, urban agriculture could become an important component of urban development and make more food available to the urban poor in Kenya besides providing employment in a moribund economy that Kenya is"." Updated October 26, 2003

British Pathe News Reels Show Historic War Garden Programs

"You have to see the clip of the chimpanzee dressed in clothes using tools to dig in his vegetable patch, or the children digging in allotments in amongst bombed out buildings after the Blitz in London. Then there are the costumed British actors advising people to prepare their winter gardens and still another film of school children watering gardens during WW1 dressed in outfits from fashion long gone, - unbelievable. " Posted October 22, 2003

E-Conference: Optimising Agricultural Land Use In The City Area - Access to land and water, adequate norms and regulations, integration in land use planning. 3-22 NOVEMBER 2003

"Many of the urban poor would take up urban agriculture for a living if they knew how to get access to land. Many cities in developing countries have much land in public ownership, with serious land use inefficiencies. Often one encounters many unused open spaces within the city boundaries eg., land earmarked for industry, infrastructure or housing but not yet developed, unused private land due to speculation, etc." Posted October 17, 2003

Kathmandu Rooftop Organic-Hydroponics Project (KROHP)

"Combining composting and locally constructed 'simplified' hydroponics technologies, along with grey and rainwater collection for irrigation, this project encourages a form of urban agriculture that integrates energy and resource efficient production to create an innovative and sustainable industry." Updated October 13, 2003

City Farmer's Cob Shed - It has a Living Green Roof

Sculptor, George Rammell, donates Haida artist Bill Reid's clay to our cob project. "The clay I provided belonged to Haida artist Bill Reid. It provided the form for many of Bill's sculpture projects including the Whale at the aquarium, and the huge bronze Spirit Canoe at the airport." Updated October 9, 2003

City Farmer's Green Roof on the Cob Shed

Photos of the roof planted, our goat, and Arctic roof gardens from long ago. Posted October 9, 2003

City Farmer's Country Lane

Vancouver City Council passed a report to fund three demonstration "Country Lanes". These lanes have permeable surfaces that allow stormwater to flow into the earth rather than drain into the sewers. Updated October 9, 2003

Green Roofs, An Icon For Our Urban Future

"Roofs able to hold the weight of 12 to 18 inches of soil can successfully grow large quantities of produce such as hot and green peppers, cucumbers, sweet potato, tomatoes, and eggplant. With ongoing research and development of lightweight growing media, rooftop greenhouses, and hydroponic techniques, the potential to grow crops on a wider range of rooftops will continue to increase." Posted October 10, 2001

Farm Experiment Thrives In The City - Philadelphia

"Farmers Lori Albright (left), 32, and Nicole Shelly, 28, have worked since March on the farm, which is expected to gross $25,000 this year. The pair usually work 45-hour weeks for $7 an hour. " Posted October 8, 2001

Design, Analysis and Management of Urban Agriculture For Resilient Communities - A Course

For people in policy formulation and action planning, January 12 - 23rd, 2004. Wageningen, The Netherlands. "The course adresses promises and drawbacks of urban agriculture. It uses modern system approaches to study practical experiences, challenges and breakthroughs as brought forward by the participants. Insights from architecture, chaos theory, ecology, social science, agriculture, energy-supply and logistics provide new avenues in problems that are difficult to deal with in traditional thinking." Posted October 6, 2001

Community Gardening In The City Of Ottawa

"There are 19 community gardens currently in the City of Ottawa, with approximately 1,080 gardeners. Fourteen of the 19 community gardens are currently on land owned by the City of Ottawa; two are on church property, two are on private land, and one is on property owned by the University of Ottawa. The Gloucester Allotment Garden Association has two locations, one of these is on NCC land leased by the City and the other is on City property." Posted September 14, 2001

Green Roof on our Cob Garden Shed

See all the stages involved in building a green roof. Posted September 12, 2003

BC Mushrooms - Non-Timber Forest Products (NTFP)

"The pine mushroom (Tricholoma magnivelare), is by far the most valuable commercially harvested mushroom (in BC). Other valuable edible mushrooms are the chanterelles, morels, lobsters, boletes, cauliflowers and hedgehogs." Posted September 2, 2003

New Agricultuist Magazine - Focus on Urban Agriculture

"Often illegal, and usually ignored by planners and policy-makers, the growing of crops and keeping of livestock by town and city dwellers creates both opportunities and risks. Urban consumers may enjoy improved availability of fresh vegetables, milk or poultry products." Posted August 31, 2003

2003 AGROPOLIS Awardees

12 new urban agriculture research awards presented, e.g. "Impact of wastewater irrigation on crops and consumers in Kumasi, Accra, and Tamale [Ghana]" and "Evaluation of the socio-economic determinants and benefits of urban agriculture: The case of Kadoma, Zimbabwe" Posted August 31, 2003

Advisers or spies? Why some people fear communist infiltration in this Caracas garden. Fears of Cuban 'infiltration' in Venezuela

"The controversy has arisen because many of the advisers assisting with the gardening programme are Cubans. And Mr Chavez's opponents, who accuse him of desiring to convert Venezuela into a communist dictatorship similar to that led by his friend, Cuban leader Fidel Castro, suspect that the Cubans are here to do more than teach farming." Posted August 24, 2003

The Garden City Handbook

PDF download. "Over the past two years, Greater Victoria has lost two of its precious community gardens to development. The Handbook provides a description of the current context and circumstances of community gardens across the region. ... It offers a range of alternatives for ensuring that community gardens are protected and provides community groups with guidance for starting gardens and ensuring that they thrive over the long term." Posted August 20, 2003

Seeds of Success

PDF download. "Cities across Canada and the United States offer models for creating and maintaining community gardens. Seeds of Success reveals the range and breadth of possibilities for integrating community gardens into the fabric of communities and protecting these gardens from development. ... Within smaller cities, including Inuvik, Waterloo and Bloomington, local governments and nonprofit groups are adapting community gardens to the specific needs of their citizens." Posted August 20, 2003

Landmarks: A touch of Tolkien Emerges at Kits Demo Garden

Story in the West Ender newspaper. "When completed, the tool shed will have a living green roof, a surrounding bench area and an impressively sculpted cob cooking oven. It will be festooned with a relief sculpture depicting the stratification beneath the topsoil surface: rocks, roots, old fossils, shells and some gnome-like creatures. The door to the structure is a work of art itself, resembling a rounded ship's hull, and several inches thick." Posted July 18, 2003

Drought Tolerant Plant List for Vancouver City Boulevards

"List compiled by volunteer Master Gardeners from Van Dusen Botanical Garden for the Prince Edward Street Waterwise Blooming Boulevard Project. Because soil and water conditions vary, results cannot be guaranteed. This list is intended as a guide to those plants which have proven drought tolerant in average conditions"(Large page/slow loading) Posted July 13, 2003

The Status Of Urban And Peri-Urban Agriculture In Windhoek And Oshakati, Namibia

"The study showed that urban and peri-urban agriculture is practised by over 70% of the residents of Windhoek and Oshakati, and that over 23 types of vegetables and fruit trees are grown on tiny plots. Most of the produce is consumed by the household and contributes to improvement of their nutritional status. The absence of policy on urban and peri-urban agriculture is seen as a serious constraint towards its intensification and development." Posted July 9, 2003

Cob Garden Shed Slideshow 2

We're still at it and it's now July. Watch the walls go up in this slide show. The roof is coming next! Posted July 9, 2003

Call For Contributions, Urban Agriculture Magazine, No. 11, Access to Land for Urban Agriculture: November 2003 and No. 12: Gender in Urban Agriculture: January 2004

"Access to land is of importance to poor urban families that already have taken up urban agriculture as part of their survival strategy in the city. ... In many cities the large majority of the urban farmers are women (in average around 65%). In most cases it is the woman who is responsible for household food security." Posted July 8, 2003

Cob Garden Shed Slideshow 1

During the week June 9 - June 15, 2003, John Freeman, Robin and Grant showed workshop participants how to build with cob at the City Farmer Demonstration Garden. Posted June 16, 2003

Cob Oven Slideshow

Over the weekend May 23, 24 and 25, 2003, John Freeman, his staff and volunteers (mostly from Mountain Equipment Co-op) built a cob oven at the City Farmer Demonstration Garden. Posted June 2, 2003

Country Lane Slideshow

The City of Vancouver is building its second demonstration "Country Lane" leading up to the Vancouver Compost Demonstration Garden. Watch the construction taking place. Posted June 2, 2003

New Village Journal: Issue Two: Urban Agriculture

Urban Agriculture: A Revolutionary Model for Economic Development Forward and Profiles by Chris Lazarus
Urban Aquaculture by Beth Ferguson
Profiles in Urban Agriculture
The Food Project- Roxbury and Lincoln, Massachusetts
Isles Community Farm- Trenton, New Jersey
Fairview Gardens- Goleta, California
Annex Organics/ Field to Table- Toronto, Ontario
Greensgrow Farm- Philadelphia, Pennsylvania
Growing Home- Chicago, Illinois
Village of Arts and Humanities- Philadelphia, Pennsylvania
The Urban Agriculture Network- Washington, D.C.
Resources in Urban Agriculture
Updated May 3, 2003

New Village Journal: Premier Issue: Community Gardens

Reclaiming the Sacred Commons (Full article in Acrobat PDF format, 370K) by Karl Linn
The Death of Little Puerto Rico: New York City Gardens Plowed Under by Urban Development by Sarah Fegusen
Brief History of Grassroots Greening in New York City by Sarah Fergusen
Resources: Community Gardening
Updated May 3, 2003

Cuba Exports City Farming 'Revolution' to Venezuela

"Inspired by Cuba's system of urban market gardens, which has been operating for several years, left-wing President Hugo Chavez has ordered the creation of similar intensive city plots across Venezuela in a bid to develop food self-sufficiency in the world's No. 5 oil exporter. Inside Fuerte Tiuna military headquarters, soldiers of the crack Ayala armored battalion supervised by Cuban instructors have swapped their rifles for shovels and hoes to tend neat rows of lettuce, tomatoes, carrots, coriander, and parsley." Posted April 28, 2003

A Healthy Garden is a Healthy Ecosystem

"The best way to solve plant health and pest and disease problems is not by cleaning the garden and applying fertilizers and pesticides. Simple horticultural practices such as soil improvement, effective deep watering and increasing the variety of plant material are the best way to create a stable and healthy garden." Posted April 21, 2003

Family Business Garden: A New Dimension Of Urban Agricultural Extension In Colombo, Sri Lanka

"The Census of Population and Housing of Sri Lanka-2001 shows that urban population has risen and the highest urban population of 54.7% is concentrated in the Colombo district. The main theme of the concept of Family Business Garden is to stress the need in converting simple form of home gardening or kitchen gardening into the entrepreneurship development venture on the long-term basis. It based on conservation of resources and aesthetic values in association with mental satisfaction." Posted April 12, 2003

Seeds Of Our City : Case Studies From Eight Diverse Community Gardens

"We were interested in learning how much food can be grown in the typical community garden plot, and what kind of impact it has on the food security of the people involved. Essential to this study was the involvement of a core of dedicated gardeners who settled in Canada from many different countries: China, Ghana, Jamaica, Sri Lanka, and Vietnam." Posted April 1, 2003

The Garden Project

"The Garden Project, a nine-year-old gardening and job-training program, has provided free food to soup kitchens and residents of the Bay Area's poorest communities for years. Based at the San Francisco County Jail, the program trains 15 ex-prisoners each year to grow organic vegetables and helps them make the transition into a legal working life." Posted April 1, 2003

Argentine Postage Stamps Celebrate Urban Agriculture

"The design of the first stamp is of two united hands that tend to the gardens and the produce they yield, while the other stamp depicts a stalk of corn. Both have as a background, city plans, evoking the urban context of community gardens. -- The series takes into the account the current state of the economy in the Argentine Republic, and recognizes its terrible effect on the large numbers of families who live below the poverty line and it acknowledges the effects of the lack of food on these people." Posted March 23, 2003

Supporting and Encouraging Initiatives of Urban Agriculture in Gaza Refugees Camps

"The low standard of living in Gaza strip, the low income of individuals, the mass unemployment, the rapid population increase, ... a great number of families living in and off the cities, depend on Urban Agriculture to create job opportunities to elevate their standard of living. The majority of refugees in camps and city dwellers in Gaza Strip are farmers in origin." Posted March 22, 2003

Arachnophobia in the Garden of Food and Flowers

"Then I turned the page to the real horror show - the three monsters known as House Spiders. In university I called them the Cheap Basement Suite Spiders. The first of this group is the Barn Funnel Weaver. This is the guy making those thick webs in dark, damp basements and in the corners of old house windows in horror movies. The Hobo Spider has an "alarmingly ugly bite" and the Giant House Spider, which is in the author's words "quite frankly, the creepiest bug in the whole darn province of BC." " Posted March 19, 2003

Aquaponics

"Aquaponics is the combination of intensive aquaculture (fish farming) and hydroponics (growing plants without soil). In an aquaponic system, the fish consume food and excrete waste. Beneficial bacteria convert the waste to nitrate which the plants use in the growth process. Many backyard gardeners are setting up systems to grow hundreds of pounds of fish and all the fresh vegetables a family needs." Posted March 17, 2003

Wastewater's Value in Urban and Peri-urban Agriculture

"The use of urban wastewater in agriculture is a centuries old practice that is receiving renewed attention with the increasing scarcity of fresh water resources in many arid and semi-arid regions. Driven by rapid urbanization and growing wastewater volumes, wastewater is widely used as a low-cost alternative to conventional irrigation water; it supports livelihoods and generates considerable value in urban and peri-urban agriculture despite the health and environmental risks associated with this practice." Posted March 5, 2003

In my Backyard: Growing a Sense of Place in Bankside

"In the book you will discover: How a Bangladeshi garden group has helped create friendships, a sense of community and some tasty meals; Why sheep and goats were grazing in the middle of an inner-London local park; That Bankside used to be two riverside gardens, with orchards and vineyards." Posted March 3, 2003

Feast Your Eyes: The Unexpected Beauty of Vegetable Gardens

"Pennington tells a terrific story of the rise and fall of ornamental vegetable gardening between the seventeenth and the nineteenth centuries, and its comeback in the twentieth. The cast of supporting characters is made up of both familiar figures (Thomas Jefferson, Alexander Pope, etc.) and obscure heroes of horticulture and landscape architecture." Posted March 3, 2003

Urban Cultivation In Accra: An Examination Of The Nature, Practices, Problems, Potentials And Urban Planning Implications

"Exotic vegetables and ornamental crops from Europe were purposely grown to feed the European settlers and to beautify their residences; the cultivation of vegetables was confined to the residences of European civil servants and merchants and the castles and forts which served as both the seat of government and the homes of the colonial administrators." Posted February 13, 2003

The Richmond Fruit Tree Project

"Plums, apples and pears are picked from August through into October from the gardens of Richmond residents. A fruit tree registry and a fruit identification program are in the works." Posted February 13, 2003

Changes In Official Attitudes Towards Urban Agriculture In Accra

"This paper is about urban agriculture, which is one of the most important informal sector activities chosen by urban dwellers in Accra. It explains why officials initially held negative attitudes toward urban agriculture. It also identifies the factors that contributed to changing official attitudes. It is noted that Ghanaian officials began supporting and even encouraging urban agriculture once they realized the importance of the practice." Posted February 13, 2003

Reusing Organic Solid Waste In Urban Farming In African Cities: A Challenge For Urban Planners

"Urban and rural communities in Africa have a long history of resource conservation through waste reuse and the application of composted organic waste for farming. This paper examines the concept of waste reuse urban farming (WRUF) as a unique local solution to address municipal solid waste problems in African cities." Posted February 13, 2003

Green Roofs

"They also create space for food production in the city. The herbs used on some 6000 meals a day served at Toronto's Royal York Hotel come fresh-picked from the hotel roof. In Vancouver, chefs at the Fairmont Waterfront Hotel help pay for the roofs over their heads by harvesting $30,0000 a year worth of food, including original marsh mallows used for exotic treats." Posted January 23, 2003

Ministry of Agriculture Allotment and Garden Guides - 1945

"A series of 8 pamphlets published by the U.K. Ministry of Agriculture at its wartime base at the Berri Court Hotel in Lytham St. Annes, Lancashire, England. The pamphlets were published for January through July and December 1945 '...to help you to get better results from your vegetable plot and your fruit garden.' " Posted January 19, 2003

Microfarming at High Latitudes: A Resource for Small-scale, Cold-climate, Food security

"I'm also concerned mainly with special conditions encountered in cold weather climates at high latitudes, that is, above 40 degrees north latitude. I am located at 61 degrees 36 minutes north. Most of the garden books I've read dealing with northern climates, define the far north as the upper peninsula of Michigan. Most never venture into Canada, and very few even mention Alaska." Posted January 17, 2003

Introductory Manual for Greening Roofs

"This manual provides a practical introduction to building green roofs in Canada. It outlines the economic and environmental benefits to green roofs as well as barriers such as safety and maintenance issues. The manual gives a thorough discussion of design and construction considerations including loading, building codes, microclimate, membranes, growing medium and drainage."(PDF File) Posted January 17, 2003

450,000 Huertas or Vegetable Gardens in Argentina

"Most of them have emerged since the mid-1990s. The average size of the huertas is 100 square metres for family-run plots, 200 square metres for schools and 1,000 square metres for community plots. Around 2.5 million people receive some food from the plots, and there are now more than 5,600 school plots and 2,300 community plots." Posted January 15, 2003

Taiwan Urban Agriculture

"As you can see, despite the urban chaos, the steep slopes of the area allow for much of the space to be utilized for agriculture. Much of the green space that you can see has some kind of agriculture, whether it be food crops or flowers." (This travel journal will be updated over the next few months.) Posted January 8, 2003

Victory Garden Contest Winner 1942

"My grandfather (Jack Reading) won 1st prize in the 'Vancouver Sun' Victory Garden contest in 1942. I have photos of the garden, the prize letter from the Sun and the original newspaper clipping with all the various winners names." Posted December 28, 2002

Botswana Civic Leaders Visit Toronto Community Gardens

Solomon Boye, originally trained in his native Ghana, takes over. Gardens are wonderful for young people who are feeling lost and angry, he says. "We tell them that nature's laws are relentless; if you don't seed, you won't harvest, if you don't care for the plants, they will die. It is not adults who are demanding obedience. It is nature demanding cooperation." Posted December 27, 2002

City Farmer - Site to Visit - Garden Inspired Tourism

"Garden Inspired Tourism's mission is to act as a catalyst and to facilitate the development and promotion of BC as a globally recognized garden interest destination. Beautiful British Columbia offers year round garden interest with seasonal showings beginning as early as February and lingering on until November, and with unique winter gardens and festivals." Posted December 25, 2002

Urban Community Gardens Fight To Save Their Space

"New York City's community gardeners have been waiting anxiously for more than two years to learn if the green spaces they love will escape the bulldozer. In 2000, New York's Attorney General, Eliot Spitzer, filed a lawsuit that froze construction of 2,922 apartments scheduled to be built on current community garden sites." Posted December 25, 2002

Southeast False Creek Urban Agriculture Strategy

"While the study of urban agriculture has gained considerable momentum in North America and elsewhere, and even become fashionable in recent years, this study may be the first of its kind in North America to focus solely on the role that food-related activity and urban agriculture could play in the comprehensive planning of a new neighbourhood." Posted December 15, 2002

A Training Manual on Urban And Peri-Urban Agriculture (For Nepal)

"The training manual has suggestions, ideas, recommendations and technologies which can contribute to UPA development in Nepal. Urban and Peri Urban Agriculture (UPA) has been in existence in Nepal since time immemorial. The Jyapus of Kathmandu were excellent producers of food in the valley. Similar groups are also found in other parts of Nepal. This training manual will present information which will help to improve traditional technologies. It will present new appropriate technologies which will be useful to the urban and peri-urban farmers in food production, processing, preservation and utilization. (21,000 words)" Posted December 10, 2002

Urban and Peri-Urban Agriculture in Nepal (Partners and Expertise)

"Urban population is increasing in all the urban areas in Nepal. More satellite towns are getting established and older cities are getting more crowded. Traditional agricultural systems are changing. Farming in or around urban and peri urban areas is getting more sophisticated and focused. This publication can be a useful companion/reference material for anyone who is interested in urban and peri urban agriculture in Nepal. The names and addresses presented in this publication were collected from within the whole country. (12,000 words)" Posted December 10, 2002

Urban and Peri-Urban Agriculture Directory (People, Organizations and Enterprises - Nepal)

"This is a directory of addresses of government departments, aid agencies, international and national non-governmental organizations, community based organizations, and individuals who are involved in urban and peri urban agriculture in Nepal. Urban and peri urban agriculture does not receive the importance it deserves from the government or other donor agencies because it is mostly practiced by the poorer section of the urban population. This group own small pieces of land, practice customary farming practices and produce food to meet the needs of the family and mainly of their traditional customers. (16,000 words)" Posted December 10, 2002

Call For Contributions, Urban Agriculture Magazine, No. 9, Financing Of Urban Agriculture

"Financing urban agriculture is broader than just the provision of credit to urban farmers. Next to formal credit, other forms of financing are considered, like informal loans, tax incentives, controlled land rent, subsidies on certain inputs, investment (of Government or private sector) in infrastructure or technologies, etcetera." Posted November 26, 2002

The Rainwater Harvesting CD

"The information has been collected from all over the world, from South and North, and from rural and urban areas. The emphasis is on domestic use of rainwater harvesting. The CTA Study Visit in Kenya shows many photos (additionally explained by voice) of different possibilities of rainwater harvesting used in Kenya." Posted November 23, 2002

"Home Grown" by the Worldwatch Institute

"In the United States, food typically travels between 1,500 and 2,500 miles from farm to plate, as much as 25 percent farther than in 1980. For some, the long-distance food system offers unparalleled choice. But it often runs roughshod over local cuisines, varieties, and agriculture, while consuming staggering amounts of fuel, generating greenhouse gases, eroding the pleasures of face-to-face interactions around food, and compromising food security." Posted November 21, 2002

Urban Fringe Agriculture

Report of the Asian Productivity Organization (APO) Seminar on Urban Fringe Agriculture held in Tokyo from 17 to 24 May, 2000. Examples of Stories: Transition of Urban Farmland Policy and Development of New Urban Agriculture in Japan (Kenji Ishihara), and the Present Situation of Urban Agriculture and Related Problems (Mitsuzo Gotoh) Posted November 18, 2002

An Olympic Sized Urban Agriculture Idea from Greece

... from the Olympic Village Athens 2004 architectural team who prepared the greenest proposal... "Hydroponic plantations on the roof, fish farming for nitrate water purification, bioclimatic roads, active thermal capacity of the structure with use of inter-seasonal thermal storage, almost all of the architects aspirations are found in this proposal." Posted November 29, 2002

Community-Based Urban Agriculture As History And Future:

Jac Smit ... "It is clear reviewing 25 years of studies of urban agriculture that urban farming is expanding more rapidly than rural agriculture or agriculture as a whole. No surprise, it's happening in an urbanizing world. Agriculture is reinventing itself to fit the new reality of human settlement on the earth." Posted November 6, 2002

40% of Toronto Households Grow Food says City Farmer

"These figures represent more than two and one half million people in Greater Toronto and Vancouver who live in households growing vegetables, fruit, berries, nuts or herbs in their yard, balcony or community garden."" Posted November 6, 2002

Homestead Food Production - A Strategy to Combat Malnutrition & Poverty

"Home Gardening is a key program activity for Helen Keller International (HKI) in the Asia-Pacific region. In 1988, HKI conducted a pilot Home Gardening project among 1,000 households in Bangladesh. Today, the Gardening and Nutrition Education Surveillance Project (NGNESP) has achieved nationwide coverage and reaches approximately 800,000 households throughout the country - indeed it is the largest program of its kind in the world." 142 pages, 2001, large PDF (9.7 MB)
November 5, 2002

City Farmer Cob Workshop: June 9 - June 15, 2003

One week intensive - limited enrollment - $400. City Farmer's Compost Demonstration Garden in Kitsilano is to be the site of Vancouver's first cob garden shed. Cob is an ancient building method using clay, sand and straw. Building with earthen materials pre-dates the pyramids.
Updated January 3, 2003

Philippine References - Urban Agriculture

12 papers and a book are referenced, including: "Allotment Gardens for the Philippines: A Contribution to Urban Food Security"; "Quality and quantity requirements for vegetables by private households, vendors and institutional users in a Philippine urban setting"; "Urban Agriculture - A Step-By-Step Guide To Successful Container Gardening in the City"; and "Appropriate methods for microenterprise development in urban agriculture". Posted October 21, 2002

The Urban Agriculture Network (UAN) President's Annual Report 2001/2002

"The importance of urban agriculture is becoming recognized as an important element of programs for not only food security, but also for sustainable urban development and efficient provision of the necessities to low-income families. UAN wants to expand its central coordinating role in making urban agriculture a reality throughout the world." Posted October 11, 2002

44% of Vancouver Households Grow Food says City Farmer

"This is the first time in Canadian history a question of this sort has been asked by a professional pollster and the result is significant," says Michael Levenston, Executive Director of the 25-year-old non-profit society based in Vancouver. "That figure represents more than three-quarters of a million people in Greater Vancouver who live in households growing vegetables, fruit, berries, nuts or herbs in their yard, balcony or community garden." Posted October 6, 2002

Toronto's Official Plan from the Perspective of Community Gardening and Urban Agriculture

"'Urban agriculture' is often viewed as an oxymoron. The city displaces agricultural land; it doesn't create it. Or so conventional wisdom would suggest. Yet, in cities around the world, urban agriculture and a city's role in supporting it, has gained new prominence." Posted October 3, 2002

A Deeper Ecology: Community Gardens in the Urban Environment

"In their article, Kameshwari Pothukuchi and Jerome L. Kaufman point out that it is the food system that is missing "from the writing of planning scholars, from the plans prepared by planning practitioners, and from the classrooms in which planning students are taught". Discounting the food system as part of a community development plan, which helps to strengthen the sense of place and belonging and aids in improving the overall environmental quality of an area, is an opportunity lost." Posted September 30, 2002

The Rural-Urban Interface, Idealistic Visions and Current Projects in Lisbon, Portugal And Santiago, Chile. -- La Interfase Urbano Rural, Idealidades Y Proyectos. Acerca De Los Casos De Lisboa, Portugal, Y Santiago De Chile.

12,000 word paper in Spanish. "Urban and peri-urban agriculture successful practises are presented as examples to be followed by other big cities, intended to reduce socio-economic differences, and to diminish the occurrence of hazards as floods, soil contamination, air pollution and green spaces retraction within metropolitan areas." Posted September 27, 2002

The Mango City: Urban Agriculture in Belém, Brazil

"It is a tribute paid to a hard working and ingenious people, who against all odds survive in one of the poorest metropolis in Latin America, frequently complementing their monthly income with fruits, herbs, spices, medicinal plants, and all sorts of animals, cropped or raised in front and backyards, in idle public and private plots, existent either within the urban tissue or in the wider peri-urban areas." Posted September 24, 2002

Inuvik Community Greenhouse - Arctic Food Growing!

Inuvik, which means "Living Place" in Inuvialuktun, is a town of 3200 in the upper corner of Canada's North West Territories. It enjoys 56 days of twenty-four hours of daylight (late June, July and part of August) and has 30 days without sunlight mostly in the month of December. "We are the most Northern commercial greenhouse in North America and the largest community greenhouse of it's kind on the planet." Updated December 3, 2002

Greensgrow Philadelphia Project

"Begun as a commercial hydroponics lettuce farm supplying high-end gourmet greens to restaurants, Greensgrow now operates a CSA and Farm Market while continuing to serve the Philadelphia restaurant community with the products of our and other local farms. We serve as a clearinghouse of information on urban agriculture issues [and] advocate adoption of urban agriculture as a tool for neighborhood redevelopment..." Posted September 19, 2002

Rural Allotments and Sustainable Development: A Japanese Perspective

"Allotment gardens first appeared in urban Japan in the 1920s (Kinoshima, 1994), and enjoyed only limited success, even in the preferred kleingarten model, prior to the Pacific War. With the outbreak of hostilities, the same enthusiasm for growing vegetables which had British and American gardeners "digging for victory" swept Japan as well, and vacant plots of land everywhere were brought into cultivation." Posted September 19, 2002

Urban Farming - Reconnecting the City to the Land - by Michael Ableman

"And so in memory of the thousands of people who lost their lives in New York, I propose that a portion of the former site of the World Trade Center be converted to an urban farm, replete with greenhouses and kitchens and an education center. I propose that this farm be established to provide food and jobs year-round to those in need and become a model of a local agriculture-based economy that we can look to as the global and military one begins to crumble." Posted September 16, 2002

Tiny Bubbles to Make Your Garden Grow

"How much fuel energy does it take to grow tomatoes in a Lanark County greenhouse in January when it's, like, -10 C outside? Well, if you're Kathryn and Ross Elliott of "Lively Up" Winter Harvest, less than $6 a month worth, or about $70 a year. That's instead of an estimated $3,000 a year to run a comparably sized greenhouse heated with propane or natural gas." Posted September 16, 2002

Growing Gardens

"We serve the St Johns, north, inner north/northeast and outer southeast low-income areas of Portland, Oregon. Requests for gardeners come by word of mouth, presentations to groups such as the WIC (Women, Infant and Children) programs, as well as strategic contacts made by staff to housing agencies such as the Housing Authority of Portland and local public schools." Posted September 15, 2002

Vacant Land in Latin American Cities

"As long as significant amounts of urban land remain unoccupied, equally important numbers of poor urban residents will continue to occupy land lacking infrastructure of services, located in areas not appropriate for urban development. This pattern both creates precarious habitats and deepens the processes of socio-spatial segregation." Posted September 14, 2002

City of Vancouver May Ban Cosmetic Use of Pesticides on Lawns and Gardens.

"The use of Integrated Pest Management on public lands has illustrated that significant reductions in the use of pesticides on lawns and gardens can be achieved without sacrificing overall landscape quality. This direction would further reduce or eliminate both known or possible environmental and health risks." Council Decisions on Report. Updated September 16, 2002

Indigenous African Food Crops and Useful Plants: Their Preparation for Food, and Home Gardens

Here is a report with information on home gardens in Kenya, Edo and Delta States of Nigeria, Anambra, Enugu, Benue, and Kogi States of Nigeria, Southeastern Nigeria, Northern Nigeria, West Africa, Cameroon, and Ghana, Eastern and Southern Africa, Zimbabwe, Tanzania, Niger, Ethiopia, Ghana. The whole book is available as a PDF. Posted August 22, 2002

Transition to Ecological Urban Agriculture: A Challenge

Urban Agriculture Magazine May, No. 6, March 2002 "Ecological agriculture is seen as especially relevant to the urban setting. The introduction in rural settings of ecological practices is still debated, although it seems that the call for the coexistence of both conventional and ecological farming in an adequate mix seems to be the best option." Posted August 20, 2002

Evaluating the Potential of Green Roof Agriculture

"I established an experimental vegetable garden on the green roof of the Trent University Environmental Sciences building. I was looking at the suitability of green roofs for urban agriculture, comparing different crops and growing conditions." Posted July 28, 2002

Small-Scale Farming and Gardens in Urban and Rural Areas - Working Group, Humboldt University, Berlin

"Gardens and small-holders agriculture belong to the informal economy - newly rediscovered in the public discourse as a result of increasing joblessness. In the old society, yard and garden were indispensable parts of the oikos, as Otto Brunner called the 'whole house'. Still today gardens, small animal holding and self-subsistence agriculture belong to the domain of the home economy. Household and food growing constitute actually the primary, basic sector of the economy." Elisabeth Meyer-Renschhausen (In both German and English) Posted July 16, 2002

FAO Journal includes Urban Agriculture Articles

Food, Nutrition and Agriculture No. 29, 2001, includes articles such as "Cities of the Future: urban agriculture in the third millennium" and "Peri-urban agriculture in Delhi, India." "Farming, processing and selling food generates income for urban households and enables families to spend more on non-food items (e.g. transport, housing, school fees, health care), which can have an impact on nutritional status." Posted July 8, 2002

Nyanga Declaration on Urban and Peri-Urban Agriculture in Zimbabwe

"Urging local authorities to promote Urban and Peri-urban Agriculture in their cities, develop appropriate incentives and other policies necessary for its growth, mainstream urban food security within their operations and promote the collection and dissemination of information on Urban and Peri-urban Agriculture activities in their territorial planning areas." Posted July 3, 2002

Why Hawked Milk Can Save Your Baby

"Historical and scientific evidence shows that, after boiling, milk can actually save, not kill, your baby by providing essential nutrients. If boiling milk were ineffective as implied in the article, most Kenyans who each day buy raw milk, boil and consume it would be sick each day. And as we all know from our own day-to-day experience, we do not get sick from drinking chai with maziwa." Posted July 3, 2002

Urban Agriculture Study - Consulting Services - RFP

"The City of Vancouver Engineering Services is inviting proposals for Professional Services to complete an Urban Agriculture Study for the proposed sustainable community to be located on the south east shore of False Creek near downtown Vancouver. The study will be incorporated into the Official Development Plan to direct development of the site including public infrastructure, private development, and community facilities." Posted June 28, 2002

"Return of Lenin" (to a Swedish allotment garden) - a short film

"In 1917 Lenin passed through Stockholm on his way to the Russian Revolution. Anna Lindhagen invited Lenin to the allotment gardens of "Barnangen" to show all its benefits. Lenin was totally unresponsive to this, - to poke in the soil was to prepare the ground for political laziness in the class struggle. The workers shouldn't be occupied, with gardening, they should rather devote themselves to the proletarian revolution. - " Posted June 17, 2002

City Farmer's Country Count

"Therefore City Farmer still has over 50 "countries" still to collect in order make sure everyone has heard about urban agriculture. Like stamp collectors we await the arrival of such rare finds as the Comoros(KM); the Holy See (Vatican City State)(VA); Kiribati(KI); Antarctica(AQ); and Western Sahara(EH)." Posted June 15, 2002

The Love Garden - Can love be found over a compost bin?

"Our first date was at the garden. Take-out Chinese at the picnic table. I had my head in a compost bin when he walked through the garden gate. 'Hello,' he said. I looked up and there he was. Rumpled but stylish New York, with a generous dash of West Coast outdoorsman (translation: fleece), and, I recoiled, a beard and moustache." Posted June 14, 2002

Urban Agriculture Now Includes Healthier Living

"The Americans are widening the definition of urban agriculture," Mr Wilson said. "They see it as part of promotion of better human health in cities, and one of the important answers to protecting the global environment. I will not be surprised to see urban agriculture become part of the US response to Japan's signing last week of the Kyoto Treaty on environmental protection," said Geoff Wilson, editor and publisher of Urban Agriculture Online Posted June 12, 2002

Human-Environment Research Laboratory (HERL) Studies the Relationship between People and the Physical Environment

"The impact of the physical environment on human aggression has been well-established - crowding, high temperatures, and noise have all been linked to violent behavior. Some scientists believe that it's because people living under these conditions suffer from something called chronic mental fatigue, which can make them inattentive, irritable, and impulsive - all of which can be linked to aggressive behavior. Exposure to green spaces, it has been shown, can mitigate the harmful effects of chronic mental fatigue, reducing aggressive behavior in the process."
Posted June 7, 2002

Proposed Community Garden Legislation in New York

"After more than a month of behind the scenes negotiation, members of the new NYC Council will file legislation that, if passed, can protect community gardens from development. The legislation being proposed will look different from the law that was introduced in the last Council. It now focuses on a stipulation that would turn the GreenThumb program into an independent public/ private partnership to act as a land trust for the preserved gardens."
Posted June 3, 2002

The War Garden Victorious

This rare book (1919), about the USA food gardening program during World War I, is being republished chapter by chapter on the Internet. "The United States government strongly encouraged everyone to plant a garden to provide their own food so that food, transportation and other resources could be freed up for the war effort." - "The sole aim of the National War Garden Commission was to arouse the patriots of America to the importance of putting all idle land to work, to teach them how to do it, and to educate them to conserve by canning and drying all food they could not use while fresh. The idea of the 'city farmer' came into being."
Posted June 1, 2002

Re-Vision Urban Farm

"Re-Vision Urban Farm is a project of Re-Vision House, aÊ shelter for homeless pregnant and parenting women and their children. We are a shelter-based, community supported urban farm growing organic produce and fish on reclaimed land which was once vacant lots." Posted May 23, 2002

Urban Agriculture and Community Food Security in the United States: Farming from the City Center To the Urban Fringe

The document advocates for policies that promote small-scale urban and peri-urban farming, and thereby prepare the next generation of urban farming leaders. The task is to increase public knowledge and support, in order to transform urban agriculture "from its cottage industry status into a major instrument against hunger and poverty." Posted May 23, 2002

E-Conference: Agricultural Use Of Untreated Urban Wastewater In Low Income Countries: 24 June - 5 July 2002

"The use of the urban wastewater in agriculture is a widely established practice, particularly so in urban and peri-urban areas of arid and seasonally arid zones. Wastewater is used as a source of irrigation water as well as a source of plant nutrients (such as nitrogen, phosphorus and potassium) and trace elements (K, Na, etc) allowing farmers to reduce or even eliminate the purchase of chemical fertilizer and of organic matter that serves as a soil conditioner and humus replenisher Lunven (1992) estimated that one tenth or more of the world's population currently eats food produced on wastewater (but not always in a safe way)." Posted May 23, 2002

Urban Agriculture Online - a new magazine

Geoff Wilson, editor and publisher of Urban Agriculture Online said he chose to launch the online magazine at the 'Dallas Urban Agriculture Symposium' because he saw it as the most important global event in urban agriculture in 2002. "Many countries have endorsed urban agriculture as most complementary food production that well meshes with rural agriculture. They are seeing it as an important response to the world's rapid urbanization of rural areas, desertification, pollution of air and water, and the possible impact of bio-terrorism." Posted May 21, 2002

Vancouver Landscaper Moves from Power to Push Mowers

"But there is this one big lawn spreading between 5.5 acres of townhouses, parking lots and perennial beds. The lawn area itself represents probably a quarter of the property. No one thought this lawn could possibly be maintained with reel push mowers on a weekly basis." Posted May 6, 2002

Walled Kitchen Gardens

"They were like an early version of supermarkets. Nowadays, our food system is global. Food is flown in from far away, which is widely regarded as unsustainable. Walled kitchen gardens succeeded in growing this food at home, all-year-round. By developing techniques and technology that we rely upon today, walled kitchen gardens were intensive food factories that spearheaded our industrial food system." Posted May 2, 2002

Chinese, Japanese, German, Swedish, English Allotment Garden Reports

"In Japan allotment and community gardening have been paid striking attention to during the last two decades. For example, the number of allotment sites has increased and allotment gardens were given a legal basis. After World War II the primary objective of allotment gardens was to obtain food. This changed to recreation and to improvement of urban environments later on." Posted May 2, 2001

Community Greens: Shared Parks in Urban Blocks

"Community greens are shared parks tucked away on the inside of residential blocks. They are collectively owned and managed by the neighbors whose homes and backyards, decks, patios, and balconies enclose the green.These secret gardens bring neighbors together as they care for and enjoy their community green." Posted April 21, 2002

Pigs in Streets of Dili, East Timor

"Asked how many pigs were wandering around Dili, Mr. Da Silva said he wasn't sure. 'They are hard to avoid at times, choosing to cross roads when they please, bringing traffic to a halt. Initially I thought they didn't have owners, but they do. And people know exactly which ones belong to them,' he added, without explaining just how." Posted April 17, 2002

A Taste of Urban Agriculture in Havana - Tara's Latest Update

"Mosquitoes are no laughing matter here in Havana. In fact, there are armies - with uniforms to boot - of people employed to rid Cuba of the dreaded Dengue Fever. These people patrol the streets with huge machines that look a lot like leaf blowers. ...The warriors will then enter the house and spray every inch with a terrible white chemical that smells horrible and that no one can identify - not even the fumigation warriors who brave the terrible white fumes without even a gas mask." Updated April 16, 2002

Evaluating Voluntary Stormwater Management Initiatives in Urban Residential Areas

"In recent decades, stormwater runoff has emerged as an issue of major concern to water resource managers. Stormwater affects local waterways both in terms of the volume of runoff that is generated, and the nature of the pollutants that may be conveyed. Allowing stormwater to infiltrate in urban residential areas is one way of managing runoff at-source, and by doing so, preventing a wide variety of down-stream effects." (40,000 word Master's Thesis in PDF format) Posted March 29, 2002

Farm/Garden Land For Rent in Greater Vancouver

"The land is just off of River Road on the North Arm of the Fraser River. We are a 30 minute drive from Downtown Vancouver, (15 minutes if they are from the south end of Vancouver), as we are just off of the east/west connector." Posted March 28, 2002

Whose Garden Is It?

Governing Magazine/March 2002 - "Community gardens can help turn neighborhoods around. It's their very success that threatens them." - "The city accuses garden activists of being insensitive to the need for low-income housing; the activists say their views are being misrepresented. The city, says Aresh Javadi, director of a group called More Gardens, 'makes it sound as if it's housing versus gardens. That's wrong. It's both housing and gardens.'" Posted March 27, 2002

Food for Everyone Foundation

"Dr. Jacob Mittleider has spent decades teaching and growing all over the world, perfecting his incredible gardening techniques. Many organizations raise money to feed the hungry, however Dr. Mittleider lives by the profound maxim: "Give a man a fish, and he'll eat for a day; teach a man to fish and he'll feed his family for a lifetime." Because of this belief, Dr. Mittleider has dedicated his life to teaching people everywhere how to be self-sufficient by growing super high-yield gardens, even in small boxes or soil plots." Posted March 26, 2002

Urban Waste And Rural Farmers: Enabling Low-Cost Organic Waste Reuse In Developing Countries

"Farmers and animal husbanders in poor countries have acquired and continue to access urban organic wastes and to process and use them in various ways. Green wastes obtained from fruit and vegetable markets are used for animal fodder; food wastes from hotels, canteens and food processing industries are fed to pigs and goats; slaughterhouse wastes are processed for poultry feed"
Posted March 20, 2002

Common Ground Program & Mini- Ag Center (CGP) in Kenya

"I was able to stop working away from my farm as a wage laborer in Mumiasi to work full-time tending my one-acre farm. After receiving training in Biointensive practices my wife and I converted our conventionally cultivated farm to one using double-dug beds. This enabled us to produce surplus vegetables for sale in local markets. The income increased four times what it was as a day laborer and I am a much happier person working for myself. As a result I have trained 530 other families in my Community" Posted March 20, 2002

Chapter 16 - Urban Agriculture: A Powerful Engine for Sustainable Cities

Just and Lasting Change - When Communities Own Their Futures, includes a 3000 word chapter by Jac Smit on Urban Agriculture. "People around the world are returning to farming in cities. As a Ford Foundation urban adviser in 1968 I found that people in Calcutta were producing one-quarter of the fish and vegetables being consumed there, using waste-water and solid waste. In many places today urban agriculture supplies between one-quarter and one-half of city dwellers total food needs." Posted March 10, 2002

References Relevant To Urban Agriculture

Here you will find reports on topics related to urban agriculture. Updated March 9, 2002

GIS-based Urban Environmental Resources Management and Food Security Project, Cagayan de Oro, Philippines

"The project will establish a GIS-based urban environmental planning system in Cagayan de Oro through a participative process. It will address the needs of the community in terms of improved solid waste management linked with urban food security. The target groups are the urban poor, particularly the garbage pickers at the landfill site, and the marginal urban farmers. " Posted March 6, 2002

RUAF Urban Agriculture Film

"This video on Urban Agriculture has been produced to facilitate a greater understanding of urban agriculture among policy-makers, urban planners, NGOs, sectoral organisations and other people who can make a contribution to the integration of urban agriculture into urban policies, plans and development programmes." Posted March 4, 2002

Sweat Equity: a Film

"Sweat Equity is the first film produced by the Metro Farming Film Project. The documentary focuses on community gardening activism that was occurring throughout the City of Los Angeles during the years following the 1992 civic unrest. Grassroots actions by local leadership and the sweat equity of community people made it possible to reclaim abandoned land to create urban gardens. " Posted March 4, 2002

Self-Sufficiency Plan for Copenhagen Suburb

"The Environment and Energy Centre (MEC) in Höje Taastrup (population 45,000), to the west of Copenhagen in Denmark, has developed a realistic plan to make the region self-sufficient in food. Double the percentage of garden owners who grow their own vegetables; Triple the number of allotments; Quintuple the number of people owning hens (5 per cent already do); Increase production of honey and strengthen bonds with nearby farms by getting more people to buy produce directly from them; or for people to buy their own animals and rent pasture from the farmers;" Posted March 2, 2002

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