Urban Food Rural Food

The Compost Diary

The Spin on Urban Agriculture
By Spring Gillard on June 30, 2010

Please click the link to read this article. I think it is time to start taking food security seriously.

Ruralrose said:

I am so happy to see an opening for dialogue on this subject. I am a farmer who works orchards, grapevines, raised bed vegetable gardens, and acres of widcrafted herbs, berries, mushrooms and flowers.

Maturity is the key to food production. The 40 year old vines produce hundreds of pounds of organic green seedless grapes without our effort. We make more jelly, juice, wine, and raisins than we can use. We give them away and feed them to our free range poultry and still there are so many they rot in piles under the vine. It is the same for apples, plums, pears, berries and tomatoes. I have started many trees like olives and exotic fruit like paw paw too since we have the rooms to grow them.

Unlike fruit production, vegetable production is hard work. For this reason we only grow the vegetables we are going to eat. Workers are available but it is risky to invest in perishables without a reliable market.

It is isolated here and everyone who wants fresh food grows their own, leaving no market for sales. Hawking at the farmer's market puts me in competition with my neighbor, dividing the small consumer dollar even further. Many farmers are in the same boat.

Any ideas?

Peace