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Published on Tuesday, June 16, 2009 by CommonDreams.org
Urban Agriculture as a Career Path
DETROIT — “I want to be an urban farmer,” said Tom Howe, 19, a freshman
at Wayne State University. “I want to start a community garden in some
kind of ecovillage with farmers and chefs.”
This may seem an unusual career goal for a young man of the twenty-first century, let alone one from Birmingham, an upscale middle class suburb of Detroit. It’s also counter-intuitive that a major university located in the middle of the cultural center could offer Howe a means to his aspirations.
But Howe is a member of WSU’s Sustainable Food Systems Education and Engagement in Detroit or “SEED Wayne” for short, a program that was instituted last May.
SEED Wayne calls for a critical assessment of the conventional food system and its relationship to the health of local communities, economies, environments, and cultures, said Kami Pothukuchi, associate professor of geography and urban planning at WSU and the founder of the largest inner-city campus with a comprehensive food systems program that is not run by an agriculture school.
“SEED Wayne also challenges students and others to examine the broader implications of their food choices,” she said.
For example, Pothukuchi teaches how a “community-based food system” revolves around local farmers, processors and distributors who produce fresh and value-added products.
Pothukuchi, who is among a handful of professional urban planners who see local agriculture and urban farming as a valuable tool for regional economic development, said that community-based agriculture has the potential for creating jobs, developing small business entrepreneurships and keeping precious dollars in the community.
“Michigan has the second most diverse agriculture in the United States [with 150 crops],” she said. “We could add another $2.58 billion to the state’s economy if we increased production of local food by another 10 percent.”
Consequently, SEED Wayne is dedicated to contributing to building a sustainable food system on campus and in the Detroit area, said Pothukuchi. It works with a number of community partners to promote food security, urban agriculture, farm-to-institution programs, and food planning and policy development.
Among its partners are the Ford Mother Company Fund, which contributed $100,000, The Henry Ford, AVI Foodsystems, Inc. (WSU dining service), Detroit Economic Growth Corporation, City Connect Detroit (funding opportunities service). Other partners include members of the Detroit Agricultural Network, a collection of organizations that promotes the city’s urban gardens such as Greening of Detroit, Forgotten Harvest (food rescue service), the Capuchin Soup Kitchen and Earthworks.
Howe’s first exposure to the city’s urban gardens occurred at Earthworks when he volunteered to work in its 1,300-square-foot greenhouse as part of his high school service requirement while he was a student at the University of Detroit-Jesuit. The greenhouse produces and distributes more than 100,000 vegetable seedlings for the city’s 355 backyard, community, and school gardens.
Earthworks was started in 1997 by Brother Rick Samyn after he noticed that the poor were buying their food at gas stations, and kids were calling Coke and chips a meal. He began a small garden on a vacant lot and two years later developed six other lots by removing debris and regenerating the soil with compost.
Today the gardens supply fresh, organic produce for the Capuchin Soup Kitchen, which prepares 2,000 meals per day. They also provide 25 million pounds of food a year, equivalent to 65,000 meals per day to the Gleaners Community Food Bank, another Capuchin spin-off.
As a student at WSU, Howe still volunteers at Earthworks once a month, but he also helps to grow and sell vegetables at the WSU farmers market which operates on the fourth Wednesday during the summer months.
“I love seeing people and vendors talking together [at the farmers market],” said Howe.
Senior Kristina Stonehill, 22, an English and anthropology major, decided to participate in SEED Wayne’s garden program because a friend recruited her. As a commuter school, WSU students need to find a reason to stay on campus after they finish their classes, she said, and learning how to grow herbs and vegetables is a good reason.
The Warrior Demo Garden (named after the university’s mascot) provides fresh produce for the campus cafeterias as well as the city’s food assistance programs.
Students volunteer to maintain the garden on Wednesdays (5 to 6 p.m.) and Saturday mornings (10 to 11 a.m.). They use the garden as a means of informing and recruiting curious passersby about SEED Wayne’s programs and principles.
“SEED Wayne is really accepting of anyone who wants it,” said Stonehill. “It’s not an exclusive club.”
Moreover, gardening for Stonehill has become a way of getting dirty, being outside and watching vegetables grow—quite a satisfying combination of activities to complement a busy academic and work schedule.
“It’s also a nice problem solving exercise where I learn not to be frustrated that the tomatoes are not as big as I want them or that I find bugs on the squash plants,” she said.
“And knowing how to eat and learning how to grow your own food allows you to cut your food costs.”
Will Ahee, 20, also began gardening at Earthworks when he was a student at U of D-Jesuit. He is now a junior in environmental science and Pothukuchi’s assistant in charge of SEED Wayne.
“Urban students who feel cut off from nature are finding that food has become a vehicle to re-connect with it,” he said. “Gardens allow people to serve but they also help people share their knowledge and connect with others.”
One of the unique aspects of SEED Wayne, especially pertinent to a city like Detroit, is its social justice mission. Detroit has the distinction of being the nation’s poorest big city where nearly 33 percent of the residents live below the federal poverty line, according to the U.S. Census Bureau (2004).
“Healthy food needs to be available to all people, said Ahee. “It is a fundamental right,”
Ahee said he could have gone to Michigan State University to learn sustainable agriculture practices, but he was attracted to Detroit where there is so much economic struggle and not much access to healthy food.
“I knew I wanted to give service,” said Ahee, “but I also wanted something that would have lasting change. Helping someone learn how to grow food does it for me.”
WSU students are emblematic of today’s growing national trend where young people are looking for ways to make a difference in their world. While their parents were more interested in political movements, this generation is more interested in personal action where individuals can get involved in doing something.
The future of the environment is college students’ particular concern and SEED Wayne is helping to provide its students with opportunities to learn about and experiment with sustainable food production.
This may seem an unusual career goal for a young man of the twenty-first century, let alone one from Birmingham, an upscale middle class suburb of Detroit. It’s also counter-intuitive that a major university located in the middle of the cultural center could offer Howe a means to his aspirations.
But Howe is a member of WSU’s Sustainable Food Systems Education and Engagement in Detroit or “SEED Wayne” for short, a program that was instituted last May.
SEED Wayne calls for a critical assessment of the conventional food system and its relationship to the health of local communities, economies, environments, and cultures, said Kami Pothukuchi, associate professor of geography and urban planning at WSU and the founder of the largest inner-city campus with a comprehensive food systems program that is not run by an agriculture school.
“SEED Wayne also challenges students and others to examine the broader implications of their food choices,” she said.
For example, Pothukuchi teaches how a “community-based food system” revolves around local farmers, processors and distributors who produce fresh and value-added products.
Pothukuchi, who is among a handful of professional urban planners who see local agriculture and urban farming as a valuable tool for regional economic development, said that community-based agriculture has the potential for creating jobs, developing small business entrepreneurships and keeping precious dollars in the community.
“Michigan has the second most diverse agriculture in the United States [with 150 crops],” she said. “We could add another $2.58 billion to the state’s economy if we increased production of local food by another 10 percent.”
Consequently, SEED Wayne is dedicated to contributing to building a sustainable food system on campus and in the Detroit area, said Pothukuchi. It works with a number of community partners to promote food security, urban agriculture, farm-to-institution programs, and food planning and policy development.
Among its partners are the Ford Mother Company Fund, which contributed $100,000, The Henry Ford, AVI Foodsystems, Inc. (WSU dining service), Detroit Economic Growth Corporation, City Connect Detroit (funding opportunities service). Other partners include members of the Detroit Agricultural Network, a collection of organizations that promotes the city’s urban gardens such as Greening of Detroit, Forgotten Harvest (food rescue service), the Capuchin Soup Kitchen and Earthworks.
Howe’s first exposure to the city’s urban gardens occurred at Earthworks when he volunteered to work in its 1,300-square-foot greenhouse as part of his high school service requirement while he was a student at the University of Detroit-Jesuit. The greenhouse produces and distributes more than 100,000 vegetable seedlings for the city’s 355 backyard, community, and school gardens.
Earthworks was started in 1997 by Brother Rick Samyn after he noticed that the poor were buying their food at gas stations, and kids were calling Coke and chips a meal. He began a small garden on a vacant lot and two years later developed six other lots by removing debris and regenerating the soil with compost.
Today the gardens supply fresh, organic produce for the Capuchin Soup Kitchen, which prepares 2,000 meals per day. They also provide 25 million pounds of food a year, equivalent to 65,000 meals per day to the Gleaners Community Food Bank, another Capuchin spin-off.
As a student at WSU, Howe still volunteers at Earthworks once a month, but he also helps to grow and sell vegetables at the WSU farmers market which operates on the fourth Wednesday during the summer months.
“I love seeing people and vendors talking together [at the farmers market],” said Howe.
Senior Kristina Stonehill, 22, an English and anthropology major, decided to participate in SEED Wayne’s garden program because a friend recruited her. As a commuter school, WSU students need to find a reason to stay on campus after they finish their classes, she said, and learning how to grow herbs and vegetables is a good reason.
The Warrior Demo Garden (named after the university’s mascot) provides fresh produce for the campus cafeterias as well as the city’s food assistance programs.
Students volunteer to maintain the garden on Wednesdays (5 to 6 p.m.) and Saturday mornings (10 to 11 a.m.). They use the garden as a means of informing and recruiting curious passersby about SEED Wayne’s programs and principles.
“SEED Wayne is really accepting of anyone who wants it,” said Stonehill. “It’s not an exclusive club.”
Moreover, gardening for Stonehill has become a way of getting dirty, being outside and watching vegetables grow—quite a satisfying combination of activities to complement a busy academic and work schedule.
“It’s also a nice problem solving exercise where I learn not to be frustrated that the tomatoes are not as big as I want them or that I find bugs on the squash plants,” she said.
“And knowing how to eat and learning how to grow your own food allows you to cut your food costs.”
Will Ahee, 20, also began gardening at Earthworks when he was a student at U of D-Jesuit. He is now a junior in environmental science and Pothukuchi’s assistant in charge of SEED Wayne.
“Urban students who feel cut off from nature are finding that food has become a vehicle to re-connect with it,” he said. “Gardens allow people to serve but they also help people share their knowledge and connect with others.”
One of the unique aspects of SEED Wayne, especially pertinent to a city like Detroit, is its social justice mission. Detroit has the distinction of being the nation’s poorest big city where nearly 33 percent of the residents live below the federal poverty line, according to the U.S. Census Bureau (2004).
“Healthy food needs to be available to all people, said Ahee. “It is a fundamental right,”
Ahee said he could have gone to Michigan State University to learn sustainable agriculture practices, but he was attracted to Detroit where there is so much economic struggle and not much access to healthy food.
“I knew I wanted to give service,” said Ahee, “but I also wanted something that would have lasting change. Helping someone learn how to grow food does it for me.”
WSU students are emblematic of today’s growing national trend where young people are looking for ways to make a difference in their world. While their parents were more interested in political movements, this generation is more interested in personal action where individuals can get involved in doing something.
The future of the environment is college students’ particular concern and SEED Wayne is helping to provide its students with opportunities to learn about and experiment with sustainable food production.
18 Comments so far
Show Allif one were to rip up existing pavement (streets, freeway lanes, parking lots, etc.), that would free up a fair amount of space...also, encouraging the repurposing of land now used for lawn or ornament...if my local airport can usurp property for a third runway, certainly cities could come up with some comrpomise for allowing gardening...we need to socialize housing, anyway...imagine gardens instead of golf courses? Oh, oh...did I just go too far?
Speaking of usurped property, friends of mine converted a "vacant" lot into a neighborhood garden. The city relocated the house on the lot a couple years back due to freeway expansion and they rent the land for $1 from the city. They tilled up garden plots for individuals and planted communal crops for everyone to share-potatoes, sweet pots, aspargus, a 3 sisters garden, squash and an herb garden. The costs and labor are shared by everyone who has a plot. The person who lives next to the garden is the common area caretaker (mows and throws out the garbage,etc) and supplies the water. The gardeners have regular get togethers at the garden and grill out and socialize.
Thousands of people pass by the garden everyday on the freeway, even though they have to look up from the road a bit to see it as its on an embankment. Talk about an idea generator for people to show what they can do in their own neighborhoods.
There are not that many vacant lots in most cities that get sufficient sunlight, so I suspect that the end goal is rooftop farming. Although a great idea, I hope that they research how much weight a flat topped building will hold. Most are not built to hold as much additional weight that soil and water might add. Hydroponics would be a good idea, again, nutrient holding tanks add weight in a small area and may require reinforcement of roof structures. Chickens and rabbits can also be raised in a fairly small area for food purposes. Hope they succeed
It all varies from building to building. I was able to use a topsy turvey on my outside balcony of my condo. The sunlight times can vary too from building to building and side to side too. I'm on the side where the sunlight hits my balcony in the morning hours while the balcony in my neighbor's condo opposite of mine has sunlight coming during the evening hours. Then there's HOA hell which will make it difficult to push for building improvements. Oh well, it's all a matter of trial and error and luck.
How wonderful to hear of something so positive rising from the ashes of Detroit.
What a sane thing to do!
Instead of universities teaching courses in urban agriculture, why don’t they consider the fundamental problems associated with food? No form of life evolved to be “food”, it evolved as a self-sustaining organism, its consumer evolved latter. Why is this important? Because plants/animals are incredibly inefficient as food producers go! Most of their energy goes into building structures that we can’t eat, like the trunk, roots, branches of apple trees or the skeletal structure of livestock.
It’s been my pet project since high school - figure out a way to produce high quality food in “factories”, eliminating the need for animals-as-food and millions of hectometres of land for farms – animals need a place to live too!
?????
What kind of "food" would you be creating in these "factories"?
"Most of their energy goes into building structures that we can’t eat, like the trunk, roots, branches of apple trees . . ."
Those structures, while not edible by humans, naturally decompose and provide food for the next generation of plants. Animal carcasses that are not consumed by predators do the same thing.
Nature works pretty well when people stop trying to control it and learn to use it.
q
There are a bunch of people working of "factory" food ideas. Mine involves growing muscle tissue, "meat", on a massive scale, I know how to grow tissue samples in a lab in a "dish", so it's a question of scaling it to industrial size.
Why meat? because of it's high caloric value, it's all protein, have some ideas how to get fat marbling but I'm still years away - a little protein goes a long ways. I have ideas for how to get the food necessary to feed the tissue via bulk plant matter found everywhere - weeds, leaves, grass etc. Humans can't eat that stuff, but some herbivores have bacteria and enzymes that can, and they can be optimized even more. In the end, they break everything down to sugars and amino acids.
I pretty sure feeding humans or even whole animals the slurry that comes out of that process wouldn't work very well as food needs to be broken down a certain way to be properly digested, my process emulates what nutrients look like once they enter the blood steam, but it will work for as fuel for tissue growth, and the human body knows how to break down that.
While the slurry process is more efficient than that which is going on in the stomachs of herbivores, it still far from 100%, those by products can then be used as fertilizer, and as they are partially broken down already, they decompose much faster. In a way it's like the stuff that comes out the back of a cow or sheep.
There is a lot more too it, and as it's my side project I'm years away from a proto type but you get the basic idea
I'd like to hear more about it, actually. Do you have any reports or essays?
this is vital to generating confidence in surviving the cessation of industry and electricity...if we work for the next couple of years, and develop gardens in precisely this way, viewing it as a way of life, rather than an altruistic hobby or a way to supplement income or regular diet, we will be so close to where we need to be...nature will grow her own gardens all around us, if we only let her...
that would leave the problems of water and shelter...
property ownership must fall...
I'll trade you property rights for wild gardens, sex, pot and music...
Combine Urban gardens with wind turbines and solar panels and you have the blueprint for becoming independent of the control system yet even more involved in the community.
Don't pay electric or heating bills, don't buy groceries. Take responsibility for your own life. It's an upstream swim but it's worth it.
This is how we re-write the story of our society.
I can see how urban agriculture would beat driving 45 miles to St Louis City everyday. Living in the suburbs that are turning into a sprawl is bad enough and missing life in the rurals, I think that urban agriculture is promising. I live in a small condo but purchased a topsy turvey to grow a few vegetables at my deck. So far so good. I think that as peak oil becomes inevitable, urban agriculture could provide a soft landing as moving from the big cities to the depopulated farmlands will not be easy for us city folks life style wise. I don't see myself doing urban agriculture for earning money but instead as a hobby.
"I don't see myself doing urban agriculture for earning money but instead as a hobby."
I agree. My gardening skills are just not that good. I can raise a few things, though.
q
"My gardening skills are just not that good."
Oh don't say that. At least you can raise a few things and feel good about it. When I used to grow up on the rurals and visit the farmers as a young girl, I used to marvel at the way they raised their crops. I just wished I had not gotten suckered into junk food and processed food labeled "healthy". I did get to revisit the farmlands even after I left for St Louis and I notice that the farmers who do it out of love and dedication always bring out top quality. Money doesn't bother them one bit even though they find themselves fighting Big Agri time and again. The way I see it and I might sound like a little girl saying this is you grow your own and you don't have to spend to buy and can even save those healthcare dollars. I look at it as Mother Nature rewarding the grower with a bonus of her own.
This is a great idea, and it means basically going back to the way our country functioned about 80 years ago, when a large percent of our people still lived on farms and sustained themselves. Now let`s carry this a bit further and throw out the TV sets, computers, cellphones with texting abilities, plastic water bottles, superstores full of manufactured food and other items we don`t need, air conditioning, gas guzzlers, etc. People were just as happy without those things as they are now.
The centralization models that evolved during the 20th century for many activities and business is not sustainable or suitable for the 21st century lifestyle.
Just as agriculture needs to decentralize, power production, domestic water extraction/collection/distribution and other activities need to decentralize.
An urban house with rainwater catchment, food production, solar hot water heater, photovoltaic power production and possibly a wind powered generator is the sustainable model for the 21st century.
Does this mean we shutdown large farms, large power plants, and large water systems? No, it just means we reduce the monocultural aspect of large farms, and build only a limited number of large power plants (no nuclear or fossil fueled plants).
The fossil fuel giants will be kicking and screaming as Peak Oil forces them to give up their centralization monopolies and give rise to decentralization.