Tag: impact Journalism

Plant first, ask later: this is what a handful of volunteers in an ordinary town in northern England did, and from it sprang a worldwide grow­it­yourself revolution, writes  Anna Polonyi

 

If you take the local train north of Manchester, England, you’ll see a Hollywood­style sign on a hill that reads KINDNESS in large, white letters. It overlooks Todmorden, an old cotton mill town that is unlike any other in West Yorkshire. It’s the birthplace of an urban gardening revolution that is quietly growing worldwide, much like the herbs and vegetables planted everywhere in the town.

“I still get a thrill when I pick an artichoke here,” said Estelle Brown in front of the local police station. Brown is one of the 30 or so core volunteers who make up Incredible Edible Todmorden, the gardening group that has made their small town famous around the world by claiming public land and growing food for everybody.

It started with part of a curb here, a corner there. Seven years on and 400 volunteers later, it adds up to about a thousand fruit trees and two dozen raised beds around town: cherries and pears by the health center, rhubarb and broccoli in front of the community college, potatoes and kale in the train station parking lot. Anyone can pick what they please: herbs year­round and for the rest, volunteers stick a “pick me” sign into the ground when it’s ready.

“We don’t like to call it guerrilla gardening, because that reminds us of macho warfare. We’d rather call it naughty but nice,” said the chair, Mary Clear, whose kitchen doubles as the group’s main headquarters. Her motto: “Sometimes it’s better to ask for forgiveness later than to ask for permission.”

This applies to much of the movement, which appropriated public land, root by root, until the local council finally created an “incredible” license, allowing residents to grow food on patches of unused public property for up to three years.

The people of Tod have tapped into something both old and new. During the Second World War, the extensive “Dig for Victory” campaign in the United Kingdom encouraged people to grow their own food in public spaces, including Hyde Park in London.

Over the past decade, interest in urban gardening has grown. While consumers wish to reduce the distance their food travels, city officials worry about food sourcing. “The volcano eruption in Iceland in 2010 was a wake­up call for many. Transport was disrupted and the grocery shops were empty within a matter of hours,” said Catherine Simon, who advises foreign groups on how to start their own initiative. If cut off from the rest of the world, most major European cities would be able to feed their inhabitants for no more than four days, she said.

Incredible Edible Todmorden never set out to make the town self­sustainable; the produce, all organic, meets less than 5 percent of the population’s food needs. Incredible Edible takes the idea of traditional community gardens a step further by being open­source: growing public food on public property. And supporting local food and businesses is at the heart of its mission. “We don’t seem to have leaders of the world who want to put kids’ future and the environment center stage,” Pam Warhurst, one of the founders of the movement, said. “So we thought, why not do it here, locally, to show it can be done.”

She showed us around the Aquagarden, a social enterprise that sprung out of the movement. The experimental learning center breeds fish and recycles their feces to grow plants without soil. The restaurant across the street will soon be putting local tilapia on its menu.

What began as an idea has now grown into an international movement. Similar initiatives in over 20 countries from Australia to Senegal, Cuba and Japan are using the Incredible Edible name.

Local councils in France and other parts of the United Kingdom have adopted “incredible” licenses.

In southern France, the deputy mayor of Albi recently pledged to help the local “incroyable comestible” team grow enough food to sustain all 68,000 inhabitants by 2020, becoming the first officially backed Incredible Edible town.

One of the many people Todmorden has inspired to be naughty and nice is 24­year­old Emilien Buffard, who started an edible garden in Rosario, Argentina. With a few medical students interested in therapeutic herbs, he claimed a patch of public lawn for produce. “People at first were pessimistic. They said it might work in Europe, but here there is too much theft and vandalism,” Buffard said. “But why steal something that is already yours?” The garden has since become a local landmark, yielding avocadoes, lemons, oranges and eggplant.

Todmorden’s climate is unlikely to grow anything as exotic as Rosario. But the modest crew of volunteers who get together to dig twice a month are thrilled to see that their story has inspired many others.

“Incredible Edible has made the town famous,” the mayor Michael Gill said. “It took off more than anyone could have expected, and people now come from all around the world to see for themselves.”

 

For more information

Website: http://www.incredible­edible­todmorden.co.uk/

Video: http://www.sparknews.com/en/video/incredible­edible­collaborative­food­movement

Geared  with  a  GPS  (Global  Positioning  System),  three  village  communities  in  the Sambas  Regency,  West  Kalimantan  created  their  village  maps.  By  creating  maps,  they wanted  to  prevent  land  conflicts  and  avoid  the  threat  of  land  claiming.  Three  villages  are Lela, Tri Mandayan, and Sebagu in Teluk Keramat Sub­District, Sambas. “Why should (we) create a map? Because there are the threat of land conflicts between member of communities, between villages, and threats from the outside, the entry of the palm oil companies to Lela.

We are concerned about these threats “said Iskandar, a member of the Lela Village Mapping Team in Sebagu Village, Sambas, Wednesday (15/4).

All  this  time, said Iskandar,  Lela  has  never  had  a  detailed  map  of  the  village  that includes region border. As a result, boundaries near neighbouring villages were still unclear and  only  based  on  each  other  claims.  Thus,  land  conflicts  between  Lela  villagers  with neighbouring villages could occur at any time. “I experienced it when I was about to clear the forest for rubber plantation”, he said.

Iskandar told, a few years ago, he cleared a forest land for rubber plantation on the border of Lela Village. He started to clear the land from shrubs and small trees. However, a few days later a man came to claim the land and stated that the land was not included in Lela Village region. “It didn’t end with physical violence, only some arguments, “he said.

Departing from similar experiences shared by other villagers, as well as concerns of the threat of land claiming by the palm oil company that wanted to enter the village that time, the community agreed to create their village map. Mapping began in June 2011 accompanied by Wahana Visi Indonesia (WVI) Sambas. Preparation of maps was done with methods of participatory, involving Lela community participation.

“This  participatory  mapping  activities  is  one  of  the  SOLVE  (Strengthening Livelihoods  and  Reduce  Local  Vulnerability)  programs.  The  background  was  the  land conflicts in some of our assisted villages. We focus this program in Lela village for the first time,  then  in  Tri  Mandayan  village  and  replicated  in  Sebagu,  “said  Lina  Lumbanraja, Coordinator of Economic Development Project WVI Sambas.

According to Iskandar, to draw up maps, they formed Team 10 consisting of 10 Lela villagers.  This  team  received  mapping  basic  technique  training  by  Participatory  Mapping Network (JKPP), one of WVI’s partner. They were taught to measure the coordinates using GPS then turned the coordinates into an image map. “Some were tasked to operate the GPS, the others were in charge to record the GPS data,” he said.

After mastering the use of GPS, Team 10 was divided into two groups work towards border village. It took five days to tour the border of Lela village. Team had to go in and out of the forest  and  villagers’ fields to record the  coordinates  of the  border.  “Based  on GPS data, we drew the map on milimeters block paper and then copied it onto the tracing paper, “ said Iskandar.

Lela’s region map was drawn simply on a sheet of tracing paper. Villagers drew it by hand, no computerization. Although the finished the village maps, there was one important hurdle,  that  is  the  boundaries  have  not  been  approved  by  the  neighbouring  villages,  like Sungai Kumpai, Puringan, Pedada, and Berlimbang in Teluk Keramat sub­districts and Jawai  sub­district.  “Although  there  is  yet  approval  from  neighbouring  villages,  but  now  there’s alsmost no land conflict. They know we have the village map, “he said.

Learning from the Lela village experience, Tri Mandayan communities followed suit in  creating their village map. Pardi, Leader of Tri Mandayan Village Mapping Field Team said, mapping team was also trained by JKPP and accompanied by WVI Sambas. “To get the village boundaries coordinates, we slept in the jungle for 10 days, because Tri Mandayan has vast forest, “he explained.

In  the  thick forests, sometimes satellite signals  went  weak. Team members  had  tot climb the tree several times to ensure GPS get a strong signal, to ensure the accuracy of the data.” For 18 days we collected the data from the GPS,” he said. Learning from the weakness of Lela village, Tri Mandayan village formed negotiating team. The task of negotiation team was  to  have  agreement  with  the  neighboring  villages  about  the  borders.  Unfortunately  the negotiation team which  comprised of some  community leaders did not move  as fast  as the mapping team field.

As a result, after the Tri Mandayan village map was finished, the village border had not  been  agreed  yet  by  the  neighbouring  villages,  namely  Semata  Village,  Sub­District Tangaran; Pedada and Sekura Village, Teluk Keramat Sub­District. “We are hampered by the map validation, because there is no agreement,” he said.

More Smoothly In Sebagu the mapping ran more smoothly. Negotiating team moved  ahead of team field.  After  the  village  boundaries  agreed  with  neighbor  villages,  like  Tanjung  Keracut Village, Teluk Keramat Sub­District; Piantus village and Sekuduk, Sejangkung Sub­ District; and Tri Kembang Village, Galing Sub­District, the field team worked with  borrowed GPS from WVI. “There is no problem. Once the map was completed, the validation was done by the Head of Piantus Village, Sekuduk, Tanjung Keracut, Tri Kembang and the Sub­District government”, said Basuni, former Head of Sebagu Village.

Once approved at the Teluk Keramat Sub­District level, Sebagu map was submitted to the  Governance  Department  of  Sambas for  approval.  However, since  the  2013  up  to  now Sambas Goverment has not yet  approved the map made through  active participation of the villagers.

According  Basuni,  Sambas  Goverment  wants  to  match  it  first  with  Sambas  region  map.  Though  they  have  to  undergo  several  hurdles,  Sebagu,  Tri  Mandayan,  and  Lela communities  now  feel  relieved  and  proud.  Now  they  know  the  exact  boundaries  of  their village. With the village map, the land conflicts between communities have been prevented successfully.

“For  the  people,  the  problem  of  land  conflicts  nowadays  is  zero,”  said  Safirudin, villager and also member of Sebagu Village Mapping Team. (Erwin Edhi Prasetyo)