Community gardens a key part of sustainability efforts, say advocates
Community gardens not only give residents a place to try their hand at developing a green thumb, but also provide opportunities for developing food security, say advocates.
The Waterloo Region Community Garden Network (WRCGN) started in 1997 to promote and support community gardens across the area. It has 104 self-directed gardens around the region, providing equal opportunity to cultivate and harvest produce.
'The primary goal is providing access to land for people who want to grow their food, with the original concept developed around the health benefits of community gardens, which are really well documented,' said WRCGN chair Doug Jones.
Public health got involved in the process to help achieve these benefits with an emphasis on being able to garden in the community and bringing it closer together, said Jones. He went on to say that people are getting together and sharing information about growing food in the community.
Jones noted how these types of gardens provide a step to sustainability, as they meet three of the 21 pillars of sustainability set by the United Nations.
'This is about economic sustainability for people, helping them to feed themselves and contributing to food security,' said Jones.
'It's about environmental sustainability. So organic farming, with sustainable practices, and then that comes to social sustainability, which flows from having those pillars, two things' people need to believe we're doing something good.'
One of the major uses of these community gardens is to give residents the skills and the agency to grow their produce. This is especially prevalent in new Canadians who often have the skills for self-sufficiency when they arrive in Canada, but nowhere to use them, said Jones.
A prime example of this concept is the Petersburg Community Garden, a 10-acre community garden in Wilmot Township. Many of the growers are new Canadians who plant culturally significant crops like corn, beans and other vegetables, similar to what they grew back home.
'This garden is really important to most of the families here, because throughout the winter, you can see that organic foods are really expensive, but not if you grow your own food, the best part. Having a place to choose what to garden, what to plant, and what is best for your family is really wonderful,' said Sifa, a member of the garden, in a video.
Jones spoke about the depth of knowledge that these immigrants bring to the community.
'The new Canadians coming in are a tremendous resource in terms of talent, ability, energy, and desire to achieve, and we have to be able to open the doors to those opportunities,' said Jones
One of the important things, especially among new Canadians, is that there are growing numbers of people who grow vegetables for more than just summer use.
'This is an important part to consider, they move into dry goods, like corn and beans, and things like squash, that store a little bit better. They want to be able to grow food for the year,' said Jones.
Another goal of these gardens, aside from giving people with the skills a place to farm, is to promote and educate the next generation on the tools they need to take on food insecurity.
'We're training youth to grow their food. So, when we think about our children graduating from our homes, we want to think they can care for themselves.'
Education like this is especially important in the current landscape as we live in the uncertain world of tariffs and a strained relationship with the U.S. Jones told The Observer that we could use community gardens like those in Petersburg to feed a significant portion of the population.
The goal of WRCGN is to eventually have an urban garden within a 15-minute walk of every person; this will teach new skills and give those who already possess them a place to grow. This future goal will also help reduce the reliance on the global food supply chain by promoting local food production, said Jones.
'Food is life, but also food is culture.'
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