Good Food Gardens
In Britain last year over a million people (1,084,604) were given 3 days emergency food and support via food-banks run by the Trussell Trust. In 2012-13 the number was 346,992. The next year 2013-14 the number of people had increased to 913,138.
The thing to note with these increasing numbers is that they are the tip of a larger iceberg. Many more food-banks operate around Britain's towns and cities in faith groups, village halls, community centres and warehouses.
In 1939, Britain faced a worse threat. 75% of our food was imported and supply-ships became a strategic target for enemy forces. To counter this threat, a nationwide Dig for Victory programme was launched. Families were encouraged to grow their own food and the number of allotments rose from 815,000 in 1939 to 1,400,000 by 1943.
In a radio broadcast in early October 1939 the Minister of Agriculture said he was confident that “half a million more allotments properly worked will provide potatoes and vegetables that will feed another million adults and one and a half million children for eight months of the year”.
By 1944 it was estimated that British gardeners had collectively produced between 2 and 3 million tons of food.
We can’t turn back the clocks, British society is quite different today both in terms of numbers and cultural diversity. What remains the same is the potential to grow food locally. This potential can be awoken once more to counter the pressing issues of health, unemployment, benefit cuts and low incomes.
Using cropping plans from the wartime model, we’ve developed a 21st century version of the Victory Garden that’s now simply called the Good Food Garden.
The aim of the garden is to provide a scalable, educational model that will show people how to grow their own food. Good Food Gardens can be sponsored by local businesses and built strategically close to areas hardest hit by austerity, where food-banks are currently providing emergency provisions.
Business owners, already savvy to the idea of sponsoring roundabouts on Britain’s roads, can go a step further. Sponsoring a Good Food Garden associates their brand with practical support for the local community.
If you’d like to find out more, just drop me a line via Linkedin.
Policy Analyst/Advisor
9 年Food is too expensive, it should be inexpensive, like it was during the booming Eighties and Nineties!
Currently resting pending re-launch.
9 年Excellent Martin. The whole idea of growing local (seasonal) food again involving community is massively interesting to me. Around where I live - there is a large amount of rich land (nutrient not fiscal) that is not farm-land & not being considered for housing (at least not yet) and could be utilised. At some point - I want to approach the owners. In many ways we are worse off than in 1939. I've just watched a film about documentary making in the 1920's and 1930's - where the ordinary working people of this country were more celebrated rather than just treated as expendable 'fodder'. There is much work to do - but this is a good start.