The Organoponicos Concept
Question: How can urban agriculture successfully occur in land affected by contamination in our urban areas?
Monty Don in his series ‘Around the World in 80 Gardens’ (Thanks to Yan and Studio 4 for the heads up) looks into the concept of Organoponicos (a type of Urban Agriculture) in the Cuban capital Havana. The concept is quite simple; the political situation in Cuba after the collapse of Communism left the population without food due to trade restrictions. Food production was a necessity that led to government endorsed community allotments that occur on urban sites. The food produced allows entire city communities to thrive economically as well as meet their basic physical requirements. The social impact is massive. Local food feeds local communities and food distribution is measured in ‘metres, not miles’. All the food is required by law to be grown organically and a large proportion of harvesting is done by the young generations.
The situation in Cuba is an example of how urban agriculture can work on a city wide scale successfully, with thousands of plots of different scales being supported through a network of ‘60 horticultural advice centers’ in the form of kiosks around the city. I argue this is what the local food collectives could aspire to as we approach a society in the post oil age within our lifetimes.
More information:
http://academicos.cualtos.udg.mx/Pecuarios/PagWeb%20EP/Lecturas/ORGANOPONICOS.htm http://www.cityfarmer.org/CubaGreen.html
