[getsmart-l] A Fruity Harvest - Growing community and creating a local, public food supply

[23skidoo]

At last a good story to forward


Hopefully there will be light at the end of the tunnel?

 

Film at 11:00

***

News & Views for Anarchists & Activists: 
http://groups.yahoo.com/group/smygo 

Natural Life Magazine 
http://tinyurl.com/2kyqyq 


A Fruity Harvest 
Growing community and creating a local, public food supply 
by Wendy Priesnitz 

Imagine a city or town where apples, pears, nuts, oranges, cherries and 
berries line the streets, create welcome shade in parking lots and parks 
and provide free food for anyone who cares to pick it. Instead, most 
urban areas are planted with sad shrubs, neglected "ornamental" 
non-native trees that require too much water and bedraggled annual 
flowers planted in regimented rows. 

Visionary groups and individuals around the world have found ways to 
combine the local food movement with beautifying neighborhoods, while 
building community and feeding themselves at the same time. 

The idea of "public fruit" is what propels a project in Los Angeles that 
was begun as an activist art project called Fallen Fruit. Artists David 
Burns, Matias Viegener and Austin Young mapped the public fruit -- which 
they define as fruit in or overhanging public spaces such as sidewalks, 
streets or parking lots -- in their neighborhood. According to 
California law, if a fruit tree grows on or over public property, the 
fruit is no longer the sole property of the owner of the tree, which 
makes free food available year round in LA without trespassing on 
private property . . . providing one knows where to find it. While 
public fruit might not be a four-season phenomenon in other areas, 
Fallen Fruit has a vision of expanding the maps around the world, and 
provides tools on its website for learning how to map public fruit. 

The group believes that fruit is a resource that should be commonly 
shared, like mushrooms from the forest. So it has moved from mapping to 
planning fruit parks in under-utilized areas and encouraging 
municipalities and urban planning groups to replace ornamentals with 
edible species to be shared by all citizens, similar to the communal 
gardens in many cities that provide food for poor families. The goal is 
to get people thinking about the life and vitality of our neighborhoods 
and to consider how we can change the dynamic of our cities and common 
values. 

They also offer a Public Fruit Jam, where residents bring their own 
fruit and jars and learn the art of making jam. Fallen Fruit has only a 
few rules: "Take only what you need, say 'hi' to strangers, share, take 
a friend and go by foot." 

Common Vision is another southern California organization that believes 
in creating safe local food supplies through urban fruit plantings. 
Earlier this Spring, traveling in what they called the "world's largest 
veggie-oil powered caravan," 27 volunteers planted 1,000 fruit trees on 
their fourth annual 20-city, 70-day tour to urban schools from San Diego 
to Sacramento. 

In a one-of-a-kind day-long interactive outdoor program that includes 
West African agricultural drumming and eco-conscious hip-hop, Common 
Vision's Fruit Tree Tour teaches inner city students how to turn barren 
school yards into abundant orchards, using Permaculture principles to 
create living classrooms with the potential to produce enough fresh 
fruit for the school's caféteria and for members of the school's community. 

Each year the tour visits first-time schools to plant new fruit trees 
while returning to old school orchards to start new initiatives like 
Roots to Fruits: School Nurseries to Feed Communities, a grafting 
program, and Harvest Hip Hop, a roots-rhythm rap contest. 

Founded in 1999, Common Vision is a solution-focused nonprofit 
organization, a project of the International Humanities Center. Its 
mission is to cultivate ecological awareness and respect for the Earth 
while generating social and environmental changes towards sustainable 
lifestyles. 

Common Vision participates in another LA initiative called Fruit Trees 
to Combat Hunger, run by TreePeople, which has been planting trees in 
Los Angeles for over 25 years. 

Urban orchards planted for community development purposes are growing in 
many other areas. In Boston, Massachusetts and neighboring areas, an 
organization called EarthWorks has been working towards a healthier and 
more sustainable local environment since 1990. Its Urban Orchards 
project is a greening and food production program that operates with 
local groups to plant, maintain and harvest fruit- and nut-bearing 
trees, shrubs and vines on public land. There are now close to 1,000 
trees in almost 50 urban orchards and the organization publishes the 
Urban Fruit Guide, which lists publicly accessible fruit, nuts and 
berries -- not only in its orchards but at all publicly accessible sites 
in Greater Boston -- and provides growing and harvesting tips. 

Not everyone lives in a place where there are public orchards or where 
it's legal to pick fruit growing on or overhanging public property. So 
some so-called "guerilla gardeners" have taken to cleaning up and 
planting gardens on neglected public or private (often commercially- 
owned) property. Guerilla gardeners run the gamut from anarchists 
fighting corporate domination of space and food supplies to local 
gardening groups seeking to beautify their neighborhoods. And many of 
them will use whatever seeds or plants they can find or get donated, 
oblivious to their food value or compatibility with the environment in 
which they will be growing. Toronto ("we vandalize the city with 
nature") and London, England have thriving but ever-morphing guerilla 
gardening groups that do encourage native plants and sometimes cultivate 
herbs and the odd tomato seedling. However, the movement has its roots 
firmly planted in urban food production. 

Many in the movement trace the guerilla gardening term to New York City 
in 1973 when Liz Christy reclaimed a patch of land to grow a community 
garden that is still going strong. And yes, it contains fruit trees. The 
organization that resulted, called Green Guerillas, now uses a unique 
mix of education, organizing and advocacy to help people cultivate 
community gardens, sustain grassroots groups and coalitions, engage 
youth, paint colorful murals and address issues critical to the future 
of their gardens. 

Working with fruit grown on private rather than public property is the 
focus of a community-based, registered charity in Vancouver, British 
Columbia. The eight-year-old Vancouver Fruit Tree Project connects 
people who have fruit trees, people who can help harvest fruit and 
community groups that use fruit in their programs. Last year, they 
distributed over 4,000 pounds of fruit to nine community partners, 
which, in turn, ensured that the fruit fed children, families and youth 
across Vancouver who would otherwise not have access to fresh fruit. 

Their idea is simple: building communities and strengthen food security 
using local backyard fruit. The Vancouver Fruit Tree Project also 
partners with Community Kitchens to offer canning workshops to develop 
skills which are being lost in our urban environment. 

Indeed, this productive urban fruit tree movement has many benefits. 
Fruit- and nut-bearing trees afford the same benefits as other urban 
trees: Aside from providing an abundant supply of locally-grown, 
chemical-free food, they provide beauty, shade in the summer, a nearby 
relief to carbon-based pollution and proximity to nature. That's not bad 
for what was often under-used, abused or even forgotten space. 

Learn More 

Fallen Fruit 
http://www.fallenfruit.org 

Fruit Tree Tour Common Vision 
http://www.commonvision.org 

EarthWorks Projects, The Edward L. Cooper Gardening and Education Center 
34 Linwood St. Roxbury MA 02119 
http://www.earthworksboston.org 

Green Guerillas 
214 West 29th Street, 5th Floor New York, NY 10001 
http://www.greenguerillas.org 

Toronto Public Space Committee, Guerilla Gardening 
253 College, Box 372 Toronto ON M5T 1R5 
http://www.publicspace.ca/gardeners.htm 

Guerrilla Gardening -- London 
http://www.guerrillagardening.org 

Vancouver Fruit Tree Project 
2-261 East 17th Ave. Vancouver BC V5V 1A6 
http://www.vcn.bc.ca 

Wendy Priesnitz is the Editor of Natural Life Magazine and a journalist 
with 30 years of experience. She has also authored nine books. Read her 
blog at www.lifemedia.ca/wendy/blog.html 

 

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