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[if you have difficulties reading this
newsletter see our online version at www.kccua.org/urbangrown.htm]
In this issue:
 - Making Kansas City, MO, Urban-Ag Friendly
- Neighborhood Moves a Step Closer to Becoming "Community
of Gardens"
- KCCUA's Work Stirs Passion in Those Who Give
- Field Notes from the Kansas City Community Farm
- Putting the Urban Ecology to Work
- Introducing New Vegetables to Urban Consumers
- Enabling Urban Agriculture in Lima, Peru
- UMKC to Offer Course on Urban Agriculture
- Calendar of Events
Making Kansas City, MO, Urban-Ag Friendly
Public meeting set to identify possible code revisions in support
of urban agriculture.
 By
Katherine Kelly
The Kansas City Center for Urban Agriculture, the Food Policy
Coalition of Greater Kansas City, and BadSeed Farm are joining
together to get Kansas City, MO, to adopt pro-urban agriculture codes.
We will begin this campaign with a public meeting on October 20,
6:00-7:30pm, at the BadSeed Market at 1909 McGee. Council people
Beth Gottstein, Terry Riley, and John Sharp will be attending along
with staff from the Urban Planning and Development Department.
The goals of the meeting will be to look at the existing codes,
identify issues and needs that they don’t adequately address, and
set up a volunteer committee which will lead the effort to develop
revised codes and to build community and political support.
Background on City Codes Issues Beginning in the early summer, BadSeed Farm, located in a residential neighborhood in Kansas City, MO, started receiving warnings of possible codes violations from Animal Control and the Codes Investigations Division. They were told that they had one too many goats (two being the legal limit), and that their goats and chickens weren’t located according to the legal set-backs from their neighbors’ buildings. They also were warned that they had other violations, including selling on site, having employees, and several others. Brooke Salvaggio and Dan Heryer, owners of BadSeed, appealed for an exception to the goat limit, which was denied. Rather than break up their herd, they gave all three goats to another farmer with more land. They moved their chickens to a smaller pen in the middle of the property to comply with the 100 ft setback required. Three of the other violations were dropped. They agreed not to have their CSA members pick up at their farm in order to comply with the requirement that "no retail or wholesale business shall be conducted on site" and also agreed to stop using volunteers in their gardens, because the city considers volunteers to be the equivalent of employees, not allowed in a home based business.
BadSeed can operate this way through the remainder of the season, but
the difficulties they encountered brought forward ways that the city
codes limit some of the potential and desirable benefits of urban
agriculture.
City Support for Urban Agriculture
Many people across the city--including elected officials, neighborhood leaders, and city staff--recognize and want to support the benefits of urban agriculture, such as small business development, hands-on training and employment, and easy access by neighbors to fresh-grown produce. But in Kansas City, as in other municipalities, the models for urban agriculture are rapidly changing. As this is happening, existing codes are becoming outdated and restrictive. We are fortunate to have leaders and urban planners who recognize the need for codes that better fit a changing urban landscape and to have urban and local food supporters willing to step forward.
We’re excited about entering into this process and look forward to
working with the city to help promote good food production in Kansas
City, MO. We invite you to join with us!
For more information, contact: Katherine Kelly, KC Center for Urban Agriculture, katherine@kccua.org, Gretchen Kunkel, Food Policy Coalition of Greater Kansas City, ghkunkel@kc.rr.com or Dan Heryer & Brooke Salvaggio, brooke@badseedfarm.com, dan@badseedfarm.com.
Neighborhood Moves a Step Closer to Becoming
"Community of Gardens"
KCCUA Urban Farmer Development Program helps new farmer start market
garden.
 By
Cathy Bylinowski
Starting his new business didn't take much time for Anthony
Adair of Kansas City, KS. A couple of weeks ago, Mr. Adair met
Katherine Kelly and me at the Kansas City Community Farm and we sat at
the combination harvest-and-conference table to fill out federal and
state tax forms online. A few clicks of the mouse and the
employer identification number flashed onto the computer screen and
Adair's new sole proprietorship was set up: Beatrice GreenPath
Produce, named in honor of Anthony's grandmother.
Of course, starting a new small farm business isn't all easy.
For Anthony the spring and summer were filled with work, sweat,
picking up new skills, and marketing his produce. But the
excitement and pride were evident in this urban farmer's smile and in
our handshakes. And then the future plans and ideas for 2010
started pouring out. I was glad to have been a small part of his
“dream to-start-his-own-business come true”.
The Farm Business Development Program of KCCUA allows gardeners who have mastered the backyard vegetable garden to get a hand in starting their own small farm business by getting marketing advice from KCCUA staff and other farmers, horticulture training, and business start-up equipment. In exchange, these growers commit to at least 20 hours per week working on production and marketing, attending workshops, and selling produce. These growers are called affiliate farmers because they receive services through our Juniper Gardens Training Farm but are not actually farming there. Instead they utilize vacant land in nearby neighborhoods, closer to their homes.
Anthony Adair became one of KCCUA’s affiliate farmers in spring,
2009. He heard about the program from Isaac Jefferson, the
vice president of the Oak Grove Neighborhood association, who in
cooperation with KCCUA has been promoting the Farm Business
Development Program in that neighborhood. For Anthony, it was a
good fit and he decided to take advantage of this opportunity and
start his own business.
Anthony gardened and did yard work with his grandmother as a child and youth. He says that these activities planted the seeds of skills, knowledge and interest. Working the vacant lot in Kansas City, KS, has given him the opportunity to start his own business and reconnect to his family’s farming heritage. It also gives him the chance to feel peaceful and connected to the productivity and vitality of growing plants for food. Another thing that attracted him to the Farm Business Development Program was his visit to the Juniper Gardens Training Farm. The sight of the growers and staff members all working together, and preparing for the next day’s market, he said, “sold me” on participation in the program. This year, Anthony sold peppers, squash, watermelons, eggplants, and tomatoes to neighborhood customers, to local restaurants, and at the KCK Green Market. His first full-fledged gardening effort as an adult has gained him praise from the community and the interest of his children who want to be involved next year. He looks forward to the training workshops that KCCUA will offer this winter and spring and to expanding his garden site. He looks forward to gaining the gardening knowledge that will help keep him motivated, on track, and productive in 2010.
Years of disinvestment in this part of town have left the area with
many acres of vacant lots. While some people see overgrown
land that needs to be mowed, others envision productive urban farms. Anthony’s
garden site is on a corner lot where houses used to be. It is
approximately 7300 sf and has been vacant for more than 10
years. While redevelopment of some of the neighborhood's vacant
land is probable in the future, some community leaders like Isaac
Jefferson are actively trying to make community gardens and farms
a long-term feature in their neighborhood. On behalf of the Oak
Grove Neighborhood Association, Jefferson is currently negotiating a 5-year lease from the Kansas City, KS, Land Bank on some two
acres of land in the neighborhood for urban agricultural use. He
says he wants a “community of gardens”. He would like Oak
Grove Neighborhood and northeast KCK to be the “bread basket of
northeast Kansas City, KS.”
Reach Cathy at cathyb@kccua.org.
KCCUA's Work Stirs Passion in Those Who Give
Supporters, volunteers and donors are vital in getting the
job done.
By Semie Rogers
KCCUA’s donors and volunteers support the roots of our work to grow
urban food by growing urban farmers. Without them, we wouldn’t
get nearly as much done. Volunteers help weed and paint, build
tool sheds and plant transplants. They collect recipes to use at
market or they prepare meals for special events. They
take photographs to show how urban farming can transform our lives and
our landscape. They maintain our server and keep our books.
People give time and money to KCCUA because KCCUA’s work is a
passion for them. Over the next few issues of Urban Grown we
meet a few of the people who contribute so much to KCCUA.
Tina Hoover, fresh food advocate, donor and KCCUA Board Chair As a customer at the Barstow School organic market, Tina was one of KCCUA’s first donors. Fresh, local, organic food is a passion she shares with many KCCUA supporters. When she first started talking to Katherine Kelly, her focus was on health and nutrition. “But I became aware that to have fresh, local food, we needed someone to grow it,” says Hoover. As her relationship with KCCUA has deepened over time, she has "come to realize how much our work overlaps with other issues I care about, like hunger.” Tina and her husband Craig donate annually in support of KCCUA’s core mission of supporting urban farms and farmers. Tina gives hours of volunteer time to KCCUA, organizing events for supporters, like last year’s Thank You in the Greenhouse, and working to help the KCCUA board grow with the organization. Patti Banks, landscape architect and owner of Patti Banks Associates, donor and volunteer Patti Banks Associates (PBA) is a consulting firm that produces environmentally-friendly design and planning. The firm looks for dual-purpose work that can combine multiple uses in a single project. One example would be a storm water management project that also addresses green space for recreation. When Banks first encountered KCCUA, the firm was already thinking about how food production could be included in green space design. KCCUA’s work “is a personal interest of mine and near and dear to the hearts of many of our employees,” says Banks. "It was not too hard to image that we could be of help," she adds, "as landscape architects, we are always looking for ways to hone our craft.” For this year’s Kansas City Urban Farms and Gardens Tour, Banks served on the education committee and helped to develop signs that show the benefits of urban farming. “Food isn’t just food,” says Banks, “it’s also beautiful. And then you add on top of that actually feeding people.” PBA designed the signs, had them printed in a large scale format and laminated. Each farm on the tour had a beautiful information piece that focused on one facet of urban farming, like sustainability or food access. The signs were a major in-kind gift to the tour. In addition to helping with the farm tour, Banks is working with KCCUA, the Metropolitan Crime Commission, and the Kansas City Parks and Recreation Department to conceptualize a training farm for ex-offenders, many of whom have prison farm experience. “How can we make the green space in Kansas City more productive?” asks Banks. She’s also excited by the potential of the project to integrate storm water management to efficiently irrigate fields. By donating her technical expertise, Patti Banks is helping more people in Kansas City grow good food and improve their neighborhood. Do you have a talent you’d like to put to work growing urban farmers? Would you like to support KCCUA’s mission? KCCUA and urban agriculture are growing fast and we can use help in many ways. Give us a call—we’d love it if you could lend a hand.
Reach Semie at semie@kccua.org.
Field Notes from the Kansas City Community Farm
By Alicia Ellingsworth
 I
want to be fertilizer. That has been my mantra for years now even
before I called myself a farmer. With autumn's tide of
gratefulness, I continue the chant. The farm's bountiful harvest
encourages my voice. Our beautiful crop of new growers confirms my
path. I've come to realize the most important thing we grow is
relationships. The interconnectedness of life on this farm is a
microcosm of life on this planet. Folks come. We communicate
our needs. We struggle. Work is started and completed.
Food is grown. Food is eaten. Stories are told and retold.
Time is taken to walk about. We rest. We begin again.
Because of our relationship with the Growing Growers program (www.growinggrowers.org) and because of the dedication of those here before me, I reap the benefit of this place. Each year KCCUA hosts farmer-wannnabes. This year many apprentices and volunteers have come. Some have come not knowing how they might fit. But they come, following an inner call. All have worked. We have grown together as farmers and as creatures of this farm. No-till beds have been in place now for two years. An apprentice led that project. A water collection system is underway. A partner farmer prompted this action. The container was donated by another. Worm bins to produce the fertile vermicompost were crafted by a past apprentice. Raised beds have been constructed through the cooperation of sweat, learning and remembering. Walls of tomato trellises went up in the spring and came down last week through the effort of volunteers. New cucumber and squash plants are growing now in the greenhouse transplanted by a volunteer mother and son team. The farm's office was painted by the same volunteer who keeps our books and delivers raw milk and fresh eggs. She brings her husband and he fixes everything I break including our computers.
A pile of woodchips was donated and delivered by a humble volunteer who
has also cleared the west side of the greenhouse of scrub trees to allow
more light and to prevent the potential damage of icy limbs.
Back-logged filing and updating spreadsheets are the project of
another. Honey from our bees, gathered by our volunteer beekeeper,
has been delivered. A gifted tool-craftsman has donated a
scrap-made broad fork and is now working with us to design a new tractor
implement. These highlights are all in addition to the daily work
of weeding, seeding, watering and harvesting joined in by volunteers.
We share our produce with these apprentices and volunteers. Our
"seconds". Produce not pretty enough for CSA or farmers
market. I am convinced this work has not been completed in order
to get some bruised tomatoes or a few green beans. Folks come here
because they want to belong. They see past weeds and imperfections
and know the farm is a special place. To be connected to this farm
is to be connected with life beyond singularity. The farm is a
place to grow. To give. To learn. The farm is a place
of connection to life and wonder.
Dreams are remembered here. Life's gathered knowledge and skills get pulled together here. This is a place of belonging to something bigger and to find oneself. Relationship grown here is powerful and pervading. Being fertilizer here is a gift. For these gifts, I celebrate.
You can reach Alicia at alicia@kccua.org.
Putting the Urban Ecology to Work
Using urban agriculture to restore and maintain urban ecosystem
services.
Kelly Garbach is an environmental scientist finishing her
graduate studies at the University of California. This year she
worked in Costa Rica on projects related to biodiversity
conservation in farmlands and farm management for multiple ecosystem
services. In addition to doing fieldwork in ecology, Kelly loves to
ride horses, visit with her family in Kansas City, and indulge in
the delicious products of healthy farmlands.
 By
Kelly GarbachWe don’t give cities enough credit. In any city block millions of interactions are going on at any moment. There’s a woman taking the bus home from work, a man chats with neighbors on a short walk to his favorite café, I am biking to the market to pick up another jar of pesto. But in addition to all the humans busing, walking and biking around, there are millions of other species interacting on this block. Imagine, for example, a garden patch in front of our neighborhood market: on the surface, herbs and flowers brighten the entryway. Just below them, fungi, worms and bacteria are hard at work transforming into fertile garden soil what the herbs, flowers and nearby trees created from sunlight, carbon and nitrogen. Such transformations can be described as ecosystem services. But if we’re in the city, where’s our ecosystem? Ecosystems are defined by all of the interactions among species; this is even true in our city block. Healthy, thriving ecosystems provide all kinds of things that are useful to us--and together we call these things ecosystem services. Some of the easiest services to recognize are the crops we harvest--like that basket of ruby red tomatoes that I drooled over at the market at the beginning of the summer. But just think of all of the things that went into that basket of tomatoes--microorganisms building up the soil, trees and shrubs filtering rain water back into the ground, the farmers planting and tending seedlings, and helpful predator insects that kept pests in check so that we can enjoy a tasty fruit--all these are ecosystem services too!
Urban farming is a great boon to every community. Farmers
within our city blocks harvest and distribute fresh, nutritious
produce. This is no small feat; often urban-grown fruits and
veggies reach people that don’t have equitable access to grocery
stores or other sources of fresh food. But delicious harvests
are just one pixel in the larger picture of urban agriculture; growing crops
in the city also provides a host of indirect benefits.
Urban farmlands provide habitat for wildlife--from birds to insects
and pollinators. They improve soil, cool ambient temperature
by expanding green space, increase social interactions among
neighbors, and bring joy and wonder with the change of seasons.
In other words, urban farms help nature be of service right in the
middle of the city.
Before we start imagining ecosystem services blossoming everywhere,
it’s important to note that all these benefits come from natural
assets like the raw ingredients of our garden patch (sunlight
streaming from above; carbon and nitrogen pools below ground).
When there are lots of assets, the possibilities for ecosystem
services abound. However, if natural assets are allowed to
decline, so do the possibilities for the good things they provide.
In urban areas this is a key idea; often times our first job is to
restore the capacity of natural systems before we can reap the
benefits they provide.
The ecosystem service of water management is a common example.
Would you believe that in some cases it may actually be less
expensive to provide safe drinking water in a large city by
restoring the function of local ecosystems rather than building
a new water treatment plant? Although it sounds far fetched,
this is exactly what happened in New York. When the quality of
drinking water fell below U.S. EPA standards, the city chose to
restore the polluted Catskill Watershed that had formerly provided
the ecosystem service of water purification. Once the input of
sewage and pesticides to the watershed area was reduced, natural
processes (filtration of toxins; biotic recycling via plants and
microorganisms) ramped up and water quality recovered to acceptable
levels. Investing in this natural capital cost $1-1.5 billion,
which was considerably less that the $6-8 billion needed to
construct a new water treatment plant (not to mention the $300
million needed for annual operation).
The common thread between watershed protection and urban agriculture
is that both are examples of how investment in natural capital can
provide important ecosystem services to city residents. As we
work to make cities greener and more livable, our perception of
urban zones expands to include thinking of them as ecosystems and
valuing the services they can provide. Viewing urban,
suburban, and rural areas along the continuum of ecosystems--each
with its unique compliment of services--can help us picture ways in
which their capacity can be built and maintained. Urban
farming is one of the best ways to make sure that natural assets receive
good stewardship in the city, and that we (and all the other
species in our urban ecosystem) reap all the benefits they can
provide.
To learn more about ecosystem services check out http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ecosystem_services
or http://www.wri.org/publication/ecosystem-services-a-guide-for-decision-makers
(click on "Quick Report" for an overview).
You can reach Kelly at kgarbach@gmail.com.
Introducing New Vegetables to Urban Consumers
Local researchers and farmers are trialing specialty
vegetables for niche markets.
 By
Ted Carey, Vegetable Extension Specialist, K-State Research and
Extension
There seems to be a trend toward greater diversity in the American
diet. Just watch the Food Channel, look in the produce section
of most any grocery store, visit a farmers market, flip through a
seed catalog, or visit an urban farm and you’ll almost certainly
find vegetables that you wouldn’t have seen ten years ago.
Often these new vegetables first appear in response to demand by
immigrants yearning for a taste of their own foods. With
time these foods may become popular among the general
population, presenting vegetable growers with opportunities to
satisfy new markets.
Over the last couple of seasons, in partnership with KCCUA, urban farmer Sam Davis and others, we’ve been exploring the potential for growing and selling a couple of little-known vegetable crops: sweet potato greens and moqua (hairy melon). We chose these crops through a participatory process which considered the potential of various crops to appeal to mainstream markets and to be productive in our Midwestern climate. Sweet potato greens are a widely consumed vegetable in some parts of the world--Southeast Asia, Oceania, and parts of Africa in particular--but completely unknown or rejected as a vegetable in others. Because I have an ongoing sweet potato variety evaluation and selection program, it seemed an easy next step to evaluate vines for leafy green production and suitability for use as a leafy green vegetable. Moqua (Benincasa hispida) is a cucurbit that tastes a bit like a cucumber, can be eaten raw or cooked, and that, unlike a cucumber, retains its texture when cooked. To some it may look a bit strange but we thought that its culinary quality could win over new consumers. I should mention that both sweet potato greens and moqua are regularly sold at relatively low prices in Kansas City's Asian grocery stores where they arrive from distant places. Still we thought there might be a broader market for these crops, with some consumers willing to pay a premium for local, fresh and organic selections. To start our sweet potato evaluation, we asked a couple of experts, Grace Kipp--a local Taiwanese chef--and Lile Merrill--originally from Tonga--to help us select a few varieties to evaluate. Not surprisingly they looked for tender, smooth (not hairy) shoot tips and leaves. Though it wasn’t the best looking, we included the widely grown commercial variety, Beauregard, because it is readily available to local growers and gardeners. We also picked up a bag of the commercially available sweet potato greens, smooth and bright green, at an Asian grocery store and multiplied them for inclusion in our trials. We distributed sets of varieties to each of our partners and also grew them ourselves. We grew them in raised beds, planted quite densely in order to have a thick canopy of shoot tips to harvest. Some of our partners regularly harvested and sold sweet potato vines at market, providing their customers with advice on preparation. And we made up a recipe and an evaluation sheet which we gave out along with free samples to visitors at our research and extension center and to customers of our student farm. During the growing season, we evaluated the production of the sweet potato varieties in our plots, observing large differences between them with respect to leafy green production based on growth habit and vigor. We took a similar approach with moqua, assembling all the varieties that we could find for evaluation including cultivars from Kitazawa Seed Co., Evergreen Y.H. Enterprises, and Johnny’s Selected Seeds. We grew transplants and gave them to our partners with the recommendation that they trellis these vining crops. Our vines grew quickly, and we have had a heavy harvest of these hairy gourds with notable differences among varieties. As with sweet potato greens, we developed recipes and an evaluation sheet to give out with free samples to promote this vegetable and ask for feedback. As a culmination of efforts for the season, we organized a sweet potato and moqua-themed tasting party where we invited people to bring dishes featuring these crops, and where we had a controlled (more or less) taste test of all eleven sweet potato varieties, cooked two ways: (1) blanched and (2) lightly fried with a bit of olive oil, garlic and a squeeze of lemon juice. The samples were number-coded and tasters evaluated each variety, and had access to saltines and water to cleanse their palates between samples. At the end of the exercise, we revealed the names of the varieties and discussed them using a flip chart. Tasters could distinguish among the varieties, clearly liking the variety from the grocery store, another variety called Diane, and also liking the leaves of a purple fleshed selection from our breeding program. Coincidentally, the favored varieties are also a great producer of vines, prolifically producing many shoots for a continuous harvest. Beauregard, however, may not be a good choice for producers of sweet potato greens as it did not stand out in the taste test and was not a prolific vine producer either. We did not do a controlled taste test of moqua, but many consumers were pleased and excited to try this new vegetable. The trials and initial customer feedback make us optimistic about the market potential of these vegetables among new customers. We will continue efforts to popularize sweet potato greens and moqua by working with growers as well as with chefs seeking to include them on their menus.
Reach Ted at tcarey@ksu.edu.
Enabling Urban Agriculture in Lima, Peru
Multi-stakeholder process leads to comprehensive urban ag
strategy.
The RUAF Foundation is an international network of Resource Centres
on Urban Agriculture and Food Security. RUAF partners share a
common vision on urban development and poverty reduction, and jointly
implement programs to strengthen urban agriculture and food security.
In 2005 RUAF started the Cities Farming for the Future program
to develop regional training and planning capacities and to facilitate
multi-stakeholder policy formulation and action planning in 21 cities in
7 regions. This article tells the experience of one city--Lima,
Peru. The RUAF From Seed to Table program continues the
processes set in motion in RUAF partner cities with an added emphasis on
strengthening urban farmer organizations, micro-enterprise and
marketing.
 By
Gunther Merzthal, Noemi Soto and Marielle Dubbeling
Agriculture is practiced widely in the low-income districts of Lima,
Peru. Yet, despite the significant contribution by urban and peri-urban
agriculture to household incomes and food security, this sector of the
economy has received very little attention until a couple of years
ago. Farming was absent from the municipal organization and
planning and the voices of local producers were unheard. Perhaps
this resembles the situation in most North-American cities?
The district of Villa Maria del Triunfo in Lima has almost 360,000
residents. Some 57 percent of them live in poverty. In
response, the municipality started an urban agriculture program to
improve urban food security.
Starting in 2005, the Municipality of Villa Maria del Triunfo, with the
support of IPES-Promoción del Desarrollo Sostenible and the RUAF
Foundation, conducted a Multi-stakeholder Policy Formulation and Action
Planning process in order to (a) develop a better understanding among
decision-makers and others about the significance of local food
production and (b) revise its urban agriculture policy and formulate a
Strategic Action Plan for Urban Agriculture. Despite difficult
growing conditions in this arid region, currently over 500 family and
community gardens are located in the municipality. In addition,
landless families living in poor hillside settlements often keep small
animals for occasional sale or home consumption.
The Multi-stakeholder Policy Formulation and Action Planning (MPAP)
process included four stages:
1. Strengthening of Local Capacities
Decision makers, municipal and NGO staff and university representatives participated in awareness raising activities, policy seminars and exchange visits to other cities with experience in urban agriculture. This helped them gain a better understanding of urban agriculture and its effect on food security, incomes and a greener urban environment. It also reinforced their commitment to the multi-stakeholders planning process.
2. Situation Analysis
A participatory analysis of urban agriculture was implemented as a basis for further action planning. Local stakeholders were identified and mobilized; the legal and normative frameworks impacting urban agriculture were analyzed. The existing urban farming systems and their (potential) impacts were also analyzed. Land resources were identified and mapped. 3. Action Planning By the end of 2006, a multi-stakeholder forum (resembling the North American Food Policy Councils) on urban agriculture was formed, in which 20 institutions participated, including the local government, development NGOs, community-based organizations, private sector organizations, international agencies and urban producer groups. The forum was asked to create a 5-year Strategic Action Plan as well as a set of policy guidelines on urban agriculture.
4. Implementation
With some co-funding from IPES/RUAF, the multi-stakeholder forum has
been able in 2007-2008 to mobilize over US$195,000 to implement several
of its short-term actions as defined in the strategic plan, including:
Today, there is wide consensus among urban producers and decision-makers
in Villa Maria that urban agriculture is a legitimate and
sustainable form of urban land use that should be actively supported and
maintained. Formerly vacant land areas located under high-voltage
power lines or on steep slopes have been transformed into productive
green spaces, contributing not only to greater food security and
increased income, but also to a more livable urban environment.
The municipal ordinance has provided urban agriculture legitimacy and
facilitated its integration in the city’s Economic Development and
Land Use Plans. The urban agriculture program is now a permanent
structure under the Department for Local Economic Development with three
permanent staff and an annual budget of US$ 55,000.
The multi-stakeholder process resulted in a 5-year Strategic Plan that
responds to the real needs of the population. Almost 600 poor
farming families and over 20 local organizations have been mobilized and
organized and have participated actively in the process of designing,
planning and implementing strategic activities on urban agriculture.
The multi-stakeholder forum guarantees ongoing dialog among
stakeholders and oversees the implementation of the Strategic Plan for
Urban Agriculture. The forum is instrumental in mobilizing
resources for the plan’s implementation. And it also works to
regularly update the Strategic Plan, thus ensuring that it remains
relevant to the viability of urban agriculture in a dynamic social,
economic and political environment.
For more information on RUAF’s approach to multi-stakeholder
policy formulation and action planning, please contact Marielle
Dubbeling, global coordinator of the RUAF-From Seed to Table Program
at m.dubbeling@etcnl.nl.
A RUAF Working Paper on MPAP can also be downloaded from http://www.ruaf.org/sites/default/files/WP_01.pdf.
For more information on the experience in Lima, please contact
Gunther Merzthal, regional coordinator for RUAF in Latin America or
Noemi Soto, local coordinator of the process in Lima at Gunther@ipes.org.pe.
UMKC to Offer Course On Urban Agriculture
Plans are in the works to offer a course on urban agriculture, food
systems and sustainable urban design at UMKC next semester. The
course will be interdisciplinary in its structure and content, drawing
from the fields of agriculture, urban planning, architecture and design,
geosciences, community development and ecology. Daniel
Dermitzel (KCCUA), Dr. Jacob Wagner (UMKC-Urban Planning) and Dr.
Molly Davies (UMKC-Environmental Sciences) will teach the course which
will also be open to professionals through UMKC's Program
for Adult Continuing Education (PACE). It will be taught as an
evening class. Stay tuned for more details coming soon.
Calendar of Events
From Commodity to Community: Food
Politics and Projects in the Heartland. The Community Food
Security Coalition's 13th Annual Conference. October 10-13, 2009,
Des Moines, IA. Info at http://communityfoodconference.org.
Growing Growers Workshop: New Farms - First steps in planning a farm business. Saturday, October 17, 10am to 4pm. Lunch provided. K-State Research and Extension Station, Olathe, KS. Led by Katherine Kelly (KCCUA) and Ted Carey (K-State Research and Extension). For more information on this and other Growing Growers workshops visit http://www.growinggrowers.org/Pages/workshop.htm or email Laura at growers@ksu.edu.
Pro-Urban Agriculture Codes for Kansas
City. Tuesday, October 20, 6pm to 7:30pm. Bad Seed
Market, 1909 McGee, Kansas City, MO. Join us as we begin to draft
urban agriculture supportive codes for Kansas City, MO. RSVP to
katherine@kccua.org.
Novella Carpenter, Urban Farmer Extraordinaire
& Best-Selling Author, comes to BADSEED:
(1) Farm City Talk: An Evening with Novella Carpenter. Saturday, October 24, 6pm to 7:30pm. Bad Seed Market, 1909 McGee, Kansas City, MO. Learn about the history of urban farming in America as well as Novella's urban farm in downtown Oakland, CA, where she has raised chickens, goats, turkeys, bees, pigs, and more! All ages/unlimited event - $10 at the door. (2) The Complete Chicken. Sunday, October 25, 10am to 1pm / 4pm to 5pm. Learn to keep happy, healthy hens on a budget for farm fresh eggs or home-grown meat. The first part of this class will cover backyard chicken basics from day old chick to egg producer. The remaining section will focus on killing a chicken as quickly and humanely as possible to put ethical meat on your table. Special butchery and cooking demo by renowned chef Samin Nosrat! $100 per student, pre-register and payment required. Visit www.badseedfarm.com for more info or contact brooke@badseedfarm.com to sign up. Food Film Festival. Wednesday, November 4. Grinnell College, Grinnell, IA. Katherine Kelly (KCCUA) will speak on a panel about the issues raised in a selection of Food Films, including Food, Inc., Fresh, King Corn and The Real Dirt on Farm John. For more information, contact Ami Freeberg, freeberg@Grinnell.edu. Cultivating Healthy Kansans--A Leadership Summit on Health Promotion and Chronic Disease Prevention. December 1-3. Topeka, KS. Twenty state and local partner organizations from across Kansas will host a conference focused on disease self-management, quality of care, environmental and social influences on health, the built environment, community planning and smart growth and effective collaborations to impact chronic disease and injury prevention. Katherine Kelly will speak on Tuesday, December 1, in the afternoon. More information at http://www.cultivatinghealthykansans.org.
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The Kansas City Center for Urban Agriculture
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(913) 831-2444
(c) KCCUA 2009
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