North Van city considers plan for farms on boulevards

UBC lab is 'trying to create something that doesn't exist anywhere else'

Kim Davis, Special to the SUN
Published: July 25, 2009

From the Victory gardens of the last century's two world wars to the community-garden movement started in the 1970s, urban agriculture has played an important role in the security of the food supply.

Metro Vancouver is no stranger to the urban harvest. According to City Farmer, 44 per cent of Vancouver's population is involved in some form of urban agriculture. When Vancouver city council passed a motion in 2006 to encourage the creation of 2,010 new garden plots by Jan. 1, 2010, a legacy for the Vancouver 2010 Winter Games, there were 950 plots in 18 gardens.

Today, there are more than 1,700 new plots in more than 40 community, or resident-shared, gardens. There are also 20 farmers' markets.

Unlike gardens grown for and by private gardeners, gardens grown for commercial purposes have historically met resistance by urban authorities and planners. Considered relics of a rural past, they were either prohibited or severely restricted.

Times are changing. Environmental degradation, dwindling oil resources and increasing concerns over urban food security are among the causes.

Locally a proposal from the University of B.C.'s Greenskins Lab to the City of North Vancouver could soon bring your local farmer to a boulevard near you.

[Read More]
- - -

Kim Davis is a Vancouver environmental affairs consultant. E-mail: redkimwrites@gmail.com

© Copyright (c) The Vancouver Sun