FARMING Tue, 12/21 6:18PM • 13:41 SUMMARY KEYWORDS urban farming, food, food insecurity, urban agriculture, community gardens, people, pandemic, grow, toronto, city, garden, started, spaces, urban farm, unraveled, canada, ryerson, communities, benefits, creating SPEAKERS Afua Mfodwo, Ran Goel, Rachel Parent, Jamie De Fleck, Cindy Pham Afua Mfodwo 00:04 In this episode of unraveled, producer Rachel Parent explores how urban farming is impacting the future of food production. My name is Afua Mfodwo, and this is unraveled. Rachel Parent 00:26 About four years ago, my mom started a garden. Every year I watched her dedicate time and harvest the rewards. I found it fascinating but never got overly involved. Fast forward to when the pandemic hit, I started to feel more disconnected than ever. Like many during the pandemic, I struggled to get off my phone, day in and day out at scroll through tic TOCs Instagram reels and YouTube while also doing online school. Needless to say, my screentime increased drastically and so did my need for something different. And that's when I got involved. I started planting seeds, harvesting vegetables and getting some fresh air. But this sparked my interest. I couldn't be the only one that turned to plants and gardening to clear my mind and to relax. I decided to do some research and found out that there were whole communities across Canada that participated in urban farming and community gardens. During this time, I also began to notice an increase in house lessness in Toronto, the ability to access food became harder and prices when higher. Food is something we all need to survive. For some food is an unconscious part of the day. Our appetites continue to grow, but sort of the barriers to meeting our needs. As the wealth gap widens symptoms like food insecurity and food scarcity in cities are more obvious than ever. The act of eating a simple task to some is a constant struggle for others, the pandemic should light and worsen the ever increasing issue of food insecurity in Canada. As an example, more than one in four food banks located in bigger cities saw their usage doubled during the pandemic. According to food banks, Canada, Ontario specifically saw a large spike in increase food aid with a 23% increase. Majority of the visits were in the largest cities like Toronto. Beyond the economic factors of food and accessibility. My research also led me to find out that our food systems are some of the most destructive and damaging for our climate and the environment. Currently, food systems produce more carbon than transportation in Canada. Which brings me back to where we started. All the research and all the digging led me back to what I was already taking part in urban farming. Many call it the solution to creating more localized food systems, helping to curb food insecurity and helping to draw down more atmospheric carbon. Growing food is important. But does urban farming really hold that much power? That's what I set out to find out. So I decided to sit down with Ran Goel the founder of fresh city farms to talk about what he thinks the potential for urban agriculture looks like. Thank you so much for joining me ran, I love to start off by talking more about fresh city. It was founded with this idea of people and the planet in mind. But could you explain a little bit more about your overall goal of the company when it comes to changing food systems. Ran Goel 03:29 Vision is a better life. We do that in a number of ways. We're trying to be an independent source of seasonal, sustainable and organic, fresh food. We're really just trying to push the ball forward on create an alternative food system, if you will, for people to be able to access a better better kind of food. The biggest challenge for us as a company in a way of the movement for a model where the food that we sell, unfortunately, at a premium, not everyone can afford it to a place where it becomes commonplace and accessible physically, financially to more and more people. I think that's the biggest challenge ultimately, that we're trying to address. Rachel Parent 04:14 It's really interesting that you brought up the idea of trying to make healthier food more economically available to everyone. I think that's an issue that's incredibly important. And I wonder where you think urban agriculture fits into that puzzle. Ran Goel 04:29 I think for urban farming, food security, and really getting food into the discussion and building communities of advocacy around these issues. I think that's where my mind urban farming has the most potential. It's by a very spirited and very passionate people together around food and advocate for less than x per cent of our food to come from cities. That's obviously a bonus but to my mind, a small part of the urban farm. Rachel Parent 05:00 Ran and I talked for some time on the phone, we covered a lot of ground. But what really stood out to me in the conversation was his outlook for urban farming. He said that he hopes this will be widely adopted as places like Berlin have already done. We're growing food no matter your living accommodations is a write. Surely, if it's already being done in other cities around the world, it could be done in Toronto as well. I liked the idea that ran could turn a passion into a business that is socially benefiting communities. The idea of green economies and being able to make a living off of something positive, is becoming more prevalent in today's society. But I really wanted to learn more. Who else is in urban agriculture? What do they see as the benefits long term? Could we address food insecurity through means like urban agriculture. As I dive deeper into the world of research, it's clear that really anyone can be affected by food insecurity, and neighbor, a friend or family member. Among some of the populations most impacted by food insecurity, I was surprised to find out that students rank fairly high. Every report was released by the organization meal exchange, pointing to 40% of post secondary students in Canada being food insecure. As a student myself, I wanted to learn more about the efforts that urban farms on university campuses are accomplishing. So I spoke to Cindy Pham, the engagement coordinator at the Ryerson Urban Farm To learn more. Cindy Pham 06:27 I got involved 10 years ago, when I started my undergrad at Ryerson in nutrition. At the time, the farm was just a small student group on the ground. And we were just utilizing underutilized spaces across campus, just to see like where we could grow food. And then from there, we got access to the green roof that was built in 2004. And so we test pilot it in 2013 saw that we could grow pretty much anything. I've been there since 2011. So it's been 10 years now. And I just stayed on because I fell in love with everyone agriculture, and I just kind of liked to be able to grow food in the city and to learn so much. Rachel Parent 07:07 Being at the farm for so long, I'm sure you've seen a lot of the environmental and social benefits, I was curious if you could speak more to the idea of food insecurity and what role urban agriculture could play in feeding more people in Toronto. Cindy Pham 07:20 Like move away from like chemicals. And industrial agriculture means to create a way to grow food that is not only beneficial to us, but also beneficial to the environment and like helps to maintain the soil and helps to maintain life and like the the finite resources that we have here and helps to mitigate issues with climate and the environment. But I think that in terms of food security, like I think that there's many other factors that contribute to it, in terms of like income, in terms of access to education, in terms of resources, in terms of people's ability to access food, I'm not really sure that urban agriculture itself is something that will like solve food insecurity, I think it's gonna really contribute to it in a way that people can take control of their food system and like be able to grow food, and like have that food locally available and urban agriculture itself still has, I feel like it still has a really long way to go. And I don't think that it's like the one thing that will solve food insecurity because there's so many other factors that come into play, that need to be access equitably for people to have, like true food security, but I think that it's like a stepping stone. It's definitely like a like a way to show people that like it's possible in cities to grow food. Rachel Parent 08:40 The one thing I noticed from speaking with both Ran and Cindy, was the amount of benefits that come out of urban farming, environmentally, socially and healthy food wise, it seems like a win all around. So why isn't it more common? And how can we get more infrastructure to support it? Jamie De Fleck is a huge advocate for urban farming. She recently released her film in my backyard, interviewing urban farmers and rooftop projects about the successes they've had all around Toronto. I was really curious to interview Jamie to get an idea of what she thought the future of urban agriculture looked like and its true social and environmental benefits. Thank you so much for joining us today, Jamie. And I want to just jump right into it and start by asking what do you think are some of the greatest benefits urban agriculture has to offer? Jamie De Fleck 09:31 When we do things like community gardens or events, harvest events, you know, all those events that would surrounded we're bringing people to to spaces and we're talking about things and we're creating relationships. And I think people need that so much these days. And that's what community gardens can do. That's what urban farms can do is they attract like minded people to those facilities and allow them to be educated. hubs, obviously food hubs, but just places that the community can enjoy each other. Rachel Parent 10:06 How do you think that we get more buildings or communities or people just in general to take part in even growing their own garden or urban agriculture, being a part of those types of projects. Jamie De Fleck 10:18 Education is the way to go with that. School gardens is a big thing. Getting kids involved very early on. Community gardens is also important. And you should look for community gardens to be a part of maybe volunteering at an urban farm. Or there's lots of opportunities if you're interested to grow things. Even if you don't have a backyard space or a front yard space. Of course, just putting some pots on your balcony or something is getting started. I think that's something that is going to need to happen in Toronto is really evaluating how spaces are utilized. I feel like right now, it's very much about development, and every inch of the city is to be used for development. But that can be leveraged because we have things like the green roof bylaw, where you know, they have to put green space on top of the roof. So they might as well put a garden that the that actually enhances the buildings so that they can the residents can grow food or flowers on top of the condo building, it actually makes it more desirable to live there. So I think it's this kind of thing that we need to start looking at in the city is power the spaces used, who benefits from these spaces? And how can we make it greener and more just for everyone. Rachel Parent 11:48 Overall, urban agriculture may not solve food insecurity on its own, because we would need to tackle the economic and social barriers. But it is a jumping off point. It allows people to connect with where their food comes from and have access to food at more affordable prices. Also, the environmental cost of transporting food and maintaining proper conditions is high. This cost doesn't exist with a localized and community driven project. Urban farming can be a part of the future as we move into this new world where everything is technocratic li advanced. Perhaps the simple things like planting a seed producing food locally. And knowing where our food comes from is just what we need. All I know is that my work in the garden won't be ending anytime soon. Afua Mfodwo 13:01 This episode of unraveled was produced by Rachel Parent. Our associate producer is Talha Hashmani and our executive producer is Elena De Luigi. Special thanks to John Powers for composing our theme music, and Ben Shelley for creating our podcast artwork. Our professor is Amanda Cupido and special thanks to Lindsay Hanna and Angela Glover. - 1 - 00Transcribed by https://otter.ai