Jerry meets up with a guerrilla gardening group taking over empty public spaces to grow food for those that need it, sharing growing skills to increase community resilience. Subscribe đ http://ab.co/GA-subscribe
Over the pandemic lockdowns, many of us were alarmed by images of empty supermarket shelves and supply shortages. Rather than running out and hoarding toot-roll, a group of young people saw it as an opportunity to provide for the vulnerable in their community and rethink how public space was being used.
Al Wicks says theyâd âalways had the pipe-dream of doing community gardensâŠover covid me and my friends started getting worried about food security for vulnerable people in the communityâ.
One of these friends was Ruby Thorburn, who says âthere was an overwhelming sense of fear, seeing these empty supermarkets. We wanted to produce food overnightâŠto avoid red tape and bureaucracy and use direct actionâ.
In response, they formed âGrowing Forwardâ, a community organisation dedicated to setting up guerrilla community gardens in underutilised public space. Weâre visiting a site theyâve successfully converted from forgotten space to thriving community gardens with a purpose.
What started out with a bit of rule bending, has now garnered support of the whole community â including the council.
âWe looked around and found a plot of land that was owned by the state government, but had been abandoned for over 90 years. Our neighbour works in council and looked into contamination reports that had been done on the soil and found it was goodâ says Ruby.
Leaning on Rubyâs permaculture background, they conducted a site assessment and identified a tap for water supply and a promising full-sun aspect. âThe goal was community food resilience, and to get people thinking differently about foodâ.
After speaking with local indigenous elders to gain their permission to use the land, the group studied successful guerrilla community gardens to try to replicate what factors had made them work.
The first was wide community consultation. Every house in the surrounding area to the proposed garden was repeatedly doorknocked, to canvas any issues or concerns with establishing the garden- and identify anyone who was willing to help. Flyers were also distributed.
The next was rapid implementation. âOur goal was to set it up in 2 days, to skip the uncertain period where people are not sure whatâs going onâ says Ruby. âWe just went ahead and did itâ says Al.
âWe brought in about 20 m2 of soil, and spent our personal money on itâ says Al. âIt took about a day to get it all in, there was a lot of community supportâ. While a lot of elbow grease went into the set-up, thereâs no permanent infrastructure, which helps avoid the ire of bureaucrats
The first garden is at West End, in inner-south Brisbane, and itâs been a total success. Occupying around ÂŒ acre, itâs ringed by edible native plants with mounded beds of vegetables inside.
Everything grown goes back into the community to feed those who need it most. âThe founding principles were doing free work for the community, and the produce is freeâ. âWe have signs saying this food is going to vulnerable people, and it seems to workâ.
At West End the produce goes to refugees living in the community, so Al and Ruby asked the refugee community organisation what they would like to eat. Accordingly, the fare is a little more diverse than whatâs on offer at the shops, with sweet potato, okra, cassava, elephant foot yams and papaya thriving. Itâs also become a place for meetings and picnics.
The approach has been a big success, regularly supplying food to community organisations and those most vulnerable, as well as building local connections. The program has expanded.
Featured Plants:
PAW PAW – Carica papaya cv.
SWEET POTATO – Ipomoea batatas cv.
CHILLI – Capsicum cv.
PUMPKIN âJAPâ – Cucurbita maxima cv.
OKRA – Abelmoschus esculentus cv.
Filmed on Turrbal & Yuggera Country | Brisbane, Qld
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26 Comments
My dream garden. But I am very busy with kids, cooking and working. I wish have enought time to build my dream garden.
Victory garden in America in the 40s, Guerilla garden in Australia in the 20s. Hard times call for people to be self reliant. Hard times are coming, and sooner than people think. Cheers from North Queensland
gardening with masks đ
Will this be allowed in the future with the 2030 agenda?
What a wonderful idea! More lower to them theyâre doing such a wonderful job. I just love that theyâre helping the more vulnerable members of our multicultural community too.
Great job guys. Xx
Councils should be on board with this, they should be converting unused blocks to vege gardens, im sure if they put the call out people will hepl make it happen, their should not be anything that the council's should put in the way of this being done, we need vege gardens everywhere t t needs to become the norm
After seeing this I am going to lobby for the government to Cull ALL the cows in the country and ALL of the chickens will be set free……Because we didn't ask their permission to exploit them. Klaus Schwab will give me a medal.
Woke alert WOKE ALERT!
I like the gesture of asking the traditional owners but at the end of the day you can't just build a garden without approval from the local council at least!
Wawnice
Time 2 get back 2 growing your own veg and fruit people great show people đ±đ±đ±đŻđŻđŻđđđđđđ Les from Perth
Is this recent?
Great concept love the idea. But guerilla gardens would be better in the poorer suburbs of Brisbane where they are more needed than
the richer ones.
Love it.. let the okra grow tho
You're using gorillas in your garden to do the work?
!
Wonderful initiative.
Our tiny indoor vertical farm here in South Carolina was founded in 2020 and is now open source. We are dumping all our methodologies to the public for all to use, get inspiration from, etc. âïžđđ±
I love gardening, but the amount of WOKE , left wing agendas in one video makes me sick đ€ź
Great work!
Great idea, but I'm curious about who is paying for the water? They said they identified a water source, where did that come from? Was it the apartment building, or was there already an outlet on the government owned land? If its on the government owned land, then its the tax payers paying for the water, which is why some government areas can get twitchy (unapproved use of tax payer funds).
J.A.P. aka Kent Pumpkins are Moschata not Maxima as show in the clip
Love ya work, its the only thing we need to do as humans , the perfect cure for depression an basically every disease known to man …. to grow an eat all fresh produce will change ur life forever… I'm living proof of this fact đ
While I like the idea, the fact the people who run the project are extreme far left leaves a lot of people from the centre and right out of it. Why would you want to get involved. Some of us have extensive permaculture experience.
Hopefully they become more neutral as time goes on. I like the concept of turning people owned spaces (council land) into more edible spaces.
why don't councils grow fruit trees in public spaces for people to pick for free? it should be their responsibility…
Wonderful ideas and action. Congratulations to all involved!
I love this! Is there a guide on how to try start a similar thing in everyone's local council? I don't have a horticulture degree but I'd definitely volunteer to be admin and a worker!