Dig Bristol: Engaging the city on a food journey
Posted on 17 April 2010
Bristol has an ambition and strategy to create a world leading food gardening city. The Bristol Food Network provides a structure for all the city groups who contributed to the strategy to work together to engage more people in producing food sustainably on land in and around the Bristol city region.
Urban food growing is a first step in achieving a more resilient city food system, and a good way to raise awareness among city people about sustainable food from spade to plate.
The Dig Bristol strategy also aims to align community food groups with other food interests across the city by buying into the common strategy. The community food groups will act as hubs for re-skilling in food gardening and developing engaging communications to get more people and more land under food production. Through this initiative, more people will be engaged in growing fruit, vegetables, nuts and herbs in private gardens, school, hospital and church grounds; public land; regenerated waste ground; parks, allotments and small holdings.
Forum for the Future, one of the groups who have contributed to the development of the Sustainable Food Strategy, is preparing the project on behalf of the Bristol Food Network. For more details, please contact simonbilling@forumforthefuture.org
2 responses to Dig Bristol: Engaging the city on a food journey
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Bristol city region
Making the West of England the most sustainable city region in the UK and one of the top green cities in the world, with leadership that understands the urgency of the need for profound change to create a sustainable, prosperous future.
Let’s just make sure that we don’t fall into the trap of thinking that the city can begin to think about feeding itself without recognising the imperative of using land from the city region. Laudable as all our wonderful small scale food intiatives are, the real task for me is to get regional decision makers to factor in re-connection and a re-vitalisation of largely derelict market gardens in the Bristol region which have suffered so badly under the influence of the global food economy.
Simon is clearly aware of the need to shape up a “regional foodscape” which could act to bring all kinds of growing initiatives together at a variety of scales.
Bristol has that opportunity to shape these ideas up in a meaningful way. Protesting Tescopoly is NOT the only way forward if we are to get a wider set of food success stories.
Richard Spalding
Very much agree Richard, and I hope we (all the local groups) won’t fall into that trap. I’m clear, like you, that we need to start valuing and protecting our ‘blue belt’ (that grade 1 agricultural land) just as much as we traditionally protect our ‘green belt’.
Paul.