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Urban Farming During COVID

Patricia Spence stands in Clark Farm, one of the earliest intact examples of agricultural property in an urban space in Massachusetts. (Photo: Courtesy of Bruce Gellerman, WBUR)

The nation’s oldest continually operating Victory Garden is in Boston and across the city modern urban farms carry on the tradition of growing hyper local food for residents.

Living on Earth
Public Radio’s Environmental News Magazine
Oct 15, 2020

Excerpt:

GELLERMAN: Williamson recently joined the Farming Institute’s $25 dollar a week Community Supported Agriculture program but even that is too much for many Boston residents hit hard by the pandemic. Hunger is a growing problem. One in 5 Massachusetts families with children are food insecure. That’s almost double the rate a year ago. And nationally some 54 million people may be food insecure this year.

Institute Executive Director Pat Spence:

SPENCE: So they’ve lost family members due to covid they’ve lost jobs ..what can we do..as farmers we’re going to give food away. If someone is in need of food, we’re going to help you. That’s the most important thing we can do at this time.

GELLERMAN: When residents were locked down Spence says, the Urban Farming Institute brought the farm to them.

SPENCE: So we developed for this year the Build On Hundred Grow Boxes Campaign and we built 20 already. and they’re growing their own food.

GELLERMAN: But providing people with fresh, healthy food is only part of the Farming Institute’s mission. It also conducts a twenty week course teaching participants to become farm entrepreneurs.
SPENCE: Those who are interested in learning the art of urban farming…who really want to get their hands in the dirt…and we’ve graduated approximately 170 people since 2013.

Read the complete article here.