Canada: Cultiville founder connects landless gardeners to people with land but no green thumb
Urban agriculture groups laud idea but warn it could pose liability issues
By Joe Bongiorno
CBC News
May 22, 2023
Excerpt:
Sophie Maslon grew up in Pointe-Claire, in Montreal’s West Island, where her father’s garden produced a bounty of lettuce, tomatoes and parsley, but it wasn’t until last spring that she really dug her hands into the earth for the first time.
Maslon says she hasn’t been the same person since. The trials and triumphs of growing her own food taught her patience and that it’s OK to make mistakes.
A resident of Montreal’s Plateau-Mont-Royal borough, she searched for a garden space close to home last year. But with waiting lists at community gardens as long as seven years in her borough, Maslon went searching on social media for alternatives farther afield.
Eventually, she found people in the Notre-Dame-de-Grâce borough and Lacolle, near the Quebec-U.S. border, who were willing to offer her some space in their backyards.
That was when she decided to create Cultiville, an online platform to connect people who have land to spare with Montrealers who want to garden but don’t have access to a plot of soil — for free, a fee, or in exchange for share of the harvest or a helping hand.
“I realized that the traditional community garden route isn’t that good,” Maslon said. “So we decided that we needed something, a better way to do it.”
