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Buildings and roads are cutting into our farming land and the amount of land around for agriculture is slowly but surely becoming smaller. For individuals wanting to have a natural, traditional, ecological and healthier way of life, urban agriculture is a useful way of going back to nature. City Dwellers are making use of backyards, rooftops, community gardens and farms at the edges of the city to grow their own food, and although this is great for the individual, with support they could be providing city with its own home grown vegetables and herbs. With the recession and families wanting a healthier lifestyle this urban gardening is becoming exceedingly popular, but there are many barriers preventing an efficient approach, for example when you are living in Toronto condos. But organizations are getting in on the act and striving to break down those barriers. Moving forward and understanding that Urban Agriculture is the way to go, the Toronto Board of Health created a sub-committee called Toronto Food Policy Council, in 1991. Pushing forward to encourage access to healthy, affordable, and culturally acceptable food for its population, it is working alongside business and community groups to achieve its aims. One of the prolific organizations linked with urban farming is Foodshare. According to its central philosophy, its major aim is to “take a multifaceted, innovative and long-term approach to hunger and food issues”. Another exciting project is called The Stop Community Food Centre. The group “strives to increase access to healthy food in a manner that maintains dignity, builds community and challenges inequality”. Working at galvanizing youth and community involvement, Toronto Urban Farm is supporting organic farming mixed in with leadership development and being healthy. If you are a youth looking for a project specifically geared at youths, or you know someone who is, then the Young Urban Farmers is worth contacting. Created in 2009 by university students, they want to show that gardening can be fun and their main goal is to help the public understand this and grow their own fresh food. Crops such as radishes, cucumbers and tomatoes, which mature rapidly are often normally the best type of vegetable or fruit to plant in an urban garden. One of the first rules of gardening is to avoid planting the same thing year after year, this will cause the soil to be unhealthy, you will invite pests and could end up with diseases.
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