Jessica Hyman of Friends of Burlington Gardens and the Vermont Community Garden Network at the Riverside Neighborhood Garden in Burlington last week. / GLENN RUSSELL/FREE PRESS
I believe that everyone can take part in growing food for themselves, their families and their communities.
There is something almost magical about growing your own food. You take a seed, some soil, water, air and light, and with care and a little patience, that seed is transformed into luscious tomatoes, tangy mustard greens, sweet peas or succulent squash.
Whether it’s in a pot of parsley on the kitchen window sill, a tomato plant in a bucket on the front stoop, a backyard garden, a community garden plot or a shared school garden, growing fresh vegetables, herbs and fruit connects you to your food and increases self-sufficiency. It also is the ultimate local food source — providing fresh, healthy produce for yourself and others.
Learning about where food comes from and how to grow, preserve and share it addresses some of the key issues in our society by changing fundamentally how we perceive and value food. Experience shows that when children have a hand in growing fresh fruits and vegetables, they are more likely to try new items and develop an appreciation for healthy eating habits. When adults learn basic gardening skills, they are more likely to extend that knowledge to their families and others.
I grew up on a dairy farm, and we always had a big garden. We ate fresh produce much of the year, and the basement freezer and pantry shelves were full of our own vegetables and fruit — and the odd chicken, pig or cow. Whether it was it was the salad in my bowl or the burger on my plate, I always knew where my food came from — and I assumed everyone else did, too. It wasn’t until later in life that I realized how fortunate I was to have had that experience and intuitive understanding of fresh, healthy food. I have continued to garden and take great pleasure in filling the freezer and the pantry with garden goodness.
In early adulthood, I spent a decade as a journalist, passionate about social justice and sharing information that helped people make informed decisions about their lives, their communities and the world. My work with Friends of Burlington Gardens and the Vermont Community Garden Network helping community and school groups across the state build strong and vibrant gardens and garden-education programs follows the same path: sharing the information, resources and encouragement that allow people to make informed and engaged decisions about their food — and by extension, their lives, their communities and the world.
Community and school gardens have benefits far beyond food. Gardening and learning together in a shared space strengthens communities. Garden friendships and mentoring can develop across ages, abilities, cultures and backgrounds, and these vibrant growing spaces often provide a catalyst for community development.
Vermont is actively developing a new approach to feeding itself, an approach that is anchored in its agricultural heritage, cultural commitment to independence and self-sufficiency, and an abiding understanding that everyone deserves equal access to healthy food.
Gardens & ag development
Garden education and community-based food production are closely connected to agricultural development. Although the food produced in community and school gardens is only a part of what we consume, the act of growing and the social and educational components that go along with it affects how people make choices about the rest of the food they buy for themselves and for their families. Evidence shows that growing food at a small scale is the first step to making healthier food choices overall.
These gardens are mini working landscapes — they are essential to connecting people to their food and to where it comes from.
Farm to Plate, the statewide strategy to strengthen Vermont’s food system, has the primary goal of doubling the consumption of Vermont-grown food in the next 10 years. This means more than just boosting the amount of local food we buy. It means increasing the amount of food that we grow, cook, preserve and share.
Community and school gardens advance the main food consumption goal of Farm to Plate, along with other key strategy goals, such as to increase self-sufficiency and access to food through small-scale production; to assure access of all Vermonters to fresh, nutritionally balanced food at prices they can afford; to help all Vermonters have a greater understanding of how to obtain, grow, store and prepare nutritional food; and to increase the exposure of K-12 students to careers in the food system.
We can all play an active role in our local food system by being producers, not just consumers. Community and school gardens are a great step toward making healthier and more local food choices, and access to gardening for everyone is critical to our overall community wellbeing.
Jess Hyman is executive director of Friends of Burlington Gardens and the Vermont Community Garden Network, a nonprofit organization that works with community and school groups in Burlington and across the state to help start, sustain and grow gardens, building strong local food systems and vibrant educational sites.