Life

Take on Nature: This idea could be a grower

With the first Growing Together cafe tentatively lined up, the north could soon be experiencing its own growers revolution
With the first Growing Together cafe tentatively lined up, the north could soon be experiencing its own growers revolution With the first Growing Together cafe tentatively lined up, the north could soon be experiencing its own growers revolution

ALTHOUGH the art of scything is all but lost to us it is a skill I have tried to teach myself in the past year. The long curving blade, properly sharpened, can clear a sizeable chunk of weeds and even brambles when swung with an expert twist of the wrist.

Unfortunately when swung in my distinctly inexpert hands it has also managed to take out a number of previously thriving saplings and the heads of a small patch of daffodils.

In our ready-made-meal society the basic skills of land cultivation that would have been second nature to our ancestors of just a few generations ago have been lost to most of us. It is perhaps a cliche for the office-bound employee to daydream in front of their humming computer or on the sales room floor of plunging hands into newly turned soil to reconnect with the life-giving earth.

Perhaps surprisingly at the forefront of an innovation in Northern Ireland to give employees an opportunity to get back in touch with their agrarian origins is a place that is normally a hothouse for political stagnation rather than organic vegetables – Stormont.

Allotments on the Stormont Estate have been set aside to allow civil servants and other staff working there to produce their own fresh food. Employees on the estate tend their plots on their lunch breaks, after work and at weekends. They have a container for tools and there have been a number of community work days to build compost bins and share skills.

The scheme has been adopted by Growing Together which works throughout the north and Britain to encourage community growing schemes. It has launched a campaign which is concentrating on encouraging businesses to support community growing groups in the areas where they work.

Heidi Seary, Growing Together Project Coordinator said: “Businesses can help groups in many different ways, for example with donations, through sponsorship, by donating equipment or offering discounts on items groups might want to use.

“They might also have in-house expertise a group could use such as accountancy, computer skills, social media or marketing skills. Larger businesses might also be able to help through corporate volunteering days or by setting up workplace growing schemes and paying community growers to provide expert help and advice.”

Mrs Seary said the payback for businesses was a high-profile demonstration of their support for a social agenda and community outreach that makes them more attractive to customers and investors.

In addition she said: “Staff may learn more skills, such as teamwork on a corporate volunteering day or other soft skills and staff morale may rise as a result of 'doing good' in their local community.”

As well as ‘doing good’, Growing Together say the scheme has the potential to grow grassroots schemes into viable, income-generating businesses. Mrs Seary points to Manchester Veg People, a co-op of organic growers and buyers who are working together to help develop a new model for the food supply chain in Manchester.

The co-op launched a successful crowd-funding campaign that enabled it to secure more storage space and its own van. This enabled the co-op to supply pubs, restaurants, canteens and – they hope soon – schools across Greater Manchester. This expanding market has created a demand for more growers to join the scheme and is providing an income for them.

Growing Together will be doing training in Northern Ireland in March to support growing groups to become ready to generate income by supplying their produce to cafes and restaurants. With the first cafe tentatively lined up, the north could soon be experiencing its own growers revolution.

Bring me my scythe.

:: Visit www.growingtogether.community