Urban agriculture

In the past few years urban gardening and farming has been growing rapidly and becoming much more popular, although this is not at all a recent fad; ancient cities such as Machu Picchu in Peru and Maya sites throughout Mesoamerica were surrounded and supported by terrace farming, along with other forms of agriculture.  There is a strong focus being made back toward eating local and organic produce in Western society, which had turned its back on this mindset with the expansion of technology in a growing, globalized nation.  This is a very important step to help create more sustainable communities and to open eyes to the fact that gardening/farming can also be successful in urban environments, not just the country.

The Dervaes family in Pasadena, California gives an inspiring example of how this can be done (and beyond!) with limited backyard space:

Growing Your Own

In Brooklyn, New York Rooftop Gardens works as a great example of how we can transform otherwise unused spaces into flourishing organic/local farms, which also work to make the city a little bit greener by reducing long-distance transport of food into the city, creating an alternative irrigation source, and reducing the overall heat of the city:

New York Organic Rooftop Garden

This can seem like a daunting task to embark on, however supporting these small-scale producers and/or even just having a windowsill herb garden is a start.  I have new sprouts growing in mine and can't wait to have an even bigger/better backyard garden this year!  I feel very lucky to live in an area that, although it is technically considered urban, is a small enough city to be surrounded by farmland on all sides, and the farm I volunteer at/get my CSA (Community Supported Agriculture) share from is only a 10-15 minute drive from my apartment.

There is so much growing information on this topic that I could devote this entire blog or even all of my research to it - for more information just hit up your favorite search engine and I can guarantee you'll be buried in reading/viewing material ;)