3. August, 2013

Contributor: The communities “Il Cozzo” and “Orto-gether” , Municipality of Messina

Communities of young people for innovative sustainable methods of agriculture in urban areas

Concept

The two projects are two pilot community gardens that are based on the principles of organic agriculture and permaculture and based on the principle of food self-sufficiency for the members of the community

The field used is owned by one of the participant’s families. This field was abandoned for many years. Initially, the “Il Cozzo” project is managed by four young people, all with university degrees, aged 26-33. The “Orto-gether” project began with four young people and little by little brought together over 100 people who helped build and cultivate the gardens. The garden is in a slum area south of the city and serves as a meeting place for people who feel the need for contact with nature and authentic human relations.

It’s possible to identify some keywords for the project such as: food autonomy, permaculture, cooperation, energy saving, 0 miles, seed savers, composting.

Result

Thanks to strong cooperation between the participants and their willingness to donate time, skills and work, it was possible to obtain in the first six months some important results. How the vegetable crops respond to cultivation in a sandy field exposed to sea coast winds was tested.

A seedbed to obtain self-production of organic plants was built. This is important in order to be independent of the standards of the market and to preserve bio-diversity of autonomous cultivations.

Benefits

The main benefits are to improve in young people the love for their land and the importance of sharing experiences and skills. The projects are also important to improve the awareness that it can be possible to satisfy our food needs in urban areas thanks to real, satisfying cooperation with less money resources.

Pro and Contra

Pro: Sharing of skills and work to help other possible new communities. In fact, the project “Il Cozzo” has been helped by the “Orto-gether” project which started a few months before.

Contra: This kind of project requires first of all the sharing of fields. In our cultural context it’s difficult to find many people that want to do that.

What are the lessons learn to be used/transferred/implemented in the other partner cities?

The practice demonstrates that only with the willingness of a few people it is possible to have an important experience for a new generation educated to think sustainable.

Question to the network

We would be interested to know similar experiences throughout Italy and Europe to learn more “secrets” of permaculture as a type of organic agriculture.