Urban agriculture initiatives are a powerful tool for many cities, providing a strong food network and creating better links between rural and urban food systems. From Mexico City's Tlatelolco Garden to City Growers' urban farms in New York, and Kalobeyei's urban agriculture projects in northern Kenya, entrepreneurs and organizations are taking advantage of the opportunity to improve urban agriculture and meet the demands of an increasingly urban population. In London, GrowUp Urban Farms is working to develop commercial-scale controlled environment (CEP) production solutions to grow fresh food in local communities. The GrowUp Box produces more than 400 kg of salads and 150 kg of fish each year, with the long-term goal of replicating the aquaponics system to build urban farms in other cities, open up employment opportunities for young people, and use agriculture as a means to make communities more self-sufficient.
At Farm X, volunteers play an important role in urban agriculture, but many organizations state that they have difficulty attracting and retaining sufficient numbers of people to achieve their goals. To address this issue, Farm X has adopted a top-down management approach while also emphasizing volunteering as support for a “delicious (r) evolution” and promoting urban agriculture as a social movement against industrial agribusiness. In addition to Farm X's efforts, there are countless initiatives that use technology, entrepreneurship and social innovation to change urban agriculture. From high-tech indoor farms in France and Singapore to mobile apps that connect producers and urban consumers in India and the United States, there are many ways to increase public awareness and engagement with organic agricultural practices related to urban agriculture projects.
One such initiative is the startup that sources organic ingredients from family farmers in peri-urban areas, aiming to shorten value chains and better connect small producers to the urban market. Asking their networks for help is another way that Garden Manager V leaders at Farm X have adopted and communicated their need for voluntary participation, helping to create a project in which many feel involved and important. Finally, teaching specific food production techniques to interested volunteers, “making a difference” in an economic environment through the farm's CSA (Gibson-Graham 200), and raising awareness of alternatives to industrial agriculture through encounters with the farm's physical use of urban space are all strategies that can be used to increase public awareness and engagement with organic agricultural practices related to urban agriculture projects in London.
