'Growing' communities (and food) through kindness

The town of Todmorden, West Yorkshire, has an ambitious goal: to become the first town in the UK that by 2018 is self-sufficient in food through their Incredible Edible scheme.

How do they want to achieve this? Through kindness. And lots of free fruit and vegetables growing all over town, in roundabouts, in front of the police station or even as broccoli memorial beds for a much loved ticket man at the railway station.

To quote from the article published in the dailymail (click here for the full article):

‘Wars come about by men having drinks in bars, good things come about when women drink coffee together,’ says Mary [Mary Clear, co-founder of Incredible Edible]. 

‘Our thinking was: there’s so much blame in the world — blame local government, blame politicians, blame bankers, blame technology — we thought, let’s just do something positive instead.’

The scheme helps local businesses, teaches about healthy eating and also seems to bring out the best in the local community - there has been a reduction in vandalism since the project started.

From the article, "Pam reckons a project like Incredible Edible could thrive in all sorts of places. ‘If the population is very transient, it’s difficult. But if you’ve got schools, shops, back gardens and verges, you can do it.’"

Now there's a challenge for our centres! Maybe this could be a project for 2012 for some of you?

Merry Christmas and a Happy New Year to all of you.