This week In a North State Garden had the pleasure of speaking with Stephanie Elliott, her two year old son, Collin, and Laurie Niles – all participants in Cultivating Community, a Chico-based project working to encourage the learning about and growing of good food, locally and on small, home garden and community scales with a long-term goal of improving health in the North Valley. Photo: A community garden supported by Cultivating Community and its partnering organizations. UNLESS OTHERWISE NOTED ALL PHOTOS ARE COURTESY OF CULTIVATING COMMUNITY AND THEIR PARTNER ORGANIZATIONS.
According to the Cultivating Community website, the initiative is “a multifaceted project supported by a 2011 California Department of Food and Agriculture Specialty Crop Grant and awarded to CSUC Research Foundation. The project aims to increase food security by serving the Specialty Crop food economy and system needs of low-income residents, local growers, and service agencies.” Photo: Re-sourced signage at the Bidwell Community Garden, supported in part by Cultivating Community and its partnering organizations.
‘Specialty crops’ is a term central to the mission of Cultivating Community. “Specialty Crops include fruits, vegetables, tree-nuts, and the plants or seeds that will become them. We can strengthen local food security by increasing community education about Specialty Crops, which are the edible jewels of our local food webs. Specialty Crops grown locally and without artificial pesticides or fertilizers are extremely nutrient-dense, in-season are relatively inexpensive, and they are delicious both raw and in cooked dishes. The wonderful thing about Specialty Crops is that they are diverse and robust enough that with a little knowledge, just about anyone can grow them, just about anywhere!”
The Cultivating Community partners aim “to get people as excited as we are about learning to cultivate Specialty Crops, learning to market them, buying them directly from local farmers, and asking grocery stores and restaurants to carry them locally-grown. Ultimately, we’d like to see our small and medium-sized farmers able to aggregate their harvests so that larger institutions like schools and hospitals can be supplied with locally or regionally grown Specialty Crops. If we can achieve these goals, our local economy will be enhanced, unemployment will drop, food security will strengthen, our collective health will improve, and both our rural and urban areas will be increasingly beautified with living color.”
Organizations on the ground (as it were) partnering with the CSU, Chico Research Foundation to develop and implement the educational outreach, workshops and gardens that will be the tangible work of the program include GRUB Education Program, OPT for Healthy Living, and CSUC’s Organic Vegetable Project. Smaller organizations are also involved, including CChaos, a “Nutrition & Lifestyle Education Organization focusing on Nutrition & Exercise and other Health Services for the most at-risk” and whose name stands for Collaboratively Creating Health Access Opportunities & Services, whose work is instrumental for the Chapmantown Friday Farmer’s Market and community garden. I think it is important to note that while the Cultivating Community initiative is “new”, all of the partnering organizations and the people involved in them have been on the ground, in the field working to encourage the local food economy, and home-grown local, seasonal food-based nutrition for many, many years in our area. Their creativity and perseverance is amazing and admirable. Photo: Stephanie and Collin Elliott on Collin’s first birthday. Stephanie (and Collin) are longtime advocates for the local food shed and members of GRUB in Chico.
The objectives that Cultivating Community has outlined for themselves in working toward their mission of improved North Valley health are listed on their website and are as follows:
Strengthen Local Food Security
*Increase community education and direct participation in our local farm-to-fork food webs
*Collaborate with local organizations devoted to food security, with community service-learners, and with experts in organic growing, edible city building, and fresh food preparation
*Link local growers, under-resourced populations, and help-agencies in a collective effort
Support Community Gardens
*Help expand existing community gardens, and start new ones
*Enliven derelict and unused urban properties
Support Small Farmers
*Provide outreach to new and young farmers
*Assist small farmers markets serving low-income growers and areas with up-front operational costs
Provide Workshops
*Offer on-site instruction in high-yield, low-cost organic farming in urban and rural environments
*Bring culinary exhibitions to urban farming workshops and to farmers markets to demonstrate *low-cost, ethnically rich techniques to prepare and preserve produce. Photo: A gardening and nutrition workshop on-site at a community garden. Below: Monica Bell, workshop coordinator for Cultivating Community, leading a composting workshop.
Promote Local, Healthy Use of Nutritional Assistance Funds
*Provide technical assistance to farmers markets and Community-Supported Agriculture businesses (CSA’s) in becoming EBT-enabled (i.e., to accept CalFresh cards)
*Provide a variety of incentive events and activities to bring CalFresh/EBT recipients to farmers markets and CSA’s. Photos: The Chico Kitchen Bike, part of the Opt for Healthy Living’s nutritional educational outreach efforts, the bike is a mobile kitchen for on-site nutrition and food prep classes and workshops. Opt for Healthy Living is coordinated by Karen Goodwin, an MS in Nutrition at CSU, Chico. Below: Richard Roth of cCHAOS at the Chapmantown Farmers Market.
Support Lower-Income Residents
*Creatively increase the availability of locally grown produce
*Promote participation in Farmers’ Markets and CSA’s
*Provide nutritious food to those most in need
*Decrease isolation associated with economic stress
Photo: We all need tools to work with. Cultivating Community is providing many kinds of tools to residents of the North Valley helping them to reconnect with the local food shed, to improve their own self-sufficiency and their access to healthful nutrition.
Upcoming Cultivating Community Workshops:
February 11 – Chico: Cultivating Community Garden Workshops: Organic Gardening Part 1 – Garden Planning Lab 1 – 3 pm. Please sign up and then the location will be given. To sign up call Jonah at 530-588-0585, or email: registration@grubchico.org. Topics covered will include techniques to maximize yields, deter pests and improve soil health such as crop rotation, companion planting and more. For more info: cultivatingcommunitynv.org. Photo: Young Collin with friend and pumpkins at the teaching food garden at the Gateway Science Museum in Chico.
February 25 – Chico: Cultivating Community Garden Workshops: Intro to Seed Starting, Greenhouse and Cold Frame Work 1 – 3 pm. Please sign up and then the location will be given. To sign up call Jonah at 530-588-0585, or email: registration@grubchico.org. Topics covered will includepotting mixes, techniques for different plant families, and how to tend to your seedlings. For more info: cultivatingcommunitynv.org.
February 26 – Chico: GRUB & Chico Permaculture Guild THIRD ANNUAL SEED SWAP 10am-3pm. FREE. GRUB Cooperative House 1525 Dayton Rd. Bring seeds and plant divisions to share potluck style, envelopes, and pen (although it is not mandatory to participate.) Seeds from local seed company, Redwood Seeds, will be for sale as well as veggie and herb starts. Redwood Seeds will be giving a presentation on how to save your own seeds from 2-3pm. There will be info stations and a kid’s area during the event. There is limited parking so carpooling or riding bikes is encouraged. For more info: http://grubchico.org/
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In a North State Garden is a weekly Northstate Public Radio and web-based program celebrating the art, craft and science of home gardening in Northern California. It is made possible in part by the Gateway Science Museum – Exploring the Natural History of the North State and on the campus of CSU, Chico. In a North State Garden is conceived, written, photographed and hosted by Jennifer Jewell – all rights reserved jewellgarden.com. In a North State Garden airs on Northstate Public Radio Saturday mornings at 7:34 AM Pacific time and Sunday morning at 8:34 AM Pacific time. Podcasts of past shows are available here.
