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Making Change Urban agriculture has been defined as, ‘growing fruits, herbs, and vegetables and raising animals in cities, a process that Making Change is accompanied by many other complementary activities such as processing and distributing food, collecting and reusing Urban Agricultural Connections food waste and rainwater, and educating, organizing, and employing local residents’ (Cohen et al. 2012). There have been numerous other definitions of urban agriculture in the literature (Smit et al. 1996; Mougeot 2000; FAO 2007), however for the purposes of this discussion, we focus on horticultural activities within an urban or peri-urban setting, since food Dr Juliette Anich plant cultivation has been the dominant form of urban agriculture historically (Gaynor, 2006). College of Design and Social Context RMIT University This discussion will trace urban agriculture’s historical narrative with a particular focus on its use as a form of activism. Victoria, Australia It will then explore how permaculture has informed new food practices. Three categories of new food practices have [email protected] been identified that demonstrate how permaculture has shaped the contemporary movement of urban agriculture. These categories are Urban agriculture as a mode of participatory activism, reciprocity and commercial endeavour. This paper concludes with a discussion on future food possibilities, informed by the historical context presented. Examples cited will predominantly be from Melbourne and Victoria, Australia. Urban agriculture has a long history entwined with place creation, personal expression and activism (Steel, 2008; Cohen, 2012). Despite regulatory and design interventions that attempt to hinder urban agriculture activities, communities continue to use it as a platform for exploration, PART 1: HISTORICAL CONTEXT experimentation and demonstration. What is revealing about the new food practices which have emerged in the second half of 20th century and into the 21st century is their ability to influence, The basic human need to eat and to secure access to a constant replenishment of food has fuelled human settlement inspire and inform like practices. This conviviality offers innovation opportunity for change and city formation. Growing reliable crops, increasing yields, and developments in storage and transportation has slowly makers within this space. This discussion will trace urban agriculture’s historical narrative with removed humans from our daily food system (Steel, 2008). What emerged as a perverse outcome to these advantages was a particular focus on its use as a form of activism. It will then explore the critical junctions a class based society between those people who had to farm for food and those that could afford to pay someone else to when new practices in food have informed like practices. This paper will specifically focus on grow food for them. how permaculture, has informed new food practices in an urban setting as an example of cross pollination between practices. Three categories of new food practices have been identified that The story is common across geographic boundaries, from the 15th century English enclosure to the colonization of demonstrate how permaculture has shaped the contemporary movement. These categories India - the rights to access land were restricted to those who could afford to own it, launching the notion of ‘private are Urban agriculture as a mode of participatory activism, reciprocity and employment. The property’ (Patel, 2009). This process created an economic revolution but its social repercussions are profound. It is also discussion will conclude with a look at future food practice possibilities. at this point where the rift in human psyche, between living with nature and having to exploit it begins. There have been many activist attempts to ‘right the wrong’. The Diggers in 17th Century England is one of the more common examples of the uprisings where ‘radicals’, with the aim of growing food to give away to the poor, seized public land (Patel, 2009). Keywords — urban agriculture; food practices; activism. Australia, who came to the formal agricultural development phase (globally) later, developed a new colony with a directive to not only be self-sufficient but to supply ‘the mother land’ with food as well. Governor Macquarie was particularly passionate about creating a civilization that was food secure detailed in his ‘vision splendid’ (Mason & Knowd, 2011). The new colony was ‘a land of opportunity and there was plenty of land available to exploit’ (Mason & INTRODUCTION Knowd, 2011, pp.63). Those people wealthy enough to own land, or those willing to relocate and work in order to own land quickly ‘developed the template of land acquisition and break up’ (Mason & Knowd, 2011) cultivated an influential New social and technical practices around food have emerged in response to major global events such as war efforts culture of man dominating the landscape which is still present today through developer-driven subdivision (Mason & and financial crises. Interestingly, some of these new practices which have emerged have not only been informed by Knowd, 2011). global developments and events, but they have also developed and evolved in response to each other. This has been seen in Australia by the emergence of Permaculture (Mollison & Holmgren, 1978). At the end of the 19th Century, cultivation of livestock and horticulture was commonplace in Australian cities (Gaynor, 2006). Market gardeners were established on the outer areas of the cities, particularly on the low-lying land near the edge Permaculture, or permanent agriculture, identifies opportunities to develop different forms of prosperity based not only of wetlands or rivers due to the fertile land and easy access to water for irrigation (Gaynor, 2006). in harmony with nature but a system that nourishes natural systems (Mollison & Holmgren, 1978). Permaculture provides both a theoretical framework and practical applications through its principles and new design opportunities which inform During the World Wars in the first half of the 20th Century our globally vulnerable food system was exposed. The new food practices significantly contributing to building a new localised fair food system. Australian Commonwealth Department of Commerce and Agriculture launched a large-scale ‘Grow Your Own’ campaign in 1943 in order to encourage civilians to make up the shortfall in vegetables and eggs. This campaign’s aim was to The contemporary, highly publicized versions of urban agriculture including guerilla gardening and grafting, urban food encourage home gardeners to grow their own vegetables ‘as a patriotic duty’. At this time, urban agricultural initiatives foraging tours, city farms and bespoke community orchards and gardens, could skew a perspective on urban agriculture were supported by governments and was perceived as ‘in line’ with what was best for the greater good, and positioned the as something new. However, urban agriculture’s role in co-locating food and people as well as its contribution to society war effort as something they could support right from their own backyards (Gaynor, 2006). is much bigger than ‘simply satisfying a feel-good niche’ (Mok et al 2013). 2424 REMAKING CITIES CONFERENCE PROCEEDINGS 2018 2525 Australia emerged from the war years, riding high on the promise of a bright new future. The 1940s and 1950s saw a defined the pursuit of environmental sustainability as ‘meeting the needs of the present without compromising the ability population explosion, the emergence of the ‘quarter acre block’, the personal automobile and convenient neighbourhood of future generations to meet their own needs’, which in turn defined the task of the broader movement to find a balance supermarkets and refrigeration (Mok et al, 2013). For the first time, Australians could remove themselves from backyard between economic activity and the environment. The challenge lay in trying to have your cake and eating it too. The food production, transforming this space into venues of consumption (Gaynor, 2006). People were encouraged to embrace search for balance has coloured the efforts around sustainable development for the next 20 years, with many new food consumerist lifestyles as a patriotic way to support democracy and equality (Press and Arnould, 2011). However, some practices finding the answer in permaculture principles. people continued to grow their own food motivated by the monetary savings, the perceived health benefits and the satisfaction derived from being productive (Gaynor, 2006). In fact, this trend continues with one in three Australian homes Environmental activism underwent a renaissance in the early 21st century. Urban agriculture emerged as a first frontier still growing some of their food (Gaynor, 2006) and, in some Australian cities, 100% of certain fruit and vegetables are for activists to get involved and ‘do’ something, due to its low barriers for involvement and particular aesthetics – an produced in the urban fringes (ABS 2010, 2011). imperative element in success campaigns in a social media age. The movement became solidified in the mainstream consciousness during the Global Financial Crisis (GFC) in 2009 when parallels were being drawn between the stock Post war life in Australia was also characterised by Southern European immigration. Despite the availability and market crash then and the Great Depression. New food practices emerged, informed by previous practices, in particular affordability of fresh produce in Australia
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