Urban Food Panel addresses municipal food-growing capacity

NEWS RELEASE – July 23, 2024

Urban Food Panel addresses municipal food-growing capacity

LANGFORD, BC. The role of municipalities in providing suitable infrastructure for the growing of natural food in urban spaces is essential now in these times of increasing food prices and emergency scenarios.

The Urban Food Resilience Initiatives Society (UFRIS) was launched in January 2024 in Langford, as a group dedicated to advocating for municipalities across the west shore and beyond to take action to ensure that all built structures allow for food-growing. That includes residential buildings — houses (with yards), townhomes (with yards or community garden space), condos/apartments (with suitable balcony or patio construction, and/or indoor vertical growing rooms), as well as commercial (e.g. office buildings, malls), industrial (e.g. warehouses or storage facilities), and institutional (e.g. hospitals and schools).

As the cost of natural healthy food (e.g. fruits and vegetables) has increased dramatically in recent years there is increasing concern that the overall nutritional intake by Canadians has been challenged.

There is also the concern that given a significant emergency – like a major earthquake or another pandemic – that with the unavailability of grocery stores and food banks (due to structural inoperability or supply chain interruptions) people will be left for unexpected periods of time without sufficient or nutritious food sustenance. Establishing energy-efficient freezer capacity is key to mitigating this impact.

In addition to information booths and undertaking a neighbourhood food-growing pilot project this year, this summer UFRIS has gathered four speakers to address the scenarios that are faced in urban communities with regard to the growing of natural food. The URBAN FOOD PANEL event is being held on Wednesday July 24 at 1 pm in View Royal, at the community constituency office of Mitzi Dean, MLA (104-1497 Admirals Rd). Speakers: Michaila Frawley, soil specialist; Brianna Stewart, managing director at FED Urban Farm; Nathan Tenney, who has converted his back yard into a food garden; and Steve Unger, Lead, Microgrid Development, SHIFT.

“Growing food is not easy but it’s a household life skill and community capacity whose time has come,” says Mary P Brooke, Executive Lead, UFRIS. Ms Brooke has a B.Sc. in nutrition and her concern started there regarding the eroding capacity of households to have full nutritional supply. Mary’s experience as an independent journalist in reporting on municipalities and other levels of government has facilitated the UFRIS vision to see a significant facilitation of food-growing capacity in urban communities.

Media contact: Mary Brooke, Executive Lead, Urban Food Resilience Initiatives Society

Email: info@urbanfoodresilience.ca | Tel: 250-588-7091 | Website: urbanfoodresilience.ca