Download or read book The Urban Farmer written by Curtis Allen Stone and published by New Society Publishers. This book was released on 2015-12-14 with total page 306 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: There are twenty million acres of lawns in North America. In their current form, these unproductive expanses of grass represent a significant financial and environmental cost. However, viewed through a different lens, they can also be seen as a tremendous source of opportunity. Access to land is a major barrier for many people who want to enter the agricultural sector, and urban and suburban yards have huge potential for would-be farmers wanting to become part of this growing movement. The Urban Farmer is a comprehensive, hands-on, practical manual to help you learn the techniques and business strategies you need to make a good living growing high-yield, high-value crops right in your own backyard (or someone else's). Major benefits include: Low capital investment and overhead costs Reduced need for expensive infrastructure Easy access to markets Growing food in the city means that fresh crops may travel only a few blocks from field to table, making this innovative approach the next logical step in the local food movement. Based on a scalable, easily reproduced business model, The Urban Farmer is your complete guide to minimizing risk and maximizing profit by using intensive production in small leased or borrowed spaces. Curtis Stone is the owner/operator of Green City Acres, a commercial urban farm growing vegetables for farmers markets, restaurants, and retail outlets. During his slower months, Curtis works as a public speaker, teacher, and consultant, sharing his story to inspire a new generation of farmers.

Download or read book Urban Agriculture written by Kimberley Hodgson and published by Routledge. This book was released on 2011 with total page 0 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Urban agriculture is rising steadily in popularity in the United States and Canada - there are stories in the popular press, it has an increasingly central place in the growing local food movement, and there is a palpable interest in changing cities to foster both healthier residents and more sustainable communities. The most popular form of urban agriculture, community gardening, contributes significantly to developing social connections, building capacity, and empowering communities in urban neighborhoods. Older, industrial cities such as Cleveland, Detroit, and Buffalo, with their drastic loss of population and their acres of vacant land, are emerging as centers for urban agriculture initiatives - in essence, becoming laboratories for the future role of urban food production in the postindustrial city. Because urban agriculture entails the use of urban land, it has implications for urban land-use planning, which is controlled and regulated by municipal governments and planning agencies. This PAS Report provides authoritative guidance for dealing with the implications of this cutting-edge practice that is changing our cities forever.

Download or read book City Farming A How to Guide to Growing Crops and Raising Livestock in Urban Spaces written by Kari Spencer and published by 5m Books Ltd. This book was released on 2017-11-07 with total page 390 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Farming in cities and small spaces is becoming increasingly popular, but it has its challenges. City Farming addresses the problems the urban farmer might face and turns them into creative solutions. It assists the new grower to gain expert understanding of how to create a production urban farm, as well as helping established farmers to troubleshoot and discover new ways to bring their space into greater harmony and production. From the perspective of a holistic gardener, growing plants and raising livestock are covered as well as integrated approaches, which bring together the whole farming system in a small space to produce high yields with minimal energy and effort. The content is organised by themes of importance to urban farmers‚ sun and heat, water usage, seasonal production, spatial planning, soil quality and usage, propagation and breeding, pests and diseases, farming under time constraints, sustainability and community initiatives. These are all discussed within the context of urban farming and include common issues and strategies like microclimates in built-up areas, natural and organic approaches, water harvesting, toxic land, roof gardening, converting ornamental gardens to productive edible gardens, municipal regulations, vertical gardening, aquaponics, composting methods, livestock suitability in limited space, Community Supported Agriculture (CSA) schemes, permaculture in small spaces, community gardens and trade & barter schemes. Each chapter unfolds a piece the story of The Micro Farm Project that provides an overview of the theme, and then discusses the crop and livestock considerations relating to the theme of the chapter in the form of the challenges they present and practical solutions to the problems such as lack of space, high population density, poor soil quality, planning restrictions etc. Case studies giving examples of different methods used within urban farming from different regions throughout the world are included. City Farming is a beautifully illustrated source that can be valuable to both beginners and more experienced urban farmers. 5m Books

Download or read book Agriculture Rural Development Food and Drug Administration and Related Agencies Appropriations for 2001 Testimony of members of Congress and other interested individuals and organizations written by United States. Congress. House. Committee on Appropriations. Subcommittee on Agriculture, Rural Development, Food and Drug Administration, and Related Agencies and published by . This book was released on 2000 with total page 656 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt:

Download or read book The Essential Urban Farmer written by Novella Carpenter and published by Penguin. This book was released on 2012-01-10 with total page 593 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: The "how-to" guide for a new generation of farmers from the author of Farm City and a leading urban garden educator. In this indispensable guide, Farm City author Novella Carpenter and Willow Rosenthal share their experience as successful urban farmers and provide practical blueprints-complete with rich visual material-for novice and experienced growers looking to bring the principles of ethical food to the city streets. The Essential Urban Farmer guides readers from day one to market day, advising on how to find the perfect site, design a landscape, and cultivate crops. For anyone who has ever grown herbs on windowsills, or tomatoes on fire escapes, this is an invaluable volume with the potential to change our menus, our health, and our cities forever.

Download or read book Barnyards and Birkenstocks written by Don Stuart and published by Washington State University Press. This book was released on 2021-09-24 with total page 413 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Rural America is struggling. The average farmer is now 57 years old. Family agriculture is gradually fading, and prime farmland is often converted into environmentally harmful applications. But food cultivation has ecological consequences, too. Farms consume 80 percent of the nation’s water. Although they often prevent sprawling development, improve water quality, or provide wildlife habitat, they also pollute rivers, drain wetlands, or emit destructive greenhouse gasses. Don Stuart believes two dangerous trends--the loss of farms and damage to ecosystems--are connected, and that a major cause is the political deadlock between farmers and environmental activists. He offers a radical proposal: collaboration. To promote empathy and point out the costs of continued political impasse, he presents opposing perspectives. Topics include incentives, regulations, government spending, environmental markets, growth management, climate change, public lands grazing, and the federal farm bill. Drawing from multiple case studies and a lifetime spent settling conflicts, the author identifies characteristics of successful community programs to suggest a model for a prosperous, healthy future.

Download or read book The Urban Farm Handbook written by Annette Cottrell and published by Skipstone Press. This book was released on 2011 with total page 0 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: CLICK HEREto download the chapter on "Growing Strategies to Maximize Garden Space" fromThe Urban Farm Handbook * More than 150 sustainable resources for the Pacific Northwest * More than 90 basic home-production recipes * 75 black-and-white and 35 full color photographs * Up-to-date information on Seattle-area urban farming permits and policy Is that . . . a goat in your garage?! It might be if you've been readingThe Urban Farm Handbook: City-Slicker Resources for Growing, Raising, Sourcing, Trading, and Preparing What You Eat. In this comprehensive guide for city-dwellers on how to wean themselves from commercial supermarkets, the authors map a plan for how to manage a busy, urban family life with home-grown foods, shared community efforts, and easy yet healthful practices. More than just a few ideas about gardening and raising chickens,The Urban Farm Handbook uses stories, charts, grocery lists, recipes, and calendars to inform and instruct. As busy urbanites who have learned how to do everything from making cheese and curing meat to collaborating with neighbors on a food bartering system, the authors share their own food journeys along with those of local producers and consumers who are changing the food systems in the Pacific Northwest. Organized seasonally, this handbook instructs on: > How to maximize space for planting a variety of fruits and vegetables > Small-animal husbandry and beekeeping > Canning, drying, freezing, fermenting, and pickling techniques > Grinding grains for flour and other uses > Tips for creating a farmer-to-consumer connection > How to form a "buying club" with neighbors > "Opportunities for Change" steps to follow And so much more!

Download or read book Agriculture Rural Development and Related Agencies Appropriations for Fiscal Year 2002 written by United States. Congress. Senate. Committee on Appropriations. Subcommittee on Agriculture, Rural Development, and Related Agencies and published by . This book was released on 2002 with total page 986 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt:

Download or read book Freedom Farmers written by Monica M. White and published by UNC Press Books. This book was released on 2018-11-06 with total page 209 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: In May 1967, internationally renowned activist Fannie Lou Hamer purchased forty acres of land in the Mississippi Delta, launching the Freedom Farms Cooperative (FFC). A community-based rural and economic development project, FFC would grow to over 600 acres, offering a means for local sharecroppers, tenant farmers, and domestic workers to pursue community wellness, self-reliance, and political resistance. Life on the cooperative farm presented an alternative to the second wave of northern migration by African Americans--an opportunity to stay in the South, live off the land, and create a healthy community based upon building an alternative food system as a cooperative and collective effort. Freedom Farmers expands the historical narrative of the black freedom struggle to embrace the work, roles, and contributions of southern Black farmers and the organizations they formed. Whereas existing scholarship generally views agriculture as a site of oppression and exploitation of black people, this book reveals agriculture as a site of resistance and provides a historical foundation that adds meaning and context to current conversations around the resurgence of food justice/sovereignty movements in urban spaces like Detroit, Chicago, Milwaukee, New York City, and New Orleans.

Download or read book Sustainable and Resilient Communities written by Stephen J. Coyle and published by John Wiley & Sons. This book was released on 2011-05-12 with total page 418 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Many of today's communities face an unprecedented struggle to adapt and maintain their environmental, economic, and social well-being in an era beleaguered by fiscal constraints, uncertainty about energy prices and supplies, rapid demographic shifts, and accelerated climate impacts. This step-by-step guidebook for urban planners and urban designers explains how to create and implement an actionable plan for making neighborhoods, communities, and regions more environmentally healthy, resource-conserving, and economically resilient. Sustainable and Resilient Communitiesdelineates measures for repairing, retrofitting, and transforming our built environments and supporting systems.

Download or read book Urban Farmers written by gestalten and published by Gestalten. This book was released on 2021-04-28 with total page 256 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Urban agriculture is the global movement that encourages the practice of cultivating, processing and distributing food in the city.

Download or read book Urban Agriculture written by Craig Pearson and published by Routledge. This book was released on 2011-05-17 with total page 130 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Most of us live in cities. These are becoming increasingly complex and removed from broad-scale agriculture. Yet within cities there are many examples of greenspaces and local food production that bring multiple benefits that often go unnoticed. This book presents a collection of the latest thinking on the multiple dimensions of sustainable greenspace and food production within cities. It describes the diversity of 'urban agriculture' and seeks a balanced representation between the biophysical and the social. It deals with urban agriculture across scales - from indoor plants to farm-scale filtration of greywater. A range of examples and initiatives from both developed and developing countries is described and evaluated.

Download or read book The Lean Farm Guide to Growing Vegetables written by Ben Hartman and published by Chelsea Green Publishing. This book was released on 2017 with total page 274 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: At Clay Bottom Farm, author Ben Hartman and staff practice kaizen, or continuous improvement, cutting out more waste--of time, labor, space, money, and more--every year and aligning their organic production more tightly with customer demand. Applied alongside other lean principles originally developed by the Japanese auto industry, the end result has been increased profits and less work. In this field-guide companion to his award-winning first book, The Lean Farm, Hartman shows market vegetable growers in even more detail how Clay Bottom Farm implements lean thinking in every area of their work, including using kanbans, or replacement signals, to maximize land use; germination chambers to reduce defect waste; and right-sized machinery to save money and labor and increase efficiency. From finding land and assessing infrastructure needs to selling perfect produce at the farmers market, The Lean Farm Guide to Growing Vegetables digs deeper into specific, tested methods for waste-free farming that not only help farmers become more successful but make the work more enjoyable. These methods include: Using Japanese paper pot transplanters Building your own germinating chambers Leaning up your greenhouse Making and applying simple composts Using lean techniques for pest and weed control Creating Heijunka, or load-leveling calendars for efficient planning Farming is not static, and improvement requires constant change. The Lean Farm Guide to Growing Vegetables offers strategies for farmers to stay flexible and profitable even in the face of changing weather and markets. Much more than a simple exercise in cost-cutting, lean farming is about growing better, not cheaper, food--the food your customers want.

Download or read book Planning on the Edge written by Nick Gallent and published by Routledge. This book was released on 2006-09-27 with total page 249 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: More than a tenth of the land mass of the UK comprises 'urban fringe': the countryside around towns that has been called 'planning's last frontier'. One of the key challenges facing spatial planners is the land-use management of this area, regarded by many as fit only for locating sewage works, essential service functions and other un-neighbourly uses. However, to others it is a dynamic area where a range of urban and rural uses collide. Planning on the Edge fills an important gap in the literature, examining in detail the challenges that planning faces in this no-man’s land. It presents both problems and solutions, and builds a vision for the urban fringe that is concerned with maximising its potential and with bridging the physical and cultural rift between town and country. Its findings are presented in three sections: the urban fringe and the principles underpinning its management sectoral challenges faced at the urban fringe (including commerce, energy, recreation, farming, and housing) managing the urban fringe more effectively in the future. Students, professionals and researchers alike will benefit from the book's structured approach, while the global and transferable nature of the principles and ideas underpinning the study will appeal to an international audience.

Download or read book Farming on the Fringe written by Sarah James and published by Springer. This book was released on 2016-09-06 with total page 202 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: This volume offers a new perspective to debates on local food and urban sustainability presenting the long silenced voices of the small-scale farmers from the productive green fringe of Sydney’s sprawling urban jungle. Providing fresh food for the city and local employment, these culturally and linguistically diverse farmers contribute not only to Sydney’s globalizing demographic and cultural fabric, but also play a critical role in the city’s environmental sustainability. In the battle for urban space housing development threatens to turn these farmlands into sprawling suburbia. In thinking from and with the urban ‘fringe’, this book moves beyond the housing versus farming debate to present a vision for urban growth that is dynamic and alive to the needs of the 21st century city. In a unique bringing together of the twin forces shaping contemporary urbanism - environmental change and global population flows - the voices from the fringe demand to be heard in the debate on future urban food sustainability.

Download or read book Smarter Growth written by John H. Spiers and published by University of Pennsylvania Press. This book was released on 2018-04-17 with total page 257 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Suburban sprawl has been the prevailing feature—and double-edged sword—of metropolitan America's growth and development since 1945. The construction of homes, businesses, and highways that were signs of the nation's economic prosperity also eroded the presence of agriculture and polluted the environment. This in turn provoked fierce activism from an array of local, state, and national environmental groups seeking to influence planning and policy. Many places can lay claim to these twin legacies of sprawl and the attendant efforts to curb its impact, but, according to John H. Spiers, metropolitan Washington, D.C., in particular, laid the foundations for a smart growth movement that blossomed in the late twentieth century. In Smarter Growth, Spiers argues that civic and social activists played a key role in pushing state and local officials to address the environmental and fiscal costs of growth. Drawing on case studies including the Potomac River's cleanup, local development projects, and agricultural preservation, he identifies two periods of heightened environmental consciousness in the early to mid-1970s and the late 1990s that resulted in stronger development regulations and land preservation across much of metropolitan Washington. Smarter Growth offers a fresh understanding of environmental politics in metropolitan America, giving careful attention to the differences between rural, suburban, and urban communities and demonstrating how public officials and their constituents engaged in an ongoing dialogue that positioned environmental protection as an increasingly important facet of metropolitan development over the past four decades. It reveals that federal policies were only one part of a larger decision-making process—and not always for the benefit of the environment. Finally, it underscores the continued importance of grassroots activists for pursuing growth that is environmentally, fiscally, and socially equitable—in a word, smarter.

Download or read book Farm the City written by Michael Ableman and published by New Society Publishers. This book was released on 2020-04-21 with total page 131 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: “A useful manual for anyone interested in turning the concrete jungle green . . . a must-have for any urban dweller serious about farming.” —Publishers Weekly In Farm the City, Michael Ableman, the “Spartacus of Sustainable Food Activism,” offers a guide to setting up and running a successful urban farm, derived from the success of Sole Food Street Farms, one of the largest urban agriculture enterprises in North America. Sole Food Street Farms spans four acres of land in Vancouver, produces twenty-five tons of food annually, provides meaningful work for dozens of disadvantaged people, and has improved the surrounding community in countless ways. Coverage includes: Selecting land and choosing the right crops Growing food in city farms, including plans for planting and harvesting Fundraising and marketing strategies, philosophies, and vital information for selling fresh products Navigating local government and regulations Engaging the community and building meaningful livelihoods Farm the City is an invaluable tool kit for entrepreneurs and activists looking to create economic and social value through urban agriculture. Urban farming has the power to change diets, economies, and lives. Yet starting an urban farm can seem daunting with skills and knowledge that extend beyond growing to include marketing, sales, employees, community relations, and navigating local regulations. With this comprehensive guide, you’ll be running a successful urban farm in no time. “A story of how to bring cities back to life, literally and emotionally . . . Local food not only addresses quality of life, economy, and food security, it changes our hearts . . . [a] wonderfully written testament to life.” —Paul Hawken, New York Times bestselling author of Drawdown