Close followers might have seen
that Food in the Streets shared her ideas with a group of American students. A new
experience and an educational moment for myself too.
The
interesting thing of being ‘an outsider’ (in this case someone who observes
while not being part) is that some things become more clear. You get a new
perspective, another point of reference and you start to ask questions. For me
it happened with the Dutch urban farming projects.
While Milan
is preparing itself for the worldwide event Expo2015,
the city and its inhabitants are also thinking about what they could do in
their own backyards. Literally, as they start thinking about growing food close
to their homes. An interesting phenomenon for a city where design and fashion
have been the key words for years. Food in the Streets hopes to be able to contribute to this 'revolution'.
The students I lectured for
only live in this town for three months. They take classes on different
subjects, some more appreciated than others. One of the classes they could
choose to follow is on social innovation a very popular term. In this class, a
group of students is going to realise a window farm, thereby starting from already realized open source designs. As
window farming is one possible form of urban farming, the teachers asked me to
introduce the phenomenon to them and inspire them with some of the projects I know of.
It seems
easy to prepare a presentation about a subject you work on every day. It was no
problem to find interesting examples, I had a whole lot of pictures on my pc
and -where needed - websites gave me the latest information on the projects I showed. But to
explain something that is so normal to you to people who maybe never heard of
it, is another thing. But definitely not less interesting.
In about
half an hour I explained how I came to the subject of urban farming, why it
interests me and why I think more people should practice it. Eight interesting
Dutch examples came by, going from herbs on private balconies to the biggest urban farming roof in Europe. And in the end the discussion about the economic future of
a phenomenon that only a few years ago was only practised by a minority of people.
For me the
discussion was very interesting. Students and invited people asked me some
interesting questions on topics which I had taken for granted for a while now.
But that is only because I’m into it so deep, that sometimes I forget that for
others it isn't that clear at all. So to everyone present, I want to say ‘thank
you’. My one-hour-of-teaching was as
educational for me as it hopefully was for you!
For those who are interested to contact invite Food
in the Streets as a lecturer, please contact me via the address you can find here.
