Design for Living: Urban farming in Detroit

There are 1400 urban farms and city gardens in Detroit. Photo / supplied

Once upon a time in America, they used to build communities around golf courses. Come to think of it, they did that here too. Country clubs for newly affluent suburbanites. There's a new thing now: agrihoods, communities built for the affluent members of another generation, but it's not golf that draws them, it's farming.

Agrihoods (a word with its own trademark, by the way) have orchards, greenhouses, beehives, windmills and solar panels, outdoor community kitchens and row upon row of lush, green organic veges.

But hang on. Why should you have to be wealthy to enjoy all that? No reason at all, says Detroit.

The Michigan Urban Farming Initiative (MUFI) is officially an "agrihood", but it was founded 10 years ago to address food insecurity in a part of the city hit badly by the collapse of the auto industry. Now it's a fully sustainable not-for-profit "agricultural campus", feeding 2000 households from 1.2 hectares of vegetable gardens and 200 fruit trees. MUFI attracts new residents and investment. It helps the community thrive.

When it's time to get the kids gardening: urban farming in Detroit. Photo / supplied

There's lots of volunteering, and lawnmowers and other tools that community members can borrow. Schools are heavily involved. There's a community centre, cafe, commercial kitchens, educational programmes, you name it. They grow peppers to make into hot sauce, to sell, but the produce is free to all. Saturday mornings, you can head on down and harvest what you need.

And get this: Detroit has nearly 1400 community gardens and farms inside its city limits. MUFI isn't even the biggest.

There are so many benefits: work skills and life skills, healthy eating, clean air in the city, education, exercise, jobs and a hundred different ways to build community cohesion.

The Michigan Urban Farming Initiative, in Detroit city. Photo / supplied

In Aotearoa, some marae and other places are doing all this now. The Garden to Table organisation does tremendous work with many schools all over the country. But why isn't it common everywhere? Suburbs could repurpose empty lots and public wasteland. Companies could donate their car parks. Bits of school land and public parks could be converted. New housing developments could provide vege gardens, composting and all the rest. New commercial developments could too.

We need to build intensely in our cities, but while we do it we also need to grow the green spaces. Parks are good but so are urban farms: if you're in an apartment, you might need them. And, ahem, what about those golf courses?

Marigolds for natural pest control are a feature of the Michigan Urban Farming Initiative in Detroit. Photo / supplied

Design for Living is a regular series in Canvas magazine.