CUBA听and URBAN GARDENING
What is the potential for growing our own food?听 Sheila Dillon looks at the Mayor of London鈥檚 new project to make more land available for food production.听 She also looks at the experience of Cuba where political and economic change forced the population to attempt an 鈥渙rganic revolution鈥 as the country struggled to produce enough food to survive. One response was to grow more food in urban areas.
This experience has struck a chord with UK groups interested in "peak oil" food production, and the film The Power of Community: How Cuba survived Peak Oil has toured the UK to enthusiastic audiences.
So what can we learn from Cuba and how productive could urban farming be in the UK?
Recordings:
Dusty Gedge,London TV (大象传媒).
Roberto Perez, Antonio Nunez Jimenez Foundation de la Naturaleza Y el Hombre in Cuba.
Vilda Figeroa, for 30 years a nutritionist at the Cuban Government Research Institute.
Justo Torres Lazo, urban farmer in Havana.
Madelaine Vasquez, food researcher, writer and presenter of the weekly TV programme "Con Sabor"
Guests:
Dr Julia Wright, head of programmes at Garden Organic and author of Sustainable Agriculture and Food Security in an Era of Oil Scarcity: Lessons from Cuba
Ben Reynolds, coordinator of Capital Growth , a scheme launched last November by London mayor Boris Johnson and the woman he appointed to be the chair of London Food, Rosie Boycott. |
Presenting The Food Programme听has been Sheila's perfect job.