The past few months have been tremendously exciting and rewarding. The project we started, “The Network of Sovereign Urban Gardeners” (La Red de Agricultores Soberanos) or, La Red, has been growing with people from many neighborhoods reaching out to us, asking for assistance to begin a garden in their neighborhoods. Given the popularity of La Red, in April, I was invited for an interview at a popular TV station, where I had the opportunity to talk about our projects and about urban agriculture more broadly. I had never been interviewed on TV before. This opportunity felt very reassuring, because it reflected the growing interest on urban food gardens as a means to transform the city by creating healthy spaces for people to learn about plants and about each other. The interview can be viewed here. We are currently working on ten different gardens around the city, but we are envisioning having fifty gardens by next year. I have focused my work on leading workshops on composting and on starting new gardens. Judith Lee Stronach Baccalaureate Prize: Spring/Summer Letter Home. 1 Juan Mauel Velez
Transcript
The past few months have been tremendously exciting and rewarding. The project we started, “The Network of Sovereign Urban Gardeners” (La Red de Agricultores Soberanos) or, La Red, has been growing with people from many neighborhoods reaching out to us, asking for assistance to begin a garden in their neighborhoods. Given the popularity of La Red, in April, I was invited for an interview at a popular TV station, where I had the opportunity to talk about our projects and about urban agriculture more broadly. I had never been interviewed on TV before. This opportunity felt very reassuring, because it reflected the growing interest on urban food gardens as a means to transform the city by creating healthy spaces for people to learn about plants and about each other. The interview can be viewed here. We are currently working on ten different gardens around the city, but we are envisioning having fifty gardens by next year. I have focused my work on leading workshops on composting and on starting new gardens.
Judith Lee Stronach Baccalaureate Prize: Spring/Summer Letter Home.
Many gardens are located in neighborhoods where it’s difficult for people to attend our workshops. I found the need to start a food garden in a central location in the city. Last January, I met with Maria Fernanda Zuluaga, the Project Director, at the city’s public university Center of Museums (Centro de Museos de la Universidad de Caldas) to discuss the possibility of starting a garden in an abandoned lot adjacent to the museum. After Maria Fernanda obtained the permits needed for this project, I committed most of my time to this garden and to organize different workshops there. The results have been tremendously exciting. We have a lush garden now, and every month the attendance to our workshops is growing. This garden is a safe place for kids, and because it’s next to the Natural Sciences Museum and the Anthropology Museum, it’s a dream location to host our educational activities. We are planning to host our first festival in celebration of the region biocultural memory this coming August 18th, in which we are planning to begin a collaborative mural project.
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After having worked at the Museum’s garden, we were invited to do a 90 hours long, certified seminar on waste management, offered by the Caldas University Center of Bioprocesses. I joined this seminar in order to deepen my knowledge of composting and of other methodologies of waste management. I have learned invaluable information on how to do composting safely, which we are now disseminating through our workshops.
This month, I’m planning to keep doing the work I’m doing, expanding La Red, consolidating the gardens we have created so far, and creating new gardens in other neighborhoods. In August, the city’s Botanic Garden will host Ecovida, a week-long event celebrating traditional agroecological practices. We are planning to host different events in our food gardens, and to host a festival at the Museum’s garden, celebrating the biocultural memory of this region.
