http://foodcycles.org/2009/10/18/new-york-has-10000-acres-of-farmland/ “Growing vibrant soil, food and community” Mon, 15 Mar 2010 14:41:27 -0500 hourly 1 http://foodcycles.org/2009/10/18/new-york-has-10000-acres-of-farmland/comment-page-1/#comment-617 Roxanne Christensen Mon, 19 Oct 2009 18:16:48 +0000 http://foodcycles.org/?p=850#comment-617 What will accelerate the establishment of locally-based food systems is for cities to regard commercial urban farming as an economic engine and encourage and support entrepreneurial farmers to set up businesses within their borders. What is needed are: land - and all cities have vacant and underutilized land, as your post points out; appropriately scaled farming systems - and SPIN-Farming is one example which greatly reduces the amount of land needed for commercial crop production; micro-level financing which can be readily found; and markets - and cities have a variety of markets, both direct to consumer as well as institutional markets, that can easily be accessed. In the first urbanized century, it is no longer useful to segregate food production outside of cities. While policymakers are struggling with how to address food security, citizens, like Stacey Murphy and Ben Flanner are leading the way by starting to practice an economically viable post-industrial agriculture that is less energy and capital intensive, more easily monitored and controlled and that produces safe, healthy food. You can see some of these pioneering commercial urban farmers throughout the U.S. and Canada who are taking the task of relocalizing food production into their own hands at www.spinfarming.com. What will accelerate the establishment of locally-based food systems is for cities to regard commercial urban farming as an economic engine and encourage and support entrepreneurial farmers to set up businesses within their borders. What is needed are: land – and all cities have vacant and underutilized land, as your post points out; appropriately scaled farming systems – and SPIN-Farming is one example which greatly reduces the amount of land needed for commercial crop production; micro-level financing which can be readily found; and markets – and cities have a variety of markets, both direct to consumer as well as institutional markets, that can easily be accessed. In the first urbanized century, it is no longer useful to segregate food production outside of cities. While policymakers are struggling with how to address food security, citizens, like Stacey Murphy and Ben Flanner are leading the way by starting to practice an economically viable post-industrial agriculture that is less energy and capital intensive, more easily monitored and controlled and that produces safe, healthy food. You can see some of these pioneering commercial urban farmers throughout the U.S. and Canada who are taking the task of relocalizing food production into their own hands at http://www.spinfarming.com.

]]> http://foodcycles.org/2009/10/18/new-york-has-10000-acres-of-farmland/comment-page-1/#comment-613 New York Has 10,000 Acres of Farmland « FoodCycles Mon, 19 Oct 2009 04:17:05 +0000 http://foodcycles.org/?p=850#comment-613 [...] Read the full post and see the video link at FoodCycles.org [...] [...] Read the full post and see the video link at FoodCycles.org [...]

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