Over the last two weeks, and as the digital storytelling about community food growing project comes to an end, we have been visiting case study initiatives to evaluate how community gardens’ activities influence wider collective and sustainable practices and how they could play a transformative role in peoples’ lives.
More specifically, we wanted to understand how these food growing initiatives overcame difficulties or obstacles of the Covid-19 pandemic, how participants developed forms of cooperation while getting to know each other better, and how they learnt and strengthened cooperative skills that could have influenced external practices.
Working in Lavender Place and Royal Berkshire Hospital Well-Being Garden (Reading) and Calthorpe Community Garden and Josiah Braithwaite Community Garden (London), we met with staff and volunteers at the gardens, as well as our collaborators, Reading International Solidarity Centre (RISC) and Sustain: The alliance for better food and farming, in many cases for the first time since the start of the pandemic!
Through interviews and filming, and conversations during cooking, eating, and talking about plants, we gathered peoples’ thoughts on cooperation, cohesion and building resilience. Watch this space for the outcomes!
