Turning a New Brunswick community garden into an urban farm

The community garden at the Peter McKee Community Food Centre in Moncton has gone through a major expansion.

The number of garden plots up for rent has doubled this year, and the garden co-ordinator says she would like to see the garden expand into a full urban farm.

“We would like this to be a urban farm more so than a community garden,” said Alicia Clarkson, who runs the garden at the local food bank.

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Clarkson’s vision for the garden goes beyond growing a few vegetables. She said community gardens are growing in popularity right across the country, especially among residents who live in apartment complexes.

“So they are able to rent a spot and grow their own food just because they don’t have the space where they live,” said Clarkson. “A lot of people don’t have access to sustainably produced food and growing your own is one of the more sustainable ways to do it,” said Clarkson.

But she would like to see community gardens evolve even further into self-sustaining urban community farms.

She’s equipped the Peter McKee community garden with a composting facility, which gathers rain water. The garden’s also a training program that teaches people how to grow food that can be widely shared.

“What we would like to do is have everybody working together to be producing food to feed more people than what you can produce in one food box,” said Clarkson.

READ MORE: Moncton food bank community garden in need of volunteers

Suzanne Melanson runs a cooking program at the centre and has her own garden plot to grow vegetables. She thinks the concept of an urban farm would bring the community together.

“This is a great way to get people back to learning about it, getting their fingers dirty, doing the planting the harvesting and really coming full circle in terms of knowledge,” said Melanson.

Clarkson’s vision for the urban farm would include small farm animals, like chickens, ducks or goats. But she said some municipalities will have to become more flexible with their bylaws in order for that to happen.

The centre is zoned for commercial use, so under the city’s bylaw they cannot house a chicken coup. But Clarkson is working with the city to see if that can change.

“Let’s say they live in an apartment and can’t have their own laying hens, then they can come here help take care of them and bring home some eggs.”

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