Student Worksheet

Tackling Food Insecurity With Urban Farming - Activity Instructions

What is urban farming and how can it help address food security?

In this activity you will consider the concept of food security by imagining food insecurity. You will then explore the practice of urban farming as one solution to current and future food security challenges. Finally you will identify a potential site for an urban farm in your area, and create a proposal for this project.

This activity will help you understand the concepts of food security and urban agriculture. You will be able to answer the question: how can urban agriculture help address food security?

Part A: What Is Food Security And Why Is It Important?

Step 1.

Imagine it’s the year 2040 and you’re hungry. You’ve been thinking about having a sandwich all day. You head to your local sandwich shop and see a picture of a roast beef and salad sandwich on the wall. You want that sandwich so you place your order along with a banana and almonds.

Now imagine that your friendly sandwich maker behind the counter explains to you that:

"Unfortunately, today the price of beef has gone up because governments have just imposed a tax on beef as well as other meats and dairy products in an attempt to slow down the production of these food items. Growing these food items uses land that could be used for growing other cheaper and equally nutritious crops like grains and vegetables (also cows produce a lot of methane when burping, which is a big problem for the greenhouse effect and global warming). Do you still want the beef?
Tomatoes are unavailable - since the decline of natural pollinators (like bees and birds) it’s been harder to source tomatoes, along with many other fruits and vegetables that we used to have.
Lettuce is also unavailable because of poor soil health - because we’ve used so many fertilisers and pesticides as well as cleared a lot of native vegetation our soils are getting poorer and poorer, making it harder to grow some foods.
Mustard is available, although it’s a watered-down version of what we’re used to having. The mustard seeds are normally grown in Pakistan and North America and current regional tensions have resulted in trade disputes."

You skip the beef, tomato and lettuce. You’re now a little disappointed at the prospect of a watered-down mustard sandwich, but you’re hungry and you’ve got the banana and almonds anyway. Then your friendly sandwich maker tells you:

"We have bread, but it’s made from a mix of real and synthetic flour. The drought in Australia means that wheat crops have been drastically reduced."

You’ve tried this ‘flour’ before and it’s not great in sandwiches. Maybe you’ll just have the banana and almonds.

But it seems that there are no bananas. You’d forgotten about the hurricanes that have been continually battering banana plantations, meaning that there are no bananas available again – climate change is really tough on tree crops.
The fact that almonds need both water and bees has made them harder to find and more expensive to buy.

So, will you have the almonds anyway? You are very hungry, so what will you do?

Finally, you ask for a bottle of water. Your friendly sandwich maker informs you that:

They do free refills but this shop no longer stocks bottles of water to buy – they haven’t had any single-use plastics for the past 15 years.

This is a scenario we might find ourselves in when faced with food insecurity. In this activity you will investigate some of the proposed solutions to help us find a more sustainable and delicious food future.

Step 2.

Does Australia have 'food security’? Watch this clip and answer the questions below. Stop at the suggested timings of the clip to find the answers.

What is the definition of food security? 0:22

Where might we import food from, and how much food do we import into Australia? Can you think of any foods you eat that come from outside Australia, for example, New Zealand, China or Thailand? 0:43

How does importing food create imbalances in the food system? 1:13

What is food justice and food sovereignty? 1:22

What might a shorter food supply chain look like? 1:48

What do you think is meant by 'build capacity and resilience in local food systems'? 2:00

Note: Visit the following websites for more information about food security:

https://esriaustralia.com.au/esri-australia-blog/find-out-where-australia-imports-its-food-from-blg-20
https://foodsecurecanada.org/who-we-are/what-food-sovereignty
https://www.fao.org/in-action/food-security-capacity-building/project-overview/en/

Part B: Urban Farming

Step 1.

Now that you have explored the problems in our food chain and you know about the challenges we face you will spend the rest of this activity focusing on solutions.

Have you ever heard of urban farming or urban agriculture?

Urban agriculture, or urban farming, is farming in cities and towns. The Urban Agriculture Forum estimates that 800 million people are involved in urban agriculture and it already provides around 20% of the world's food needs. The Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations believes that urban agriculture has advantages for both developed and developing countries.

Now, watch this clip from 2040 and answer the question below:

Click to watch: 2040 – AeroFarm (Password: 2040_EDU)

What are some advantages of urban agriculture?

Hint: For some more ideas, read this page: The Ecology Center (https://www.theecologycenter.org/resources/10-ways-urban-farms-benefit-the-community/).

Part C: Urban Agriculture In Your Area

Step 1.

In this activity you will develop an agriculture project in your area.

Follow these steps, and complete the detail by following the steps below:

Identify a site. This could be in your neighbourhood (such as vacant or under-utilised land, or unused buildings).
Identify what form of urban agriculture would be most suitable, such as vertical farming or green walls, hydroponics, aquaponics, rooftop or backyard gardens, street landscaping, animals (e.g. chooks) or bees, or greenhouses.
Extension: You may like to create a report, poster or video to share your ideas – this should include maps, diagrams, proposed forms of urban agriculture, and justification for design and site selection.

1. Site selection

Record the details of the site selected for your urban agriculture design below. If you can’t visit the site in person to collect this information, you could locate the site on Google Maps.

Location of the site (give the address and/or coordinates):

Type of site (e.g. unused land in town, curbside land, school land, etc.):

Details of the site (e.g. existing vegetation, existing infrastructure such as walls or paths, size of site, etc.):

2. Urban agriculture selection

Now think about how the parameters of your site might affect the type of urban agriculture you will choose, for example, if your site is adjacent to a wall and does that mean you could incorporate vertical farming? If your site is in a location with lots of traffic, could you create a garden of hardy vegetables and leafy greens that can withstand small levels of disturbance? If your site is reasonably isolated, could you plan for beehives? Or if you have a larger open space, could you be adventurous and design for aquaponics?

The type of urban agriculture I propose for the site is:

I have chosen this form of urban agriculture because:

.

Now, think about and address the following:

Size of the site – Some forms of urban agriculture require significant infrastructure; will your site be able to accommodate this infrastructure? Justify:

Potential site disturbance – Some sites may experience regular foot traffic; how might you mitigate against site disturbance?

Shading – Some forms of urban agriculture will require sunlight; does the form of agriculture you have chosen require sunlight and how will your site accommodate this?

Energy and water – Some forms of urban agriculture require access to electricity and water; how might you ensure your site has access to these resources?

Taking It Further

Create a proposal

Activity 1.

Create a report about your agriculture project based on your responses above. Be sure to include:

Site selection and details of the site, including map (including BOLTSS - Border, Orientation, Legend, Title, Scale and Source) and photos of the site (if available).
Suggested form of urban agriculture and justification for this form of urban agriculture, including a sketch of how your design might look once complete.
Social and environmental benefits of your design.
Risks and challenges of the design and proposed measures to address these.

Activity 2.

Suggest a response to the following question:

Do you think we should be including urban agriculture in all future designs of urban environments? Explain your answer.

What other ideas do you have for addressing food security in the future? Watch the following clip and come up with your own ideas that you would like to add:

Click to watch: What's Your 2040 - For Food? (Password: 2040_EDU)

2040 - Tackling Food Insecurity With Urban Farming

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