Internationalising community gardening

dublin | environment | news report Monday May 15, 2006 18:36 by Paul Baynes dolphinsbarngarden at gmail dot com

Short report on gathering at Dolphin's Barn community garden

Though nothing new is being planted in the Dolphin’s Barn Community Garden for the rest of the season (see previous article: http://www.indymedia.ie/article/75438), we are still tending the few herbs, potatoes and onions that had already been planted. A small group of us were in the garden on Sunday afternoon to do some weeding. I took home a small spring onion and some oregano which went into my dinner. Patrick, Ciaran, Lara, Bruno and myself all shared some tea and home-made cake before heading our separate ways.

Bruno is visiting from France, where he has been involved in community gardening for many years. He was involved in a French community gardening network, and showed us a magazine that the French group had put together. After the recent meeting in Clare of community gardeners from Dublin, Belfast, Scariff and elsewhere, the hope is that we can forge a similar network here in Ireland. The Dolphin’s Barn gardeners have made informal links with some groups, such as the Rialto Environment Network, the Dublin Food Co-op and the Cultivate Centre for Sustainable Living. One possible long-term goal would be to link up as many existing like-minded communities as possible, across Ireland and even beyond. Bruno is to report back to the French network on the state of community gardening in Ireland. As oil production appears to be reaching its peak and urbanisation is drawing more people off the land, urban food production is likely to become increasingly important in the future.

Talking to Bruno gave an idea of the possibilities of what can be achieved by these kinds of projects. He was involved in setting up a French project whereby organic vegetables were grown and sold in baskets, providing work for a number of people who had previously been unemployed. He also spoke about the rehabilitative possibilities of gardening, and told us of a community gardening scheme in which people with alcohol problems and other drug problems would live and work on the land as a means of therapy. Dolphin’s Barn gardeners have already been involved in different ‘outreach’ activities - staging an exhibition and information evening in the local public library last summer, and gardeners Ciaran and Kieran giving a talk in a National School in conjunction with ECO-UNESCO in 2005.

Although the Dolphin’s Barn garden is on hiatus, there is still plenty of community gardening going on in Dublin, with sites opened up in Phibsborough (http://www.indymedia.ie/article/75922) and Finglas (http://www.indymedia.ie/article/75692). There is also the possibility of opening a new site in the Dolphin's Barn area.