Guide Helps Gardeners Become Leaders of the Local Food Movement
by Micheal Smith (Veshengro)
The creators of the SPIN-Gardening online learning series have launched the SPIN-Gardening Discussion and Action Guide, which can be used by gardeners to create action teams to rebuild local food systems. It can be purchased for $19.99 for immediate download at the SPIN-Gardening website.
Contained in the SPIN-Gardening Discussion and Action Guide are ten sections that detail how non-commercial local food production can be conceptualized, championed and implemented, whether it be in the middle of an urban jungle or on the suburban fringe, or in a small town. Topics covered include assembling land bases, sub-acre growing practices, valuing production, workflow and management practices, harvesting and post-harvesting protocols, investments and establishing food production groups.
“Others have written persuasively on why the current food production system should be re-localized,” says Co-author Wally Satzewich. “SPIN provides the how, by offering a system that makes food growing un-intimidating, productive and fun.”
There is no one-size-fits-all plan, according to Co-author Roxanne Christensen. “Individuals and communities will create local food systems that reflect their abilities, needs and resources. They just need a clear way to get started, and the SPIN-Gardening Discussion and Action Guide provides that.” And we must admit that there will never be a “one-size-fits-all” solution to anything, whether it is gardening or anything else for that matter.
Satzewich and Christensen first developed a commercial sub-acre farming system called SPIN-Farming which they also make available as an online learning series. They started to hear from gardeners who asked how they could take their gardens t the next level by turning them into significant sources of food crops. In response, the authors launched the online SPIN-Gardening learning series.
By serving as a common denominator between commercial and home and community-based food production operations, SPIN is helping to define what is possible and do what is practical, according to Satzewich.
“What gardeners are telling us now is that they don’t just want to grow food. They want to grow a new culture,” says co-author Roxanne Christensen.
SPIN-Gardening is a do-it-yourself food production system that adapts the commercial sub-acre farming techniques of SPIN-Farming® to a home and community-based context. It shows how to grow a steady and dependable supply of vegetables that have all the quality of farm-grown and all the convenience of store-bought by working part-time or full-time, working alone or with family, friends or a like-minded group. A self-serve, self-study online learning series on SPIN-Gardening is available at www.spinfarming.com
SPIN (S-mall P-lot IN-tensive) Farming (www.spinfarming.com) is an organic-based, non-technical, easy-to-understand and inexpensive-to-implement farming system that makes it possible to generate significant income by growing common vegetables on sub-acre plots of land. It is organic-based and can be practiced on a single plot or multi-sited on several residential backyards in urban or peri-urban areas, or as part of a larger acreage in the country. A self-serve, self-study online learning series on SPIN-Farming is available at www.spinfarming.com
I have to say that I have neither tried this approach as yet nor have I studied any of the guides though shall attempt to get one or two of them in order to review them.
© 2009
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SPIN-Gardening™ Discussion and Action Guide Now Available
