How This City is Being Transformed by Artists whose Graffiti is Gardening

Ron Finley is a health food advocate that seeks to inspire and educate individuals to grow their own food. Finley’s volunteer group, LA Green Grounds, was founded in 2010 with the mission of increasing the accessibility and affordability of health food to South Central LA residents.

 

By empowering individuals and families to grow their own foods through community gardening, Finley began a cultural revolution. LA Green Grounds consists of volunteers from across the city that dedicate their time to planting gardens on nature strips, that are owned by the public but maintained by the home-owner.

 

The project began in South Central LA due to the poor health of its residents. In Finley’s Ted Talk on gardening, he explains that obesity rates are five times higher than other areas of LA and people are dying from curable diseases. He calls it a ‘food desert’ and ‘land of the drive thru’ and describes the neighbourhood as consisting of liquor stores, fast food and vacant lots, painting a very grim picture in our minds.

 

With 26 square miles of vacant lots, LA has the space equivalent to 20 central parks, which is enough land to grow 725 million tomato plants.

 

Healthy food becomes accessible and affordable when children are encouraged to grow their own food because kids will eat what they grow. This hands-on approach allows children to experience positive effects on the mind and body. By teaching the joy, pride and honour in growing food, a cultural shift towards healthy eating is truly underway.

 

Gardening can be a tool for transforming a community and it is therapeutic, especially in the inner city.

“Our reality was manufactured for us but why not take charge and manufacture our own reality,” proposed Ron.

Ron Finley is an artist and says gardening is his graffiti. Ron envisions gardening as appealing to the cool kids, if it’s portrayed in the right light.

“If you aint a gardener, you aint gangsta. Be gangsta with your shovel and let that be your weapon of choice,” said Ron.

Pam Warhurst is another local food advocate in the small town of Todmorden, England. Warhurt engaged Ted listeners with her talk on How we eat our landscapes.

 

Warhurt is part of a team that grows and campaign for local food, called Incredible Edible, a movement for those across all ages, incomes and cultures. Her talk seeks to raise recognition of the program that her team has implemented and to inspire other communities to do the same.

 

Warhurt describes the group’s success in planting herbs, corn and fruit trees on un-used land surround car parks and doctor’s offices. She has introduced children to orchards where they are growing fruits and vegetables and since, their local High School has introduced agriculture into the curriculum.

 

Forty nine percent of all food traders in the town said their bottom line had increased due to these volunteers. The success of the program in Todmorden is replicable. More than 30 towns in England are spreading the Incredible Edible plague. New Zealand and more recently, Japan have shown interested in taking similar action to encourage buying local.