Urban food security, urban resilience and climate change - weADAPT

(http://sharingabundance.org/). Again, while yet reflected in much scholarly andacademic literature, sites such as this offer a valuable window into grass rootscommunity activity that would be otherwise hard to access. Sharing Abundancesupports a number of projects, but perhaps the most interesting is the use of aninteractive map to identify and locate urban fruit trees that are accessible to the public,and a program that links tree owners with the broader community to share in theharvest when there is a glut of fruit.In the following section, and again in the absence of an extensive scholarly literature onthe extent of urban agriculture in Australia, we draw heavily one the work of Montague(2011), who conducted a comprehensive review of local government and food securityon behalf of the Victorian LGA. Her report highlights a number of exampled of urbanagriculture across Australia. Whilst this does not quantify the amount of food grown orvolume of urban land in use for food growing, the report illustrates the wide range ofactivities currently underway in Australian cities of all sizes, and further, gives someindication of both the scope and the history of urban agriculture. Some of theseinitiatives reported by Montague (2011: pp.18-20) are reproduced in full next page.City of Greater Dandenong: VicUrban Meridian Development – integrated ediblelandscape into a new development. Public orchards supported by levy included in eachhousehold’s rate notice. These funds are managed through the Meridian HomeownersAssociation and pays for a community and landscape manager to managemaintenance requirements and work with residents to create an activity program tomaintain the orchards.Moreland City Council: Ceres Farm and Market in Brunswick has been in operationfor over 20 years despite the fact that no zone for commercial agriculture exists.Baw Baw Shire: active by Design Guidelines new guidelines require that for a subdivisionto be considered ‘active by design’ the people that live there should be able tobe able to access community gardens.Swan Hill Rural City Council: as a participating Food for All Council 20052010,Swan Hill provided a range of support to the Manatunga Community Garden, anAboriginal community garden that has been operating for ten years. Council assistedthe garden group to apply for federal government grants that then enabled them toinstall water tanks and a watering system and to purchase fruit trees. Council providedsome infrastructure support in the form of framing for a greenhouse, and a barbeque soproduce could be cooked on site, and community sessions could occur to engage andinvolve more participants etc. The garden participants were also encouraged to visit thenearby Robinvale Community Growers Market. This provided an opportunity for thegarden to sell any excess produce. The key has been the leadership and consistencyof the person involved in running the garden and great patience in building therelationship between the FFA project and the indigenous community.Brisbane City Council: is encouraging urban agriculture and has incorporated it intohigh level planning documents such as The City Plan. This document, Our sharedvision – Living in Brisbane 2026 city-wide outcomes states ‘Food in the city: Brisbane islush with food producing gardens and city farms in parks, schools, backyards,community facilities and businesses.’City of Darebin: supports gardeners in a number of ways: discount prices on compostbin, sustainable gardening workshops; the Backyard Harvest Festival Program, and anumber of publications around sustainable and seasonal gardening.Maribyrnong City Council: has supported community gardens in a number of ways;supporting the development of a Community Garden Network; establishing aUrban food security, urban resilience and climate change 90