Urban gardens, gardens online with 'digital participation' in life in the fields and home delivery of products. Three brilliant initiatives show how #garden dreams can really come true. Thanks to an alliance between peasant agriculture and Consumers attentive to the authentic value of food. Without overlooking the premises.
Is peasant food getting better and better?
Is it really better, peasant food? It depends. The 'zero km' has a definite advantage, reducing transport and its environmental impact. And human relationships carry significant weight. But it's not enough. Proof is the relatively modest success, compared to huge investments, of Campagna amica. So what is missing? First of all, the demonstration of the actual sustainability of agronomic practices, which is by no means obvious.
Peasant food has a recognizable and appreciated value when organic. Because this is the only identity guarantee of what the Consumer recognizes as 'good and healthy'. Good for the ecosystem and biodiversity, of which the 'organic' farmer is the guardian. And healthy, thanks to the substantial absence of chemical residues whose dangers to public health are becoming increasingly evident.
Peasant agriculture, local and eco-logical, can therefore play a key role in defining a new social pact with consumers who receive a guarantee of 'good and healthy' products. A basic guarantee is inherent in organic certification and related controls. And it is no coincidence that Coldiretti itself, mother of Campagna amica, has recently signed an agreement with Federbio.
The pact between farmers and consumers can be strengthened with further forms of sharing. From the physical presence of consumers on farms – thanks to initiatives like those promoted by #Vazapp! – to their 'digital participation'. Which can be achieved with various innovative tools, from blockchain to the installation of cameras that allow everyone to observe the fields and laboratories, savor nature through a smartphone when there is no opportunity for ‘outdoor’ visits.
The shortening of the supply chain – from the fields to the consumers' homes, or to the Solidarity Purchasing Groups (GAS), according to tradition – can benefit farmers, no longer forced to 'undersell' their goods and to process (or allocate to animals) the less 'beautiful' fruit and vegetables. But one must not abuse this either, as consumers themselves must also gain an advantage. Not only idealistic, but also economic. And the large-scale distribution is in turn organizing 'organic' supply chains that are inevitably less 'fair' but tend to be affordable for all budgets. Therefore, the price formation must also consider this aspect, tobalance the authentic value of local eco-agriculture products with the spending needs of a non-elitist audience to whom one must be able to address.
Gardens online, a model of sustainable innovation
The ‘online’ gardens can represent a model of sustainable and shared innovation in the territories. They can stimulate internal demand for local products, support the economy of districts, and generate employment. In addition to protecting rural areas from abandonment, pollution, and concrete. Perhaps also laying the foundations for widespread tourism in areas otherwise prone to social desertification. The ‘green economy’, often preached recklessly at high institution conferences, thus finds concrete application. Developing new business models – including cooperative and social – to produce ‘with new eyes’ good and fair food and reinvent the local market of ‘food & drink’.
The ecommerce of giants global – which also gains approval among Italian SMEs – does not seem to be the most appropriate context for this setting. (1) Amazon, with its recent investment in Deliveroo, will certainly optimize logistics with timely and widespread distribution, starting from large cities. But its business model is completely unfair and therefore incompatible with the basic concept of a fair supply chain. In addition to tax evasion, there is exploitation of workers and lack of transparency to the consumer.
The local economy does not need to bow to the contractual and economic harassment of global ecommerce. Nor to give disproportionate commissions, up to 20%, for a ‘marketplace’ service that online gardens do not even need. Their visibility can be promoted at much lower costs, also relying on physical resources in the territories and word of mouth. And digitalization can also be implemented with the help of freelance IT specialists and ‘open-source’ software. Perhaps organizing in a network to share the costs of sustainable innovation, or relying on a marketplace local one, not greedy like the giants. Only in this way can reasonable prices be maintained for consumers, without giving up their rightful share of value.
Garden Chef, Korto, Biofarm. Three garden experiences online
The online garden model It was developed with various initiatives, whose variety confirms how imagination has no limits when based on good ideas. Not always 'organic' – as we prefer, as an emblem of the utmost respect towards nature and its inhabitants – but always interesting. All based on a direct sales scheme, from producer to consumer. The first two examples, in Turin and nearby, recall the pre-Renaissance idea of domesticating the lands surrounding cities to meet the food demand of villages and municipalities. When stillglobal, national, or regional markets were missing, each Municipality had its own fruit and vegetable production reservoir. Why give it up now?
Garden Chef. The former computer scientist Davide Almondo started an urban horticulture path in 2014, in some public gardens in the city of Turin. The recognitions of merit from the ex-mayor Piero Fassino and the founder of Slow Food Carlo Petrini encourages Davide to create, in the same year, an even more ambitious project, Garden Chef. The idea is to cultivate some peri-urban land to produce quality food for catering. The idea of a cuisine that uses raw materials from its own garden is new to a metropolis like Turin and is developed with two city restaurants. One of which is the hanging vegetable garden – more precisely, a bioclimatic greenhouse – on the Sanpaolo skyscraper, 150 meters high. Dizzying innovation, of symbolic value for the avant-garde'green' metropolitan, even if it has an irrelevant social impact.
Korto. The same Davide makes use of the urban horticultural experience for a project instead dedicated to the families of the city, Korto. Fruits and vegetables are grown on several hectares of land, in the park of the Reggia di Venaria Reale and in Chivasso, in the province. A crate of fruit and vegetables produced a few kilometers from home is delivered every week at a good price to subscribed families. The 'digital participation' of citizens is encouraged by webcams in the fields, thanks to which it is possible to follow the growth of plants, activitiesagricultural, environmental care. The service is currently temporarily suspended, as the processing plants for some foods are being developed. And other news, yet to be revealed.
Biofarm is a broader project that aims to establish a direct relationship between consumers and farmers who apply organic methods in the various regions of Italy. The relationship can even be established with individual plants, which can be ‘adopted.’ With the aim of sharing, albeit ‘remotely,’ the cycles of nature and the enterprise of agriculture. Initial costs, maintenance, yields and risks, seasonality. The perspective of the consumer changes who can thus learn the meaning of their needs. The egocentrism of‘wanting’ this or that product turns into a transparent relationship – albeit mediated by technology – with nature and its fruits. How long the plant lives, what it needs, when I can harvest the crops, with whom I share this resource?
Dario Dongo and Guido Cortese
Notes
(1) On 7.5.19 Amazon also signed an agreement with ICE, to promote the ‘Made in Italy’ abroad. But under what conditions? The Antitrust Authority, repeatedly contacted by us to evaluate the manifestly unfair and illegal commercial practices applied by the US giant to its suppliers, has so far omitted to consider abusive clauses that cause unjust damage to thousands of Italian companies. Therefore, to the national economy.
Dario Dongo, lawyer and journalist, PhD in international food law, founder of WIISE (FARE - GIFT – Food Times) and Égalité.
IT professional and beekeeper. Former conscientious objector, he served and then volunteered in a soup kitchen for the homeless in Turin. He deals with the right to food, food policy, food sovereignty, and biodiversity. He founded the association of Metropolitan Pollinators with the aim of defending biodiversity through specific social and environmental regeneration projects. He represents the Slow Food Community of Metropolitan Pollinators. He promoted the birth of the national network of urban beekeepers.He runs an independent agricultural market, collaborates and writes for Egalitè (Onlus Rome) which defends the rights of disadvantaged people, and with the newspapers Great ItalianFood Trade, Qualeformaggio, L'apicoltore Italiano and minor magazines.
