Editor’s Letter: Talking to Sara Venn, Founder of Incredible Edible Bristol

This week we’ve been attempting to sow a few seeds of wisdom here at HC. “Her Garden” has been focused on a topic that is close to all of our hearts:

Food.

Specifically, we have come together to think about the food we eat; where it comes from and how we can make the most of the food that we buy.

Being conscious of where our food comes from does not always take top priority at university. Pesto pasta is the go to for substance and efficiency in first year, Sainsbury’s Basics is easier on our purse strings in second year and there’s just not enough time in the day to be growing a carrot in third year.

Despite all this, we wanted to demonstrate that it is possible to be a food-conscious student. We can cut down our food waste, buy more local produce and even start to grow our own. It remains to be seen whether I can keep my basil plant alive of course.

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Inspiration for our eco-friendly journalism came from a meeting last week with Sara Venn, co-founder of Incredible Edible Bristol.

Incredible Edible Bristol has been around since February 2014, with Incredible Edible having actually started in 2007 in Todmorden, a small town in Yorkshire. In its simplest terms, the project is a “Community food growing movement.”

Pam Warhurst, one of the original founders of the movement, can probably explain things better… Here she is giving a handy TED talk on How We Can Eat Our Landscapes:

So what inspired Sara to transform Bristol into an edible city? A horticulturalist by trade and a keen allotment grower, Sara saw what was happening in Todmorden and was fascinated by the “Concept of bringing people in to growing by community action.”

Arriving in Bristol three years ago, relocating from a “Non-community” outside of London, Sara expected to find Incredible Edible up and running.

Instead, she found “an Incredible Edible sized hole.”

Following some preliminary talks and a big public interest meeting, a group then started to take steps towards creating an edible landscape in the city centre.

(Image credit: Incredible Edible Bristol)

Chatting with Sara, it’s easy to see her excitement, enthusiasm and drive for the project. She is a woman who takes action – it’s not about talking about making a change, it’s about going out, getting in the mud and making a change.

Incredible Edible was successful in gaining funding for the Bristol European Green Capital year. This was spent on realising an Urban Food Growing Trail from Temple Meads to Millennium Square, which features simple boxes that showcase ways of growing for people to take back to their community.

There are now 27 gardens across the city.

As part of the Bristol Food Network, Incredible Edible also works with Food Route Local and FareShare to bring food to the people who most need it. Food Route Local is a food surplus redistribution service intercepting waste at local levels to bring local produce to local community organisations.

Venn highlights that this is particularly geared towards those people who “Fall through the gaps of being able to access the system.”

“If you can come and get food, you can have food.”

The response to Incredible Edible over the last 12 months has been “Amazing.”

Sara’s reasons that their success is due to the fact that: “Everything we do is about saying to people ‘Come along and learn how to do this, and at the end of it take some food home with you’.”

(Photo credit: Incredible Edible Bristol)

Nationally, Incredible Edible is lobbying for changes to food policy at a government level and Sara has now been asked to be on the network board. In the mean time, Incredible Edible continues to make change quietly in the background.

Sara underlines that the project is about doing, acting and making things happen. It makes sense that the movement has been dubbed “Guerrilla gardening” then.

“We do ask for permission, but we don’t listen to the word no.”

The horticulturalist believes that we need to shift our perspective when thinking about cities:

“Why aren’t we looking at how we design our urban spaces and saying concrete isn’t good enough anymore?”

This fault extends beyond the physical buildings of the city. There are “bubbles” in Bristol. Sara talks about how there are “Food deserts in this city and people struggling to access wholesome healthy food for their children.”

Incredible Edible Bristol offers a way to overlook these boundaries and grow food for the community. With work ongoing in the gardens, Sara says “It’s great to see things going in to their second year and having an impact.”

As for student involvement Sara says that the project is keen to work with the univerisities in Bristol – perhaps it’s time we transformed Royal Fort Gardens into our very own allotments!

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