7/25/2023 0 Comments Urban ag supplyThe cost includes new soil, compost, fencing, and adding a water supply. And it costs the city $250,000 to get a half-acre of city land prepared to farm. However, it takes the work of one farmer to care for a quarter-acre of land. Via the incubator network, farmers will be able to graduate to city-owned land, helping to make use of hundreds of vacant lots created by disinvestment and economic blight. Training and incubator farms will further advance Chicago’s goals for urban agriculture by not only creating a local food supply, but teaching marketable job skills including hoop house construction, food processing, compost production, and both retail and wholesale sales. To support our nonprofit environmental journalism, please consider disabling your ad-blocker to allow ads on Grist. Produce grown at the site will help bring fresh food to local neighborhoods as well as small, local retailers moving into the healthy food arena. Scholarship funds will eventually be available for economically challenged students. Allen estimates tuition will be $200 a month during the first year, then dropping as farmers advance in the program. Tuition will go toward operating and lease costs. Allen says the program provides participants with three years of support, earned income, and rights to lease and farm the land long-term. The program will help these emerging growers launch their own businesses by providing not just the land, but also technical assistance, shared tools, seeds, and access to local markets. To start, Farmers for Chicago will only take applicants with prior farmer training who submit a business plan. When in full operation, Farmers for Chicago will school 100 farmers annually. Erika Allen says six to 12 farmers will be chosen for the program, with farming beginning on small parcels as early as May. Growing Power has been a leader in the urban ag movement nationally and operates eight farms throughout Chicago. Detroit, Cleveland, New York, and other cities that are working to build local food systems are also feeling the farmer drought. Erika Allen, Chicago and national projects director for Growing Power (and Will Allen’s daughter), says that while the city is making huge advances in developing urban agriculture, there simply aren’t enough farmers to grow the food that Chicago needs.
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