Fleece Bridge

Fleece Bridge

Blizz Biking in YYC

Had to get out for a little Blizz Bikking

Calgary Hoarding Art Project

Hoarding Art Project commences.

Prep work

The Heart of Food Policy

The Heart of Food Policy

As I see it, the heart of food policy can be distilled down to a few key items.

Municipal governments must create the political & policy environment for a local food system to thrive.

Here's how:



1. Capacity to produce Locally:
ABC:Access, Build, Cultivate

A=Access the land


B=Build the smallscale infrastructure


C=Cultivate the crops



2. Recruit farmers



3. Educate/Train farmers



4. Develop Markets/Influence Procurement



This is a slideshare powerpoint that helps create a better understanding of the economic development & job creation opportunities of Urban Ag:

Drilling 4 Soil: The Case for Urban Ag & Food Policy



Twitter: @Hughes4YYC

Where the Political Shovel Hits the Dirt: Planting the seeds of the Calgary Local Food Production System

Where the Political Shovel Hits the Dirt: Planting the seeds of the Calgary Local Food Production System


YYCCC has known about the economic/job creation potential of Urban Agriculture ever since I made a point to present to as many alderpeople as possible in the fall of 2008 & spring/summer of 2009. Joe Ceci & Bob Hawkesworth both cosponsored a notice of motion based on the work of the Calgary Food Policy Council to highlight the ROI of using unused city land.

Here is the 16Dec10 Metro (Thanks, Darren Krause!) article about the 10,000+ acres just laying there doing Sweet FA.

2011 can be a huge year for Cowtown Urban Agriculture. YYCCC will need to show some leadership and political will to initiate the development of a resilient local food system.

While Chair of the Calgary Food Policy Council, Bronco steadfastly turned down 15 requests over a 2 year period to meet. Most infamous the request denials were Bronco's Chief of Staff, Mark Henry's bubbleheaded quips: "What's Food Security?" & "Why can't you go to Safeway like everyone else, Hughes?"

Mayor Nenshi & Chief of Staff, Chima Nkemdirim, have a superior understanding of the Urban Ag potential. It is quite simple to connect the dots of 1,000,000 mouths and 10,000 empty acres.

Planting the seeds of the Calgary Local Food Production System has never been easier.

Reusable vs Plastic Bag

Mac & I were living in the small town (500 ppl) of Leaf Rapids, in Northern Manitoba, when they decided to ban plastic bags... 1st municipality in North America to do so.

Here's the collector's edition commemorative reusable bag honouring the local legislation.

I grew up in Leaf Rapids in late 70's, early 80's... this was an exciting day for this little town that showed leadership on an environmental issue.

To this day, everyone uses reusable bags.

When I moved to Calgary, I met with some aldermen/councillors on this issue. In particular, John Mar.

Time for #YYCCC to revist this issue and show leadership in the face of what Toronto is juggling.

Via Wayne Roberts: There's a controversy going on in Toronto now about the value of the five cent a plastic bag tax for food shoopers. Here's a powerful business case for keeping the tax, an example of a green tax that supports green behaviour in two ways -- one by saving people money if they do the right thing, and two by arrangements to contribute that five cent penalty to fund enviro groups.




Map of Leaf Rapids

KidsFarm: Calgary Kids Urban Farm project looking 4 volunteers

KidsFarm

Calgary Kids Urban Farm project looking 4 volunteers.

Contact: Paul Hughes paul [at] paulinate [dot] com