Do you know your neighbors? - by Robb

As I dig into the data coming in from my thesis research into homebased food growing here in Sheffield, I'm struck by how many folks don't garden because they feel they don't have enough land, while a few doors down one of their neighbors is willing to let someone else garden in their yard.

My experience is that gardening at whatever scale you can is worth doing, whether it is herbs on the windowsill, tomatoes in containers on the back deck or giving over your entire yard to it. If the folks who don't feel they have enough land knew their neighbors and worked cooperatively to produce a small scale operation everyone would profit. Local food would get grown and neighborhoods would cease to be so isolationist in nature. An increased sense of community would result and the resiliency derived would be priceless. As threats to food security worldwide continue to mount; from biofuels, peak oil, increased monopolization of supply, climate change, we will need all the resiliency we can muster.

There is much discussion about the suburbs of America being, as James Kunstler has said " the greatest misallocation of resources in the history of mankind" but I see a great opportunity there. All those homes with large lawns represent resiliency potential for those communities. If the people living there can begin to see themselves as members of a community and begin to work together to build sustainability into their lives these sterile deserts of driveways and closed doors can awaken and become nice places to be. What better way than to plant some veggies where there once was lawn, share them with your neighbors, welcome them into your patch, help them do it in their yard. Work together to make resiliency happen.

Invest in sustainability instead of gadgetry, study self sufficiency instead of watching TV, work to get out of debt and quit commuting rather than to get deeper into debt and more dependent on resources from afar. Do it sooner than later, you will be glad you did.