Construction has begun on a £1m community growing space in Dundee designed to promote self-sufficiency and prepare for a potential global food shortage.
Based at Camperdown Park, the hub will offer growing and cooking classes while volunteers also plan to deliver vegetable boxes through a subscription.
Fruit trees including apples, pears, plums and cherries are being planted at the site near Camperdown Wildlife Centre, which could start producing harvests as early as next year.
Vegetables such as beetroots, broad beans, sweetcorn, amaranth, squash, kale, garlic and potatoes are already being grown.
Some of these are being given out to locals for free on Saturdays between 11am and 1pm at the nearby playpark.
Climate emergency threatens food supply
Volunteer group Campy Growers, which describes the Camperdown Growing Hub as the “first of its kind in Dundee” has been pushing for the project for a number of years.
And last year, Dundee City Council managed to secure Scottish Government funding of more than £1m for the build while contributing £200,000 from its own budget.
Volunteer Kate Treharne says the climate emergency and sudden crises such as the war in Ukraine show the pressing need for people to learn to be self-sufficient.
She said: “It won’t be long before we just won’t be able to import produce from certain places.
“For example, it’s 47C in Spain this summer – how can they continue to grow things we import, such as courgettes?”
She added: “It’s kind of about creating a new culture and a new way of doing things.
“We’ve had this big experiment where everything is mass produced and some of it is imported from exotic places using lots of energy in the process.
“But we’ve now arrived at the point of catastrophic climate and ecological breakdown. We need to do some rapid turnarounds and start to really generate food ultra locally.
“The ultimate goal is to reduce imported produce but we need to prepare ourselves for that.”
Hub will feature kitchen and multi-functional space
As well as improving local growing skills, it also aims to improve biodiversity, mental health, children’s education, and community spirit.
The design of the hub itself is still being worked on but it will be a timber construction and include a kitchen, large multi-functional space, toilets, showers, and a cold store storage zone.
The nursery’s polytunnels and raised beds will also be restored.
It will be set in a former council plant nursery within a seven-hectare site, much of which will be used to grow produce.
Kate, however, is keen to point out the idea is very different to an allotment.
“It’s definitely not an allotment, it’s a public service essentially,” she said.
“People won’t be able to come along and have a space to grow things in but it is for the people of Dundee.
“Lockdown saw a huge uptick in people experimenting with growing things themselves.
“Allotment demand is also going through the roof with big waiting lists.
“I think there’s a lot of interest in this kind of thing just now and we want to build on that.”
Supported through Scotland Loves Local funding, the project has also appointed a part-time employee to help drive it, development worker Nadège Depiesse.
The cash comes from the Scottish Government’s Regeneration Capital Grant Fund, which is for community-driven regeneration projects.
Conversation