Urban Farms in NYC
For as long as I can remember, I lived in big cities. So, it’s easy to guess that all the food I have been getting comes from supermarkets: meat, dairy, vegetables…
There were attempts to grow my own herbs a couple of times, usually after a particularly interesting biology class, but those failed pretty fast, and I went back to my usual routine: fill the cart with all kinds of food and eat it for a week. That was easy, that was familiar, and that was what everybody else did.
As time passed, I started thinking more about what I eat. I discovered that supermarkets only sometimes sell healthy foods, even if it is something as simple as a vegetable. What can be easier to grow a vegetable? You plant a seed, take care of it, and get the results of your efforts in your salad a couple of months later. But that is different from what many of the big farms do. To accelerate and increase growth, they use pesticides. Only big and shiny vegetables get to go on the shelf. Small ones do not have a chance and are thrown out. Though, as we know, the smaller the vegetable or fruit, the more flavor there is.
That was when my urban farm journey started. I wanted to buy locally from the community I trusted. I first started growing peas on my windowsill, but that soon became not enough. I needed a wider variety of foods.
There are many urban farms in NYC. Each borough has dozens, some smaller, some bigger, but all serving a great purpose of making our lives more eco-friendly and us healthier. Urban farms in New York grow their produce and organize field trips and classes where you can learn about urban farming and clean lifestyle.
For example, The Battery Farm in Manhattan grows over a hundred varieties of vegetables and is open for NYC residents and students who can learn about water ecology.
Eagle Street Rooftop Farms in Brooklyn produce honey and eggs. You can buy fresh foods at their market. It is open every last Sunday of the month from May to October.
Oko Farms in Brooklyn produces vegetables and fish. That is definitely something to check out! There are also a couple of on-site programs available to the visitors.
Crazy, right? You can locally source almost all of your shopping cart!
Even though urban farming is not talked about widely and might be considered as something small and not worthy of attention, it is a big industry that does not use energy for the transportation of its products, uses eco-friendly methods of farming, and ensures you have good quality food on your table.
There are plenty of urban farms to choose from! Find the one you trust and whose ideas you support, and start buying locally grown foods from them. You will help the environment and know what you are eating and where it comes from!
Article by Mary Zakharova
