Vancouver Pt. 3: SOLEfood Farms, An Urban Farm Project
Incredible French Breakfast radishes being harvested in Vancouver's Downtown East Side, July 2010After visiting the YMCA Intercultural Community Gardens on the rooftop of St. Paul's hospital, my next urban ag stop in Vancouver was a very exciting new urban farm. SOLEfood Farm, an ackronym for Save Our Living Environment, has made a bit of splash, not just because it's a new urban farm in Vancouver, but mostly because it has transformed a vacant lot in Vancouver's Downtown East Side (DTES), a community that unfortunately is more associated with street drugs and social problems than with fresh veggies. Maybe SOLEfood is going to change that, even just a little bit.
SOLEfood Farms is a social enterprise project of United We Can, a community development group whose tagline is "A Street Charity That Means Business." United We Can has been operating in this part of Vancouver of over 15 years, combining environmentalism with social justice. About two years ago, the idea of starting an urban farm arose and after a year of looking for a suitable and available space, the parking lot adjacent to the Astoria Hotel on Hastings Street and Hawk Avenue came up late last fall. The problem was, the owners wanted to take advantage of the property tax concessions that the city of Vancouver was offering to land owners who would covert bare lots or unused space into a green space, and the deadline was...tight.
"We built it in one day, on October 31" says Seann Dory, a soft-spoken Edmontonian-turned-Vancouverite / and social enterprise manager turned farmer, "in order to get the tax assessment done." It took about 50 volunteers to turn the 17,000 square-foot space into an urban veggie farm on that day last year. The farm is now in its very first growing season in the summer of 2010.
The land that it sits on is courtesy of the owners of the Astoria Hotel, a rooming-house hotel common in the neighbourhood. Dory explains that they got access to the lot because of Vancouver’s new tax incentives for green spaces. It was the parking lot to the hotel next door, but mainly it was a dumping ground and a haven for a lot of the street activity that goes on in the neighborhood. The hotel owners received a healthy tax break if they converted that unused space to a park or garden; and United We Can jumped at the chance because they had been looking for a space for their urban farm for almost a year without any viable prospects. But the deadline for the tax evaluation was November 1 and Dory and about 50 volunteers had to literally build the farm on October 31 in order for the space to qualify.
It worked and the enterprise got space for merely the cost of the property taxes. Now that SOLEfood is a rather shining example of what a farm can do to clean up a formerly derelict lot, he says other sites have become available. It has made it easier to ask for land, and Dory imagines that other urban farms will soon sprout.
A Wikimap / Google Map of the location before the farm; the red box is the hotel; the "farm" is just to the right
After my visit to SOLEfood, I find an old Google map image of the lot a few days later on the internet. Sure enough there’s a rubble heap at the far end and it’s an eyesight kind of bare lot. (Above). Compare it to the productive, clean and positive space now.
Having come at urban farming because of the social enterprise opportunities, Dory admits the biggest challenge, after finding a suitable piece of land -- which technically is asphalt-coated land -- was to learn how to grow the food. "None of us had any farming experience, so we surrounded ourselves with experts. I grabbed as many master gardeners as I could and put them on our advisory board. We met quite frequently for a while.
Then SOLEfood hit paydirt when they attracted Michael Abelman, a pioneer of the sustainable farming and urban farming movement whose 30-years of experience made up that knowldge gap fairly quickly.
Michael Abelman became an urban farmer when the Southern California suburbs literally encircled his Fairview Farm in the late 1980s and early 1990s. Founded in 1895 and under the protection first of Ableman and now the non-profit group, it is generally regarded as the oldest organic farm in Southern California.It is now operated by a non-profit group as The Center for Urban Agriculture at Fairview Gardens. Ableman’s 1998 book On Good Land: The Autobiography of an Urban Farm (Chronicle Books) remains a touchstone for the modern urban farming movement today. He has since relocated to Foxglove Farm, 120-acres on Salt Spring Island in British Columbia, and continues to consult, speak and author books on sustainable and organic farming.
Abelman agreed to come on as a consultant and has been very instrumental on teaching the group everything from best growing practices to how to price and present their products for sale to restaurants and at farmers' markets. "We are leaning very heavily on Michael Abelman," Dory laughs.
It seems to be working. Dory tells me that despite the fact that they are "making mistakes all the time" like "overharvesting," "overwatering," "poor seeding" and such, the successes are far-exceeding the setbacks. Dory is clearly enjoying the challenge and enjoying the drastic change that this one farm can make to a neighborhood.
The morning I arrive, it's warm and sunny and the most beautiful French Breakfast radishes are being pulled, washed and bundled in preparation for the Main Street Farmers' Market that Wednesday afternoon. A pigeon takes advantage of the pools of water to have a rambunctious bath, and Dory tells me about his excitement when he found earthworms in the beds a few weeks ago.
"We're producing like a much larger farm," he says. They sell 90 percent of their produce to the premium markets like high-end restaurants and farmers' markets around Vancouver. Ten percent goes to community organizations, but they don't give food away. "We're not working on a charity model," Dory explains. "We're working on a community development model." They are also riding a wave of the Vancouver's momentum toward building sustainable regional food systems and many customers are willing to pay top dollar to support the growth of a local food system. By year two, Dory says that the farm might just be self-sustaining, which is the ultimate goal. And if it is, it will be the most successful urban farm I've seen to date.
L to R: Seann Dory (manager) and urban farmer Jordan Cochrane harvest dinosaur kale
An inner city tomato
Those radishes, looking ravishing, ready for market
Green peppers 
high-value market greens, smart and beautiful to look at
SOLEfood, Vancouver, urban farm
Reader Comments (2)
I am worker for SOLEfood and it has changed my life in more ways then i can possibly say!I LOVE what in do knowing it has changed and helped alot of people.I will continue to work along side any one and every one that i come in contact though the farm.i have learned so much about our world and how that farming should be the first thing we should work on putting back into the hands of humans.It bring me great joy to go in to work every day.Rain or shine.I thank Seann for teaching me alot abot the world and it`s need for more the these farms.I can`t wait to start building as many as we can all over Vancouver!Last year my health didn`t let me do and learn as much as could BUT this years i thank every one for keeping me work some that i love and will do any thing to keep this GROWING!!Thanks Ken Vallee
Dear Ken, THANKS so much for leaving a comment. I think that SOLEfood is totally inspiring too and it's great to hear that it has had such a positive impact on your life. Imagine if the cities were filled with SOLEfood-type farms?! SOLEfood will have a big part of my chapter in Vancouver. Thanks again for leaving a comment and I wish you improved health and happiness and fresh veggies.