London Fights Urban Agriculture’s Peskiest Pest: Red Tape

Urban farms offer cities a multitude of benefits, but municipal bylaws have long hindered them. London councillors are hoping to change that with a new strategy

Published on May 25, 2017

by Mary Baxter

They wanted to grow food in the city and supply small local processors and soup kitchens with fresh vegetables — but when four would-be urban farmers in London found an ideal stretch of unoccupied land in the east end, the city told them they couldn’t lease it.

“We were literally not allowed to bid on that land because we were not going to develop it into houses,” says Richie Bloomfield, co-owner of Urban Roots London, the farming outfit in need of farmland. “That was kind of shocking to us.”

Urban agriculture is gaining popularity fast, but for farmers just getting started, often the biggest challenge isn’t learning how to till soil or keep pests at bay — rather, it’s the tangle of municipal rules and bylaws that either don’t take farming into account or actively discourage it.

But a new and nearly finalized urban agriculture strategy in London should make things easier, proponents say. According to Leif Maitland, the local planner spearheading the strategy, it’ll land on councillors’ desks by the end of the summer.

Supporters tout the benefits of urban farming: It makes fresh produce available to city-dwellers who might otherwise have trouble finding it, and it creates jobs, too. It can even help the environment, creating habitat for pollinators and reducing the distance food has to be trucked.

London’s strategy may not be the first in Ontario, but its inclusion of processing, distribution, food waste management, and education — all under the umbrella of urban agriculture — is unique.

Some of the proposed ideas, like building community gardens and growing fruit trees on public property, already exist in the city. Others, like a proposed backyard chicken pilot, have a long way to go before implementation. There’s also talk of establishing more farmers markets; creating hubs for sharing tools, supplies, and information; and building school gardens and community kitchens.

“We really wanted this strategy to inspire action, and that’s what the city wanted too,” says Lauren Baker, a consultant on the project and a former policy specialist with the Toronto Food Policy Council, a subcommittee of the city’s health board.

One of the biggest challenges will be putting the strategy to work — which will require participation from the municipal government and the broader community. In London, Maitland says, it’s not clear who will take the leading role.

“Maybe we’ll be enabling community groups, maybe we’ll be partnering with them,” he says. “Maybe we just need to change our bylaws to be as accommodating as possible, and then get out of the way and let people do what they want to do.”

Maitland says he’s familiar with the difficulties Urban Roots ran into searching for land. The city does rent to large-scale farmers who grow, for example, soybeans and corn, which can thrive even in poor soil. But the land is designated for other purposes, such as residential or commercial development, so it’s unsuitable for organic farming ventures that need to invest in long-term soil improvements.