Greens candidate for Lord Mayor and Ward 1 Jess Whittaker is calling for a dedicated position in Council to encourage community gardens, crop swaps and urban farms to boost Wollongong’s resilience and development of local food systems.

“Remember that time when you had plenty of neighbours swapping their extra lemons, tomatoes, basil, parsley, or even sharing a few eggs? Well, right now we need to encourage the growth of local food initiatives in our city,” said Jess, who’s a coordinator of the Port Kembla Crop Swap.

“Everywhere I go, while talking to the community, access to affordable, local food keeps coming up as an issue. People are finding it harder to buy good quality produce. They’re frustrated by the two large supermarket chains who have a stranglehold on our weekly shop. On top of that, growing quality produce is being affected by climate change. And I’m also finding that people are looking for small events like a crop swap or a community garden so they have more opportunities for connections in their local community.

One example of the power of local food projects is Woonona Community Garden. In just over 3 years, WCG has built a thriving community garden where local residents from diverse backgrounds and gardening abilities work together to grow food, share the harvest, and build new friendships.

“The Greens will recharge the local food economy with our plan to fund a dedicated position on Council to act as a mediator for local food production and swaps. This role will be the point of contact for people wanting to start a community garden, a crop swap or other event based on local food production. It will also assist existing community gardens to build membership and look for new funding opportunities. We don’t want a situation where people are turned off starting a project because getting through Council’s red tape and bureaucracy is too hard. Greens councillors will be more supportive of people wanting to get involved in community building food projects.

“As a city, we should be actively looking at land that may be available for small-scale local food production. While talking with people another idea has been looking at developing resources that could help small urban farms on private land. We are seeing a few pop up. However these enterprises generally don't receive support or encouragement from any level of government.

“The Smith Street Distillery is a great example of a micro farm in our city which was built on a small privately owned car park. It’s now composting food waste from a collective of restaurants, producing eggs, providing community green space & a coffee cart and growing ingredients for boutique products that promote Wollongong as a foodie destination. This model shows that urban farms can be economically sustainable and improve the wellbeing of our residents.

“As an organiser of Port Kembla Crop Swap we’ve seen a massive return in community wellbeing from a small investment in our time. At the crop swap, every month local citizens assemble to swap a range of surplus produce like eggs, citrus, preserved foods, seeds, plants, greens and honey. It’s just a really fun way to share ideas and produce and we are seeing more crop swaps established in the Illawarra and South Coast.

“A Council appointed local food coordinator could be the point of contact on council to help people wanting to start a crop swap to find a spot to host it, providing information on weeds that probably shouldn't be swapped, access to tables and assistance with promoting the events. It’s important that the community leads when it comes to local food, but there is a lot that the council can do to give them encouragement. Sometimes people just need help to build their confidence to host an event like this, but after the first few runs they can be self-sustaining. At the moment the local food scene doesn't get much attention and our new Greens on council will be committed to changing that.”

For more info check out the video: What is a Crop Swap?

Contact: Jess Whittaker