Field trip

Visit 1: ONZE community gardens

ONZE (meaning ‘ours’) community gardens is a greenhouse complex in the outskirts of Almere in which individuals or families can rent a small plot (starting at 12m2) for organic vegetable production. The garden was created by an entrepreneur who had to shut down his professional rose farm for economic reasons. 

The greenhouse community garden attracts people from all ethnicities who like to produce their own vegetables organically. The garden allows people to know what they eat, to be more self-sufficient and to grow sustainably as well. As the vegetable gardens are inside a greenhouse, (sub-)tropical crops such as bitter gourd and yardlong beans can also be grown, which adds to the multicultural character of the community gardens. This concentration of urban gardens in a large greenhouse connects people and food in an inspiring way.

Visit 2: Almere Oosterwold

Oosterwold is a large peri-urban area of the Dutch city of Almere. The municipality has introduced a planning strategy for this neighborhood that enables residential development while retaining farming. In addition, it is Almere’s ambition that this new urban area produces 10% of Almere’s future food needs. In order to achieve this 10% aim, the planning documents of Oosterwold depict the future area as a peri-urban landscape with versatile agricultural activities. Hence, Oosterwold provides us an interesting opportunity to appraise how planning practices are being performed when aiming to move beyond the conventional housing-versus-farms dichotomy (Jansma & Wertheim-Heck 2022 in Land Use Policy). 

During the field excursion we will visit several small farming initiatives that produce vegetables and fruits for self-sufficiency and for the community. In addition to the gardens, we will also have a closer look at the (self-)organisation of how products are marketed and connected to the community.