EL ESTADO DE ÁNIMO

Figure 101.Image courtesy of project.nsearch.com

Accessing, producing and a desire to consume ‘organically’ grown food were factors that provided the majority of practitioners’ the impetus to invest in allotment gardening in the city (See chapter 3). Changes in food production and consumption practices and the problems of conventional industrialised food systems have fostered growing concerns over the source, content, quality, changing taste and nutritional value of food (Fig 101).

Indeed, such change has generated growing environmental and health concerns over the ways in which food is being produced, distributed, marketed and consumed (food scares, declining nutrition and taste, growing levels of obesity, food poverty, environmental degradation; soil erosion, excessive nutrient loading, food miles, loss of biodiversity). As a result, food has taken on new meanings, new values and new ideologies. Two plot-holders explain:

“ … these pesticides and everything, sure ‘tis destroying the food we’re eating. We don’t know what we’re getting, what’s gone into it … there is so much cancer appearing … I think that it has to be in some way connected to the food chain. …the food we’re eating is full of all sorts … There’s no taste off it. Any time you get talking about the veg [on the allotment], that’s the first thing that comes up. Everyone talks about the difference in the taste. … The stuff you buy in the shops doesn’t taste as good as the stuff you get here

… There’s no smell or taste off veg you buy at all now. This is definitely better, it tastes better, it’s organic”

Margaret. Practical Gardener. 2013

176 “Farmers are pouring all sorts into the ground and it’s going into the soak ways … and it’s having a knock-on [environmental] effect … It’s associated with … fertilisers … It’s all about production, not really about the quality of the food …the land, the soil, … the harm its doing … sustainability … It’ll be soil poverty not food poverty we’ll be facing”

John. Idealist/Eco-Warrior, 2012 How food is produced, where it is produced and how it is consumed have altered the meanings and symbolic value of food, detached food from time, space and cultural traditions, generated hegemonic ideologies and disconnected individuals from the land, nature, traditional forms of knowledge (food production systems) and practice.

Significantly, changes in food production have effectively effaced the complex web of social relations that run through the production, distribution, preparation and consumption of food. Andrew and Caroline, two Socio-organic gardeners explain:

“ … my neighbour only buys frozen veg ‘cos the ads on the telly say that only the best vegetables are frozen, therefore the rest then must be rubbish ... that’s the way a lot of people are … and my wife minds a little lad and she had him up here last year on the plot and she was giving him peas off the pods there, and he said ‘I thought peas grew in tins”

[laughs]. Sure X [neighbouring plot-holder] was only telling me about a young lad he knew who thought carrots came in a bag [laughs]”

Andrew. Socio-Organic Gardener, 2013 Caroline, a Socio-Organic gardener reiterates:

“From the time we were very young you’d be sent out to water the veg, put it into the tunnel, cover them if it was going to be frosty, or get it for the dinner… it was very much part of growing up, part of what we did … you’d pick the cabbage … you’d prepare it, …

… Now, everything is bought, it’s ready to cook, frozen or it’s already cooked. You don’t even have to bother doing any of that anymore”

Caroline. Socio-Organic Gardener. 2012 Indeed, conventional industrialised food systems have created an antithesis between rural and urban, producers and consumers and humans and nature. They have ‘aestheticized’,

‘domesticated’ and ‘standardised’ food, and generated hegemonic ideologies around it’s character, quality and taste which is compounding further individuals disconnections from the land, nature, knowledge and practice, and from the social relations inherent in food production and consumption. Pat and Andrew, two practitioner’s comments illustrate:

177 “... even the carrots in the supermarkets are clean, presented nicely with no muck, no dirt, not a trace of soil, nothing that shows they even came from the earth. ... There’s no smell off them ... and as for the taste, there’re full of water, there’s no taste off them. The veg you buy now is …well, it’s perfectly shaped, no flaws in it, no evidence of where they came from … except for a small label, and sure what does that tell you? Some people think that that’s the way food is ...because some of the people in here throw out their veg if it doesn’t look right!… We don’t know half of the ingredients in the food were eating

… what’s in it”

Pat. Idealist/Eco Warrior. 2013 And Andrew reiterates:

“If you grow up in a house where everything is bought you wouldn’t know how to grow.

Now everything is bought in shops and people don’t know how to grow their own food.

Years ago everyone worked on the land, or grew something. Now the general perception is that the ground is dirty and if there’s muck on it then it must be bad, … oh, and if you mention the word manure people are disgusted … that’s seen as dirty. The changes in the way food is grown has done that. Everything has become sanitised, politically correct and all this malarkey about health and safety has changed people’s attitudes to food…”

Andrew. Socio-Organic Gardener. 2013 Technological developments in agriculture, the commodification and growing monopolisation of food have meant that food now reflects “an embodiment of corporate-led dietary convergence” (Weis, 2007:15). Long distance sourcing, sophisticated processing and packaging systems designed to prolong shelf-life and forge consumer loyalty reflects a global food system which claims to meet the needs of individuals living fast-paced fragmented lifestyles (ibid). Consequently, what is being produced is fast becoming characterised by distance and durability, convenient and cost. Bobby, a Socio-Organic gardener and Margaret, a Practical gardener’s comments explain:

“….if you buy tomatoes in the supermarket they’re all imported from Holland. They’re grown on water culture, so really what you’re getting is water and chemicals essentially.

They’re fed with chemicals and stuff is put on them to preserve the colour of them when they’re transported. You don’t know what you’re eating and it’s dreadful. It doesn’t taste right. The tomatoes before tasted like tomatoes. Now all you’re getting is a tomato full of water”

Bobby. Socio-Organic Gardener, 2013

“People have been removed from it [practice]… all these jars and stuff, … it’s [food] mass produced, … Their stuff [Global Food Industry [GFI]] is in the market before my stuff, the same veg is grown in half the time. They’re using methods now to mass produce food [GFI] and it can’t be good for you. Nature didn’t intend it that way”

Margaret. Practical Gardener, 2013

178 Such change has generated growing concerns over the way food has been reduced to another commodity and another chore in the general “commodification of everyday life”

(Sage, 2014). Indeed, some respondents believe such change is breeding inertia. They are keen to disseminate knowledge and generate a more transparent, trustworthy (localised) food production system that enables urban dwellers to (re)connect with knowledge, practice the land, and to the social relations inherent in the production, distribution and consumption of food. Pat and John, two Idealists, whose motivations for investing in UA are primarily underpinned by a desire to disseminate knowledge, transform current models of food production, re-localise food systems and practitioners’ (and public opinions), actions, practices and worldviews explain:

“ I worked in a garden centre for years and I saw people spending an absolute fortune on a Christmas tree yet they didn’t know anything about growing food. Like, during the Celtic Tiger garden centres were focusing on making everything look nice, they certainly weren’t focusing on growing your own, that’s for sure! … and as for the programmes on the telly they were showing what it was like to have a nice garden, …a garden wasn’t about growing food ... Years ago everyone knew where their food came from, everyone grew, even in the city. They knew how to grow, … Now, now people don’t know how to grow their own food … they don’t have to grow it, … that change came when food companies started mass producing”

Pat. Idealist/Eco-Warrior, 2012

“people aren’t aware of what’s going on, that harm that’s being done … We’re not clued in. … they don’t see the changes”

John, Idealist/Eco-Warrior, 2013 Whilst many plot-holders believe that individuals have become increasingly disconnected from knowledge systems and the practices associated with cultivating the land (food production systems), current literature suggests that the rise in interest in organic food represents a growing disenchantment and distrust with modern food systems, and a growing awareness amongst the citizenry at large in terms of the value of producing and consuming organic ‘chemical-free’ food (Sage, 2014). Indeed, urban dwellers investing in allotments see the cultivation of an allotment as an opportunity to engage in more transparent, localised, trustworthy food production system, an opportunity to and improve the ecological and environmental quality of the city and their nutritional status and health.

179 Moreover, the majority of practitioners see UA as a means of combatting the social dis-embeddedness generated by modernity, and an opportunity to (re)connect with nature, knowledge, practice, the land, and others in their locales. Three plot-holders comments explain:

“I wouldn’t even trust the organic food you buy in Aldi or Lidl, … you don’t’ really know how it’s been grown .. and also, the food miles too … I grow my own organically … that’s important to me … knowing where it’s from, what’s gone into it … and I know it’s better

… better for your health … and the food miles too.”

Martha. Socio-Organic Gardener 2013 “ … I’m growing organically because I want fresh, quality food…. and knowing how it’s grown, what’s going into it really … and to improve biodiversity, … to make the city a better place to live too. That’s really important to me”

Pat. Idealist/EcoWarrior. 2012

“With all the [food] scares in the past few years I don’t trust what they’re [GFI] doing to food. This is definitely better, it tastes better, it’s organic”

Margaret. Practical Gardener. 2013

Whilst the majority of respondents express a desire to produce and consume ‘organically’

grown foods and identify their practices as ‘organic,’ the evidence suggests that practitioners’ approach to cultivation is underpinned by their ‘habitus’, which influences their approach to cultivation, their practices, actions and lifestyles and overall worldviews.