Havana uses vegetable gardens within the city to feed the population, locally and organically. They aren't doing it to be nice guys - they are doing it because they have to.
Last year Maria Finn posted on her blog about traveling to Cuba and visiting these gardens. This morning she is sharing with us a few pictures and describes how these gardens/farms are set up - and why...
"On Saturday mornings, the 17th Street market in El Vedado in Havana, Cuba comes to life. Venders shake their hips to music by Los Van Van as they weigh yucca roots. The smell of guava fills the air and flowers from the flamboyant trees drift onto the streets. Here, produce from the organoponicas, or small produce gardens planted throughout Cuba’s cities, are sold at far less than the cost at grocery stores. While the rest of the world is now talking about growing organic vegetables in urban spaces to save of fuel and food costs, Cuba has been long ahead of the curve.
"Following the collapse of the Soviet Union in 1989, Cuba lost 80 percent of its imports. Almost overnight, government food rations were cut in half and buses quit running due to lack of fuel. This became known as the “Special Period”. The U.S., hoping to crush the Socialist government tightened their embargo, and not only was food scarce, but also pharmaceuticals and chemicals. Cuba had no choice but to go organic. They decided to plant vegetable gardens in all the empty lots throughout cities because they couldn’t truck the food long distances due to the lack of gasoline. Since they didn’t have chemical pesticides, they plant in rows with natural barriers. Corn stalks rim the exteriors to attract aphids off the crops. Large bunches of marigolds and basil flank the ends of the plantings to throw insects off the scent, and then finally, chives line the beds to further confuse the olfactory systems of pests.
"These gardens in Cuba are not “community gardens” in the sense that residents all have private parcels to tend. They are run by experts, such as the man pictured here, Alfonso Martinez Verdero. He is an agricultural engineer who oversees eight gardens for the municipality of Plaza de la Revolución in Havana, Cuba.
"The gardens are tended by state employees, such as the group mugging for the camera.
People from the neighborhood can stop by, and for a few Cuban pesos, fill a big bag with vegetables for their evening supper.
"School children are mobilized to give presentations on the benefit of organic farming and the health benefits of vegetables."
It was Garden Rant's post the other week on the movie "Power of Community: How Cuba Survived Peak Oil" that made me recall Maria's post about Cuba, and how seeing these photos and learning about another city's reality made me think more about how our own city operates and survives.
Maria Finn's original post can be found on her blog, CityDirt.net.
Cuba is very near and dear to Maria's heart, having compiled and edited the anthology "Cuba in Mind" (Vintage Books, 2004), taught a creative writing course for Hunter College in Havana in 2003, covered the Havana Biennial for the New York Times in 2003, and written about Sandhill Cranes in Cuba for Audubon. She also wrote an essay about falling in love with a man in Havana, which was included in The Best Women's Travel Writing 2006.
matt at apartment therapy dot com
Copyright © 2008 Apartment Therapy
I always like it when men work without their shirts on.
There's a great book I was looking at within the last month called.
Havana deco / Alejandro G. Alonso, Pedro Contreras, Martino Fagiuoli. New York : W.W. Norton, 2007. xiii, 175 p. : ill. (chiefly col.) ; 32 cm. Published in Spanish under the title La Habana deco
There are some beautiful DECO buildings down in Cuba. They all need to be painted but I would love to live in some of them.
view Weasel Dearest's profile
I go to Cuba every winter. It's a very common sight, and the veggies are out of this world.
view aladywhoknows's profile
I think this is a great way to locally grow food, but I do wonder about the pollution. When I was in Havana, the air was heavily polluted--does that affect crops in a negative way?
view brittanykate's profile
Weasel Dearest: they need to be painted? only painted? for X's sake, buildings of Centro Habana (And other neighbourhoods) literally fall down whenever there's a heavy rain / hurricane / storms because of how deteriorated they are
view La loca's profile
ps. And I dearly wish that Cuba's problems would go away with some paint on top of their buildings and some "organic veggies"
view La loca's profile
La Loca:
I'm no structural engineer so what you say may be true. The buildings in the book were beautiful. They didn't look like they had structural problems but it did appear as if there was no paint IN ALL OF cuba.
Check the book out. It's all color photographs. It's a great book.
view Weasel Dearest's profile
Some cities in Ohio are considering having tree farms in the inner city to fill the vacant lots and foreclosed houses. The economy is so bad there there are blocks with only one residence occupied and it is a waste of money/resources to provide city services and utilities to one house.
view LaDonnaNichole's profile
Thanks for the interesting post. It's awesome to see that a country like Cuba could step up to the plate and adapt in a difficult situation. Sadly (and embarrassingly?), I'm not certain the US could accomplish the same thing even in dire circumstances. We're a little more likely to whine into our cell phones about the atrocious price of gas while driving our $50k SUV's. *sigh*
I'm going to scroll back up and look at the shirtless men one more time now to improve my mood!
view behren's profile
I really like the idea of using vacant lots to sustain the surrounding community. I can think of at least 10 places nearby my own home that could be put to better use.
view saramichelle's profile
Thank you, thank you, thank you for this post. Not only the photos, but the blurb about why these gardens came to be. Having visited Cuba once for work, I continue to be touched and impressed by what folks have managed to do under the pressure of the last 50 years. The stories, the art and the music that can still exist under this political history are amazing.
view oteach1's profile
Thank you for this post -- it is fascinating. There is something about Cuba that pulls me...
I remember seeing a news story years ago about a Canadian tourist who broke her leg at one of the resorts, and the ingenuity with which the doctors fashioned a cast, since they had none of the standard materials due to the blockade. The doctors in Canada were amazed.
And then there was the documentary (which perhaps gave Michael Moore the idea) about how the Cuban health care system was caring for patients from the former Soviet Union with rare forms of cancer (many of them as a result of Chernobyl) -- for free. And getting much better results.
Don't get me wrong, I do not condone the repression (having come from a communist country myself, I know its ugliness only too well), but there are many lessons to be learned from Cuba, and many things to be appreciated.
I would love to know the health impact of the dietary changes they have had to make since the Special Period.
view mschatelaine's profile
i live in the wrong country. the hot boys are in cuba.
view SD913's profile