Tapping Into Urban Abundance
Photo via Forage Oakland
The amazing thing about gift economies is that once people begin to give freely, we discover incredible abundance - even in the most cash-poor communities. Two community projects tap into the abundance in their communities in order to ensure that everyone has access to fresh, healthy, and delicious fruits and vegetables.
Forage Oakland was born in 2006, when Asiya Wadud became aware of the broad variety of fruits growing in her neighborhood in West Oakland. She began making small maps of the fruit available in the area, marking out fruit trees on public land, and on the land of owners who let her know that they had more fruit that they could handle on their own. As the project evolved, it became a broader barter network, organizing fruit for fruit exchanges between people who had excess fruit that they would like to trade for a different variety. Recently Forage Oakland has expanded to include work for fruit exchanges, where individuals can offer their labor to the owners of fruit trees in exchange for their surpluss fruit. No money is exchanged through forage Oakland. "I feel like if money was exchanged it would just exacerbate the problem of inequality and lack of access," Asiya explained. "If there was money involved it would mean that only people that could afford to reap the benefits of this neighborhood fruit would be involved." Learn more on the Forage Oakland website.
Community gardener Gary Oppenheimer has taken the idea behind Forage Oakland to a national level. His organization, Ample Harvest, connects backyard gardeners to food pantries. Through their website, gardners with a bumper crop of tomatoes or squash can locate a food pantry in their area to accept their extra produce, and ensure that fresh healthy vegetables are available to people regardless of their economic status. You can hear an interview with Gary and learn more about Ample Harvest in the video below:
