Chennai Resilience CentreA brief presentation on the Chennai Urban Farming Initiative’s Mobile Vegetable Garden Kit Program and its current status.
Chennai Resilience CentreIn collaboration with Sempulam Sustainable Solutions, Chennai Resilience Centre (CRC) distributed kitchen garden kits to homeless shelters and Integrated Child Development Scheme (ICDS) centres within the jurisdiction of Greater Chennai Corporation (GCC), as a part of the Chennai Urban Farming Initiative (CUFI). A skill-based training session was organised for 66 Anganwadi workers and 15 ICDS block coordinators at the Anbagam shelter for mentally challenged on 9th March 2022 and the Madras Seva Sadan on 10th March 2022 and 11th March 2022, and between 2 pm and 5 pm.
Chennai Resilience CentreOrganic Mobile Vegetable Garden Kits were distributed in three batches (March, April and August 2021) to 151 ICDS centres. All the centres initially received 5 kits and some well-performing centres were provided with additional kits later. In Jann 2022, 75 newly identified ICDS centres will receive 5 kits each. Similarly, 55 homeless shelters were initially provided with 5 kits each beteen April 2021 and August 2021 following which some well performing shelters received additional kits.
Chennai Resilience CentreA skills training cum exposure visit was organised by CRC for shelter coordinators from the homeless shelters administered by GCC and Assistant Coordinators of the SUH initiative on Aug 30th, 2021 and Sept 5th, 2021. Participants were taken to an organic farm, owned and maintained by Sempulam Sustainable Solutions, at Sukkankollai, Kancheepuram district.
© S RaghuEarlier this year, we ran a contest – the Patchaimadi Thottam Challenge – inviting people to submit creative ideas on how to inspire 300 RWAs to take up rooftop vegetable gardens in their localities within the next 12 months. We followed up with some of the Patchaimadi Thottam Challenge Winners and were so pleased to receive photographs of their gardens! Here are some of the images we received from Hemavathi G, Seetha Gopalakrishnan, Oinam Devi & Rob Peck, and S Raghu.
© PudiyadorEarly in 2020, when the lockdown in Chennai came into effect as a response to the COVID-19 pandemic, vulnerable communities across the city were the hardest hit. Adrienne Arsht – Rockefeller Foundation Resilience Centre came forward to fund food relief distribution to daily-wagers, women-led households, scheduled caste and tribal communities, and other vulnerable groups that two NGOs, Pudiyador and Information and Resource Centre for the Deprived Urban Communities (IRCDUC), were working with in Chennai.
Chennai Resilience CentreThis scoping study is undertaken to understand the viability of introducing an urban horticulture initiative in Perumbakkam, one of Chennai’s largest resettlement colonies located in neighboring Chengalpattu District. Learnings from the Perumbakkam case can be useful in assessing some of the common limitations as well as opportunities that other low-income neighbourhoods in Chennai are likely to present.
As Chennai Resilience Centre enters into the implementation phase of the city’s Resilience Strategy, it recognizes the immense potential of fostering a Green Livelihoods Program centred around urban horticulture/farming that will allow Chennai to directly address multiple Sustainable Development Goals.
© The HinduAs the pandemic disrupts food supply, cities worldwide are thinking of urban farming as a solution. Access to healthy and affordable food is an age-old challenge for urban residents, especially the poor, from Mumbai to New York. The COVID-19 outbreak has further highlighted the fault lines in urban food systems.