EAT wants City’s help

Oct 6, 2023 | 3:46 PM

PRINCE GEORGE – It’s a five-acre piece of land in the middle of the city, and it has been an active farm for years. But a coalition of organizations that support the production of local food has come together. It’s called Eat, an acronym for Everyone at the Table.

“It’s a local consortium of people who are very concerned and interested in addressing food security and food insecurity in Prince George and the region,” explains Annie Booth, a local food advocate. “And they are bringing people together to work on developing better food security activities and opportunities, including things like understanding where poverty and food insecurity come from, addressing the particular needs of indigenous peoples and their cultural requirements around food security, and the fact that we are very food vulnerable in Prince George.”

So the consortium presented Council was an interesting proposal by the five acres of land. The owners want to sell, but they want it to stay as farmland, and that presents a whole different set of opportunities for the Urban Farm Group.

“It’s actually a pretty critical opportunity to acquire a space where they can do a multiplicity of things. They can use it as a center for education to nurture young farmers and ranchers to ensure some of the knowledge of the experience farmers and ranchers can get passed on,” says Booth. “It’s an opportunity to look at growing opportunities specifically targeted in the Prince George region right there. A lot of things we can’t grow. There are a lot of things that we actually can grow, and that’s where the city and other levels of government can step up. The City of Prince George occasionally talks about it. We know the Regional District of Fraser for George just completed an agricultural strategy in which they’re going to work in the region to try and enhance local food production by supporting farmers and ranchers.”

Councillor Cori Ramsay recently sat on a Council Committee looking at the creation of a Food Policy Council and Food Charter. But EAT is not the only organization looking for help from the City.

“We’ve had reps come forward asking us to purchase or to support support, whether through in-kind or through monetary donations for their demonstration gardens. We’ve had asks from the David Davis Botanical Garden Society. So a lot of these groups are coming forward asking for support from the city. So there’s definitely a need for something like this. But with multiple groups asking, it’s hard to determine where those resources should be allocated.”

The matter was referred to Administration to look at options if the city were to buy the property in question.