30th March 2021
Foodscape are a social enterprise set up by Azlan Adnan, as a division of his family business. The activities, programmes and events are designed to benefit society, with their commercial activities being integrated within community service. Many people during the Covid-19 pandemic lockdowns found it difficult to access food, highlighting the need for food security. Growing your own, in whatever space available, could just be the answer. Foodscape define themselves as “Cheapskate gardeners”. They recognise not everyone is green fingered. Some succeed, some may not, but it is a skill that can be learnt by anyone.
Foodscape's purpose is to teach through experiential learning. Anyone can go along and volunteer, work, create, and grow an edible landscape. Learn about permaculture techniques and how they can be applied in everyday gardening or farming. Foodscape are about growing things that can be eaten, or have another use, without using pesticides in the food chain. Gaining awareness of pollution damage, relating to the land, and helping to revive the soil are integral to understanding how what we eat is grown. In the process volunteers get to clean up the environment, and plant a patch of urban green.
Foodscape are keen followers of Masanobu Fukuoka, a Japanese microbiologist and agricultural scientist who promotes the concept of "do nothing gardening". Once the earth is restored it takes care of itself.
Azlan teaches volunteers how to grow food using the traditional German method of gardening called Hugelkultur. Hugel is German for mound, translated into English as raised bed, or batas in Malay. When designed and assembled correctly with the right mixture of ingredients, Hugels do not need to be watered or fertilised for 10-15 years. They rely on rainfall, once in three weeks being sufficient. Hugels are designed in a specific way to ensure that the right combination of manure, freshly-cut green and brown dried organic matter, oxygen, hydrogen, nitrogen, carbon dioxide, and all other micronutrients are working together. The most labour-intensive part at the beginning is preparing the site. Then it's a matter of doing nothing and watching plants grow before they are harvested.
Volunteers who have joined Azlan at Foodscape or community foodscapes on derelict land get hands-on experience of every aspect of gardening. Clearing rubbish like plastic from land, seeing the micro plastic in the soil, digging, clearing soil, cutting whatever wild vegetation may be around, making natural organic compos, and finally learning the layering technique. Once people have learnt the skills it’s for them to spread the word, find other volunteers, grow food in urban areas, and benefit from improving their nutrition and health while coming together as a community. At the end of the day it is satisfying to see food crops grow knowing the soil has been regenerated.
Find out more on Azlan's FaceBook page: https://www.facebook.com/Azlan.Foodscape/