It’s pretty hard to disagree with the idea of produce-based urban farms.  They are, after all, a hipper version of the vegetable patch you find in many a suburban garden, albeit larger and more sophisticated.  They also tap the current zeitgeist for reducing food miles by sourcing locally, and – in some cases – organically.

Detroit is one of the models for the urban farm movement.  Commonly viewed as a “post industrial” city, whose population has more than halved since 1950 as the auto industry withdrew, it has 40,000 vacant lots and crumbling infrastructure.  A new film – from LA based Tree Media whose earlier credits include the Leonardo DiCaprio narrated ‘The 11^th Hour’ – chronicles the rise of the movement through farmers,  city officials and local residents.  Urban Roots highlights the diverse motivations of participants; some are looking to grow food for themselves, others view farming as a path to rehabilitation.  A third group – who are akin to Richard Florida’s notion of a creative class – were drawn to Detroit for the opportunity to put into practice their environmental and political views.  The farms are diverse; one is used to feed the needy, another grows edible flowers for high-end restaurants, a further one is a backyard of chickens (for the record, keeping farm animals in close proximity to humans worries me somewhat given the diseases that it’s led to in developing countries).  The total impact of the farms has yet to be comprehensively measured but the anecdotal evidence is overwhelming positive, with tales of lower crime, better health and an improved community spirit.

Things get more controversial when you start to look at urban farms as a business model.  One farmer set out to prove that he could sustain himself on a one acre parcel (the average US farm is 418 acres), but a couple of the farmers have wider ambitions.  Hantz Farms, in particular, has drawn opprobrium for its intention to grow from its current 77 acres into 5,000 over the next five years.  The plan has opposition from both those who fear the “Walmartization” of Detroit’s urban farming scene, and from city officials, who appear to have the project tied up in red tape for the moment.  Beyond these objections, it’s not clear how easy it will be to create a sustainable business in dislocated urban plots given both the complexity of soil remediation (it takes at least 3 years for the lead-rich soil to become acceptable for produce) and the logistics of managing so many small farms.  To date, land has been used either at no or low cost in the city, but this would change were there to be competing bidders for plots.  Finally, most urban farmers quite rightly ignore the complexities of maintaining yields, but higher yields are vital to creating sufficient food supplies globally and this is tough to do in small plots even with modern hydroponic techniques.  Right now, urban farms may be able to heal a neighborhood, but it’s unlikely that they’ll be able to feed the world.