Food for all? Critically evaluating the role of the Incredible Edible movement in the UK

Hardman, M; Adams, M; Barker, M; Beesley, L

Abstract

This chapter provides an interdisciplinary evaluation of the role of local food initiatives, such as Incredible Edible Todmorden (IET), in creating more just food systems.The Incredible Edible movement emanated from a small town in England; with informal roots it started in 2008 through guerrilla gardening practices before legalising and growing into a formal collective (IET, 2017). The movement now crosses the globe and is a popular model replicated in a variety of urban areas across the UK. Across Europe, and particularly in the UK, similar initiatives are becoming more popular, receiving large amounts of praise and public funds to advance their work. Despite this, to date there is little critical analysis of these popular UA schemes. Often such projects are assumed to be inherently ‘good’ since actions are devolved to the local scale (see Born and Purcell, 2009) and yet recent literature shows that there is more to these practices which requires further investigation, including concerns about participation and exclusion, about risk and safety and about democratic decision-making (see for instance Allen, 2014; Hardman and Larkham, 2014). Furthermore, whilst there is a distinct lack of objectivity with regards to their impact, there is also a general lack of data on crop yields and consumption as well as the safety of such practices in terms of crops becoming contaminated (Chipungu et al., 2013). Drawing on research on the Incredible Edible movement, this chapter questions the extent to which local food initiatives can be said to be inclu- sive, with regards to involving the wider community, and what this means in terms of any such small-scale UA being viewed as contributing to food justice. Of particular focus is its ability to empower communities to grow, sell or eat healthy produce, the key principles underpinning the concept of food justice. A mixed methods approach is employed to critically evaluate the movement and its impact on communities, drawing on both qualitative and quantitative data to provide an in-depth exploration of its value to inner-city communities. The chapter critically evaluates a number of taken-for-granted assumptions about the role and place of such local food initiatives and suggests ways in which local food initiatives might be better structured to contribute to food sovereignty. In addition to this, the chapter presents an insight into the risks associated with the ‘grow it anywhere’ philosophy in terms of the lack of access to safe and fertile soils in urban centres and the subsequent adoption of UA practices on potentially contaminated land.

• Publication Date: Feb 1, 2019
• Deposit Date: Oct 19, 2018
• Publisher: Manchester University Press
• Book Title: Urban Gardening and the Struggle for Social and Spatial Justice
• Chapter Number: 9
• ISBN: 9781526126092 ; 9781526191342
• Publisher URL: http://www.manchesteruniversitypress.co.uk/9781526126092/