15 March
- naudemalan
- Mar 6
- 3 min read
Systems of Production for Urban Agriculture
Please join us for the next iZindaba Zokudla at the Soweto Campus of the University of Johannesburg. We will meet in B3 at 9 for 930 and bring an ID, Passport or birth certificate to gain access to campus.
In this workshop we will consider suggestions on the creation of a production system for urban agriculture. This system must be appropriate to the smallness and particular niche the enterprise exploits in society and the neighbourhood. In our previous workshop, we discussed how to make a small enterprise profitable. It needs a very low cost base, needs to be vertically integrated in that it builds inputs for production on site, it needs a high intensity production system, and needs to sell at highest possible price.
On the 15th of March we will workshop what, why and how of developing such an “organisation”.
The basics of high intensity urban agricultural production include a few basic technologies and methods. Besides the obvious but expensive candidates like hydroponics (which can be adapted to low cost) and aquaponics (which is infeasible on a small scale), we focus on high value biological soil based systems. However, this is the tip of the iceberg, and below lies a series of systems necessary to maintain these deep trench beds. This is the organisation that is the enterprise.
Deep trench beds represent a balance between access, low-cost, longevity, high fertility and ease of construction. We will discuss above ground and below ground deep trenches and the principles of biological decomposition and production inherent to them.
Themes we will visit include the following:
· The need for planning and design of the production system
The bed is only the beginning of your production system. To build a good trench you need a lot of materials, more than you would be able to collect quickly in with a wheelbarrow. Hence, it is necessary to plan for the collection of the materials.
However, since you will be expending a lot of resources on the deep trench, you may as well plan the whole layout of the farm before you construct the trenches. We will spend some time on discussing permaculture and what we can learn from it. This impresses on us the need to think about the overall design of the farm.
As you need to create your own inputs, to keep costs down, you need to devote a substantial portion of your land to composting and outer input and technology production. We will discuss a few examples of how you can gain maximum value from your composting.
As you need a lot of composts, you need a permanent waste harvesting system. This could take 2 forms, by harvesting through customers, or by sourcing biological waste from the environment. We will workshop a few suggestions for this.
· The need to design for the multiplication of value in the systems of the enterprise.
We will consider this important concept, that relates a lot to your capabilities as an entrepreneur.
· The need to include customers in the design and functioning of the enterprise
The most important source of inputs, and the least costly in terms of time and effort, is your customer. To gain and keep a competitive advantage, all opportunities must be pursued. Customers can bring waste a in exchange for food, and the merits and features of this system needs to be debated.
· The basics of soil fertility and biology
To understand soil fertility and biology, we need to understand how fertility is created in the soil, what or who does it, and how do plants benefit. We will navigate this in broad terms, and link it to the construction of your trench beds.
· The integration of several technologies with the deep trench bed.
This is the first and most fundamental way of multiplying your efforts and investments in your farm. We will workshop the significance of this and the ways this can be realised in practice.
To join via MS Teams, click this link:
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