Nabolagshager and the Agency for Urban Environment (Municipality of Oslo), hosted on the 21st of October the second taworkshop of a series of three workshops to help urban agriculture initiatives in Oslo to develop their sustainable financial models. During this workshop “Enhancing customer relations and strategic partnerships” we focused on how ECS initiatives can utilise the value of their organisation to better connect with customers and form partnerships. We looked at how to find new customers, better connect with customers via social media, and how to create mutually beneficial partnerships – both private and public. It is important to recognize the benefits we can all produce and receive when we work better collaboratively.

We want to thank again all the participants for attending our second workshop at Linderud gård. Special thanks goes to our guest speaker Helene Gallis from Nabolagshager who gave participants many tips and tricks about how to get noticed and how to attract (traditional) media as a way to promote our work, products and services.

We look forward very much to meeting all the participants again at our next and last workshop on the 11 of November.

You can find more information about the workshops “Finding Sustainable Economic Models in Urban Agriculture” in this link: https://www.edicitnet.com/workshops-oslo-finding-sustainable-economic-models-in- urban-agriculture/ 

There are numerous edible fruit trees, edible fruit bushes and herbs on the public green spaces in Rüdersdorf near Berlin. Citizens of the community are committed to this rich cultural landscape with the support of two local companies. In October, a tree pruning course took place on a newly planted orchard with 40 fruit trees under the professional guidance of EdiCitNet partner Mundraub. Young Fruit Trees need a regular care in the first ten or even better 15 years. Because this is nowadays not considered in most cases, many new orchards do not survive their adolescence. This is a waste of money and a waste of valuable living resources.

Alice from Wageningen University developed an interesting Tool to look at Edible City Businesses. She named it “The Diamond”. It is designed to get a holistic overview about organizations. Mundraub met her for an intense workshop to map the Ecosystem around Mundraub and the new sister brand “We are Edible”. There are some innovative features in the diamond that are different from traditional Business Model canvases: stakeholders are living beings but also “dead” data bases. Money is not a resource in this model and any resource can be translated into another. So the diamond seems to be a process oriented and very lively tool which is lurking to take off.

Mundraub held a workshop in Eltville / Rhine Area. Together with citizens we talked about easily implementable ECS. In the beginning we introduced the auditorium to the idea of Edible Cities. Then we worked in small groups and developed solutions that can easily be implemented in Eltville and the might be accepted by the city authorities. In the end we planted a Sweet Chestnut Tree in the City Park. Thanks to the Youth Center Eltville that enabled the Workshop and hosted it in their rooms. Thanks to the City Council that gave us space to plant the tree.

In the past months, ICRA and BOKU have been working together to transform the information of Deliverable 4.3. (“Documentation of ECSs in FCs”) into Edible City Solutions (ECS) profiles in the EdiCitNet toolbox (see https://toolbox.edicitnet.com/). This type of collaboration is very relevant to ensure a long-term impact of EdiCitNet project, since it ensures that the data collected during the execution of the project is properly stored in the EdiCitNet database and public available in a user-friendly format.

As a result of this fruitful collaboration, 85 profiles of Edible City Solutions from Berlin (35), Carthage (16), Montevideo (16), Sant Feliu de llobregat (11), Šempeter pri Gorici (6), Lome (1), are publicly available in the EdiCitNet toolbox.

Now, ICRA and BOKU are working on a strategy to transfer the management and editing rights of these profiles to the owners/coordinators of the Edible City Solutions.

By having the ownership, they will be able to:

• Interact with other existing initiatives by leaving and receiving comments and questions thought the profiles, think of it as a social media outlet for urban food initiatives.
• Edit the profile or even delete it.
• Soon they will also be able to share events and news related to their ECS profile with the community.

This week, the interdisciplinary teams of city officials, local food initiatives, research organisations and members of the public of Sant Feliu de Llobregat (Spain) and Carthage (Tunisia) met online to discuss the status quo of their local food systems. The meeting was co-led by our project partners from the Institute of Organic Farming at BOKU University Vienna and the School of Architecture, Technology and Engineering at the University of Brighton (UoB).

Aim of the workshop-like meeting was to kick-off an exchange between cities that are interested in using UoB’s opportunity mapping process within WP4’s transition pathway method to address specific societal challenges in relation to their local food systems.

Carthage and Sant Feliu de Llobregat share certain general urban characteristics – f.e. the proximity to major urban centres (Tunis and Barcelona) – whilst they differ in others – f.e. the access to water. During the last two years, the city teams in both cities have met regularly to discuss the status quo of their local food systems, collect as much data on their local situation as possible, as well as to extract and agree on where the major challenges lie for implementing resilient, equitable and enjoyable urban (food) futures within their communities.

In preparation of the meeting, Ian and Katrin have taken the two cities’ observations, data and thoughts and systematised them into first drafts of key societal challenges that now make the cities comparable to each other as well as to urban food systems discourses worldwide. Key themes in both cities include the necessity to safeguard and improve local agricultural production as well as access to nature. Sant Feliu de Llobregathas extracted the need to focus on food education, amongst others, whilst Carthage, amongst others, is challenged by the heritage status of many of its open spaces.