Finding Food in Ottawa during COVID-19 – Please forward to everyone in your work and home networks asap
Just Food Newsletter April 10, 2020
In this Newsletter:
1. Good Food at Your Doorstep Launched | First order due by Monday 13th at noon for deliveries next week
Low income and vulnerable households can order a ‘Good Food at Your Doorstep’ box full of fresh fruits and veggies for $20. There is an option to donate a box to a household financially impacted. You may also buy a box for someone you know who is having difficulties affording food by using their delivery address and phone number.
The project provides those facing financial barriers to access food with an affordable ($20) box packed with a variety of fresh fruits and veggies delivered right to the doorstep, with delivery free of charge, thanks to Ottawa Community Foundation.
Due to the social distancing requirements, all home deliveries are ‘no contact’. Once the order is placed, customers will receive their box on one of the delivery days later that week between Wednesday and Saturday (9am-5pm). Produce changes weekly depending on availability and seasonality. Orders placed by Friday of each week will be delivered the following week, with an extension given on orders for delivery this first week until Monday April 13 at noon.
The Ottawa Good Food Box, in collaboration with MarketMobile, led by the Rideau-Rockcliffe Community Resource Centre, partnered with Ottawa Community Foundation, North House Foods and Just Food, is launching Good Food at Your Doorstep as one response to the need from COVID-19.
2. Are You Looking For Food online or delivered? Visit GoodFoodOttawa.ca / BonnebouffeOttawa.ca
Due to the COVID-19 crisis, you may be looking for ways to buy online. Just Food will continue to update Good Food Ottawa as a one-stop-shop for finding food – for those struggling with income AND for those who are more financially secure AND for people seeking options to support local farmers. This service existed before, will be updated during COVID-19, and will exist into the future, to ensure good information on food is available.
Please share these sites throughout all of your networks as quickly as possible to ensure everyone has updated information on services available:
On it, you will find:
- Resources just published by City of Ottawa re. what is open now for emergency food support, for household and for isolated seniors
- Good Food at Your Doorstep: a $20 box of fresh fruit and vegetables with free delivery for those struggling with low-incomes
- Savour Ottawa Buy Local Food Guide: Producers newly updated on April 8, 2020 – find local farms, restaurants, markets, retail, breweries, wineries and microprocessors (including those who have online shops)
- CSA Farms: a detailed listing of who still has boxes available for the 2020 season (CSA stands for Community Shared Agriculture farmers in the Ottawa region)
- Groceries and Restaurants: find online stores and restaurants that are open and operating with pick up or delivery options
- FoodLink Directory: food bank, community meal program, community kitchen or meal programs (Please check individual websites for updated COVID-19 hours as many of these may be closed or have reduced hours)
- Farmers’ Markets: find more information on farmers’ markets in Ottawa as it becomes available. Many are moving towards online ordering with pick-up options
If you are aware of places that are not on the above lists, or aware of information that has changed, please let us know at info@justfood.ca.
Updates on Community Gardens as Essential Food Services
At Just Food – April 7 2020
Updates on Community Gardens as Essential Food Services
Thank you! – many of you have written last week to support Community Gardens Must Remain OPEN as Essential Food Services in Ontario, and have signed onto this Open Letter from Sustain Ontario. Just Food’s Moe Garahan was interviewed on CBC News – Declare community gardens essential, non-profit urges.
We all take safety and physical distancing seriously, to stop the spread of COVID-19. And, this can still be done while allowing thousands of people to grow food in community gardens as most rely on that food to feed their families and other community members.
Breaking news from Gatineau! “For the 2020 season, the City of Gatineau is supporting 22 community and collective gardens, 3 more than last year. The current context requires specific measures to comply with the guidelines for physical distance and the use of common equipment. The committees responsible for the sites, together with the City, are to set up the procedures required for the opening of the sites as soon as possible.” This is a Google translation of the relevant French document, read the original message on La Ville de Gatineau website HERE.
Last week, the provincial government in BC reversed an earlier decision and now has made Community Gardens essential services. BC government recognizes in this LINK that community gardens are a way of subsistence agriculture as it is food cultivation.
Similarly, last Thursday, Victoria BC passed a motion for Scaling Up Growing in the City for Community Resilience, in response to food security, which will temporarily reprioritize the focus of some Parks Department capacity to grow 50,000-75,000 food plants from seed in the municipal nursery and greenhouses for planting in the 2020 growing season. Read this story HERE.
Updates from CGN and Just Food
We at CGN and Just Food have received many emails and understand your difficulty to make decisions on how to proceed with your community garden and its many members. We hear you!
Just Food is working very hard to….
- Advocate an informed decision and reversal to make community gardens essential food services, so they can continue to operate this year. Across Ontario and across parties, many MPPs are working on this, as are many of our City Councillors.
- Co-facilitate the Ontario Community Growing Network to develop safety measures and best practices for COVID-19 for community and allotment gardens across Ontario, based on public health input, so as to best coordinate and build on each other’s efforts. This will be sent to the Ministry of Health next Tuesday to assist them in reversing the decision on community gardens while ensuring individual and public safety. Ottawa Public Health has agreed to work with Just Food to further develop these safety practices for the Ottawa context once the province gives the go-ahead.
- Communicate with community gardens in a timely fashion – there will be more newsletters than usual on the progress.
- Get ready for the growing season so we are ready to go as soon as we are able. This includes finalizing a COVID-19 specific garden agreement that every garden coordinator, and every community garden member, will need to sign in order to access their plot, outlining they understand the new procedures for this year and will abide by them.
Next newsletter coming this week to all gardeners in Ottawa will be all about online garden workshop dates and topics.
Community Gardens Must Remain OPEN as Essential Food Services in Ontario
To All Gardeners and Supporters in Ottawa,
Your support is URGENTLY needed TODAY!
On March 30th, the Ontario government mistakenly identified community gardens as recreation activities for closure (READ HERE), as opposed to essential food services, where tens of thousands of people across Ontario grow food for their households.
Please send your own version of the letter below to your local MPP ASAP today, and copy Just Food at jf2@justfood.ca, so we can see how many letters are coming in.
If you are a member of a community garden, please say which garden you belong to, and why it’s important to you to access food through your garden plot.
Your list of MPPs in the Ottawa area:
Stephen Blais – Orléans – sblais.mpp.co@liberal.ola.org
Lucille Collard – Ottawa – Vanier – lcollard.mpp.co@liberal.ola.org
John Fraser – Ottawa South – Jfraser.mpp.co@liberal.ola.org
Hon Merrilee Fullerton – Kanata-Carleton – merrilee.fullerton@pc.ola.org
Goldie Ghamari – Carleton – goldie.ghamari@pc.ola.org
Joel Harden – Ottawa Centre – JHarden-QP@ndp.on.ca
Hon Lisa MacLeod – Nepean – Lisa.macleodco@pc.ola.org
Jeremy Roberts – Ottawa West – Nepean – jeremy.roberts@pc.ola.org
To read more about Gardening and COVID-19 in Ottawa, CLICK HERE.
To read and sign on an Open Letter Calling on Province to Identify Community Gardens as Essential Food Service, CLICK HERE.
Suggested letter template
To [name of your Member of Provincial Parliament or all MPPs if you are a City-wide service],
Everyone is working hard, and we are trusting this is just an oversight, but please immediately remove outdoor community gardens from the list of closures for recreation activities released on March 30th, and place them on the list of essential food services in Ontario.
Thousands upon thousands of families rely on community gardens to produce food for their families each year. In Ottawa, we have a conservative accounting of 7,000 people relying on community gardens to supplement their food during the growing season. There has been a major increase in demand for this service since the beginning of COVID-19. People throughout the province have already invested in their seeds, and started seedlings, for this growing season.
This model of community food production is seen as integral to the COVID-19 response in countries throughout the world, particularly as food prices increase and global food supplies are increasingly uncertain. Food banks also receive tonnes of much-needed fresh food in Ottawa from local community garden efforts. Community gardening availability should be enhanced, not limited, especially at this time.
We all take safety seriously. We support community growing with clear protocols that WORK in gardens to maintain public safety, agreed to by public health officials. The Ottawa Community Gardening Network at Just Food is working with public health departments to achieve such safety protocols and is a key partner in communicating critical public health messages to our communities. However, we must not identify community gardens as recreational activities, as for many, many people community gardens are essential ways that community members access their food.
Please take immediate action to clarify for everyone in Ontario that community gardening is an essential food service.
Thanks very much!
Your name
Name of your community garden, if applicable.
Gardening and COVID-19
For All Gardeners in Ottawa
We hope you are all keeping well during this difficult time.
This newsletter is to reach out to all gardeners in Ottawa, including those in Community Gardens, to provide you with some updates, and seek your input in the face of COVID-19 pandemic.
We gardeners are creative, strong and resourceful! Did you know that there are minimum 6,000 – 7,000 community garden members in Ottawa within 100 community gardens? Let alone the thousands of people gardening at home.
Together, we can do a lot!
If you are a Community Garden Coordinator: Please forward this email to all of your gardeners, and encourage them to sign up for community garden newsletters by clicking here. Fill out this contact form to be sure you are on our coordinator-only emails.
CONTENTS
1. Gardening at an unusual Covid-19 time
2. SeedLing Saturday scheduled for May 23, 2020
3. Gardening workshops
4. Ordering regionally adapted seeds for your gardening needs
5. Watch Cornwall’s Seedy Saturday Online
1. Gardening at an unusual Covid-19 time.
Just Food believes firmly that all gardening, including in community gardens, in yardshare situations and in households, are essential services.
We have asked Ottawa Public Health for their advice for gardeners working outdoors, including in a Community Garden or Yardshare setting. We are working with other networks, compiling practices under discussions in other regions in North America, and will share with you as soon as we have it together. So hang tight!
Just Food will be hosting all meetings and training workshops through Zoom until further notice.
What are your ideas?
With food security becoming ever more looming, and many uncertainties ahead, we are gathering tips and ideas on how communities, households and businesses are responding to food access.
Physical distancing (not social distancing!), type of food to grow this year, online community garden AGM, volunteer days, staggered gardening schedules…
What are some of the strategies you are considering for this year’s gardening season?
What measures are you taking and are seeing as effective in this community or reading about in other communities related to gardening?
Your experience, ideas and expertise can help us plan for regulations allowed for gardens this year.
Please click here to share your information or ideas
For Community Garden Coordinators:
If your Community Garden group needs an online meeting, including an AGM, we can set that up on our Zoom platform for you…
Please click here to indicate you would like a meeting set up for your garden.
2. SeedLing Saturday Scheduled for May 23, 2020
We have previously posted about East Ottawa Seedy Saturday on April 18, 2020.
While seeds are an essential service, this event is CANCELLED, based on the ability of people to purchase seeds online. (Please see #4 below for a list of seed companies).
However, seedLings need to be picked up, so Just Food is hosting a
SeedLing Saturday!
WHEN: Saturday, May 23, 2020.
WHERE: Just Food Farm (2391 Pépin Court – Bus #25 and free parking)
COST: Free admission (with strict requirement to adhere to physical distancing standards)
RSVP: Keep your eyes on the next newsletter for details on time of the event, and how to sign up.
If you are a seedling vendor and would like to participate, please click here and we will send you additional information beginning of April.
3. Gardening workshops
Online Workshops
Learn food gardening basics from instructors who are experienced.
First, we are providing BASIC gardening online recorded sessions for FREE, so everyone who is interested in food gardening can get started.
The topics include:
- How to plan and grow a small garden on your balcony or pots/container.
- How to plan and grow a garden in your backyard, front yard or community garden plot.
- Indoor Seed Starting.
- Making compost and building soil outside.
- Vermicompost – making compost inside and year-round.
- Container food gardening.
- Natural Pest control.
- Water-saving gardening design.
These sessions will be available online on the Just Food website.
We will send out the dates to you shortly, in our next email.
For gardeners looking for broader topics and more intermediate skills and to get tips in an interactive way, we are going to host a series of interactive online workshops, from seed starting to harvest to food preservation to fermentation to herbalism.
These workshops will be hosted by Just Food with community partners, and will be provided at cost ($5/person), or a free option if you don’t have the money.
COMING UP NEXT WEEK
Indoor Seed Starting Workshop for your Organic Vegetable Garden
Choose one of the two identical sessions
– Monday, March 30 at 1 PM – 2:30 PM (Event link), and
– Tuesday, March 31 at 1 PM – 2:30 PM (Event link)
Please note that there is a link in the registration pages listed above, where there is an option to participate for free, if you do not have money.
The next newsletter coming out very shortly will have more topics and dates.
We need your input
*If you have the knowledge to be a trainer on any relevant topics, or
*If you have topics you want to see covered in an online workshop at any point during the growing season,
please click here to let us know.
We URGENTLY need facilitators with experience growing in the Ottawa region to teach BASIC GARDENING in French and Arabic. if you have this expertise, please get ahold of Sun Shan at communitygardening@justfood.ca
4. Ordering regionally adapted seeds for your gardening needs
It is important to order seeds immediately if you haven’t already.
(If you or other gardeners don’t have the ability to purchase online with a credit card, or are low-income and don’t have money for seeds, please click here, and we can assist you in finding another way.)
We encourage you to use UNTREATED seeds. For community gardens, using untreated seeds is a requirement.
To ensure garden success, find seeds that are adapted to this region, either through a fellow gardener, or one of the vendors from the Organic Seed Directory put together by Canadian Organic Growers. The link to access this Directory is https://www.cog.ca/home/find-organics/organic-seed-directory/. Organic seeds are chemical-free and untreated, and they were grown under Certified Organic conditions.
In addition, check out
Bird and Bee Seeds
https://www.birdandbee.ca/
Email: info@birdandbee.ca
Phone: 613-601-9177
Address: 2391 Pépin Court, Ottawa, ON, K1B 4Z3Richters Herbs
https://www.richters.com/
To email them, click here.
Phone: +1.905.640.6677 Fax. +1.905.640.6641
Address: 357 Highway 47, Goodwood, ON L0C 1A0 Canada
There are other seed companies that you might be buying from that have regionally adapted seed. If they are not listed above, please let us know so that we add them. Thanks! Email CGN Coordinator at communitygardening@justfood.ca.
Have we said to order seeds immediately if you haven’t already? 🙂
5. Watch Cornwall’s Seedy Saturday Online
This past Saturday, Cornwall hosted an online Seedy Saturday. Watch the recorded Seedy Saturday video here on Transition Cornwall facebook page (you don’t need a facebook account to watch): https://www.facebook.com/TransitionCornwall/videos/636814140475290/.
Topics covered are:
Indoor Seed Starting Workshop | Register Now!
In partnership with Capital Greens, we’re hosting this workshop where you’ll learn how to get nearly 100% germination, and how to create the ideal conditions for your seedlings to grow into strong, healthy, high-yielding vegetable crops!
WHEN: Two identical workshops: March 30 and 31 from 1-2:30pm
WHERE: Online
COST: $10 per person
(If payment is an issue, participants can attend for free at the registration pages below)
RSVP: For March 30th, please register at http://justfood.nationbuilder.com/indoor_seed_starting_workshop_20200331
For March 31st, please register at http://justfood.nationbuilder.com/indoor_seed_starting_workshop
These workshops will be hosted by Just Food with community partners, and will be provided at cost ($10/person).
*Note that there will be a chat feature which you will be able to use to ask questions during the workshop!
The webinar will begin with a ~30-minute “classroom session” (to get you up to speed on some of the theory) followed by ~1hr demonstration in you’ll be shown how to prepare your growing medium, fill your pots, plant your seeds, and then care for your seedlings.
A hands-on tutorial with face-to-face interaction would be better in terms of education, but we feel an obligation to do our part to protect the vulnerable people in our community, and to slow the spread of this virus.
Transforming and Sustaining Local Food: Ottawa’s 2020 Local Food Networking Event
WHEN: THIS EVENT HAS BEEN CANCELLED DUE TO COVID_19 CONCERNS AND CAMPUS CLOSURES
WHERE: Restaurant International, Algonquin College School of Hospitality
COST: $0 (Lunch included) *Parking is $4/hour
RSVP:
Join us for the Ottawa Local Food Networking Event for farmers, chefs, food retailers and processors on Monday, April 6, 2020 from 11:00am – 2:00pm (previous date March 10).
Presented by the Algonquin College School of Hospitality and Tourism in partnership with the Egg Farmers of Ontario, Just Food, City of Ottawa and Ottawa Tourism.
RSVP required: priority will be given to local farmers, chefs, retailers, and processors.
Free lunch, courtesy of our sponsors!
Highlights
- Presentation from the Mayor on the new Rural Strategy and Action Plan
- Highlights from local food regional innovators on sustainability including a keynote by David Beking of Beking’s Poultry Farm
