Atlanta Smart City Tech Village Startups and Free Food Forest

Photo by Skylar Jean on Unsplash

Can you imagine living in a place thirty minutes by bus from the nearest grocery shop? Some Atlanta people are living in what's known as a food desert.

At the turn of the century, Browns Mills Pecan Farm's former owners, Willie and Ruby Morgan, would leave spare fruit and vegetables on fence posts for their neighbours.

The developers who bought the working farm in 2006 failed thanks to the recession.

The farm lay abandoned for years until 2016, when The Conservation Fund bought the land.

Fast forward to May 2019, the Atlanta Council unanimously voted to buy 7.1 acres of Conservation Fund land. They used U.S. Forest Service grant money to create a food forest on the land.

The work began on converting Browns Mills Farm into a green space for the community. Trails to walk along and trees and plants to pick food from, for free. Smart Cities Dive calls it an edible garden. Does that make you smile?

If Atlanta's Parks and Recreation and nonprofit Trees Atlanta can achieve what John and Molly Chester achieved with their farm, the local community will be blessed with an abundance of natural crops.

It took the Chesters years to produce the natural ecosystems Browns Mills is aiming for, but the wait was worth it.

They found solutions for every problem, sometimes the solutions even found them!

The full-length film is available for free on YouTube.

Atlanta provides food for people which enables them to improve their lives. The orchard, with a ground cover of plants with strong roots keeps the soil in place during heavy rains.

Too much ground coverage will choke the trees, so root-eating gophers give the trees breathing space. Then the gophers mass produce - you can see how this goes on.

Please, watch the film, it is a wonderful study of what once was and what can be again.

A local nonprofit foragers use medicinal herbs for remedies for homeless people’s weather-beaten hands, feet and faces. There are grants available for all sorts of American Public Gardens, including The Herb Society of America.

Herbalista works with the community, they even offer medicine making instructions, worksheets and more.

If you prefer to buy your health foods instead of growing them why not try Sevananda Natural Foods Market.

Pollinators, birds and various other types of wildlife benefit from the park. That’s not all, though. Students can use the forest to learn about agriculture. Workers and managers can use it as a development space.

Traditionally charities and communities would run initiatives such as food banks, but public agencies are interested in this scheme too.

In the past, community orchards provided free food for local people. Yet the method of farming was flat. Food forests have seven layers!

Atlanta's Hottest Tech Startups

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Atlanta Tech Village know being a startup can be a lonely time. That's why they created a village.

They also offer virtual workshops. There's one on March 16 for Finding Product-Market Fit. If you have a product and you need to find the right customers, you might like to RSVP.

Would you like to develop a business idea? At 10 AM on March 18 you can join the event by RSVPing here.

Lastly, who doesn't want to CULTIVATE A POWERFUL NETWORK FROM SCRATCH? Join the virtual workshop on March 19. RSVP here.

Atlanta offers a lot to support its citizens. Free food locals can pick for themselves. Free business advice. Plus, Atlanta's Tech Village startups can help your business thrive in a competitive world.