We talked about access to land and growing, skills and education, composting, and how we want to organise as a group. Some of our ideas for actions were:
- getting more growing spaces going in the North of Sheffield
- setting up a local food market
- running training sessions for community composting
- advocating for changes to allotment allocations e.g. making them smaller
Acknowledgements:
Firstly we would like to thank everyone for coming down and enthusiastically contributing despite it being one of the hottest days of the year so far! Thanks the circle for hosting us, Mikee for the fruity kebabs, and Gareth for the sarnies.
Meeting Agenda
After rooting through the minutes from the meetings since 2023, three strong themes emerged. We split into groups to catch up and discuss what’s happened/ been happening since we last met in 2025, to figure out the vision and decide upon some tangible actions.
Access to Land and Growing Infrastructure
What’s happened/happening?
This group identified that many of the key stakeholders in terms of already productive land included Regather & Sheffield Organic Growers, Heeley City Farm, Food Works and Woodseats allotment, all of whom are based in the South West of the city. The question was asked, where can we grow in the North?
What’s the vision?
- Every neighbourhood with access to land for community growing! This will need to look different for different groups.
- Community ownership and shared infrastructure.
What can we do together?
We can build active engagement and capacity within our communities, in order to do so we need to understand the barriers together. We should review the maps that already exist. We should take inspiration from MUD kitchen, Hyde Park Source and get back involved with the Right to Grow.
Skills & Education
What’s happened/ happening?
This group identified many of the stakeholders who are providing/ could provide upskilling opportunities for kids in school right through to adulthood. Schools leading the way included Arbourthorne Primary, Whiteways Primary and Firvale Academy have a new head who is interested in forest school and the 80/20 rule of play. There’s also the Young Marketeers opportunity for many primary schools across Sheffield to grow and sell their own veg, organised by School Food Matters, a national charity. Food Works working to support 9 schools across Sheffield for the next two years, and has begun running workshops to capture a wider community. Grow UK are helping 16-25 yr olds gaining horticultural experience across a wide variety of organisations in the city. Percy Street CiC is hosting a Grow UK trainee at Norton Nursery, and building planters across the city inspiring young adults to try their hand at growing native wild flowers & herbs. Sheffield City Council are aiding apprenticeships in Parks/ Countryside team and allotment societies are providing more support for growing. Manor Community Kitchen has since been established and connected to Green Estates, who offer many adults seeking career diversions a hand in the horticultural industry. Allotment societies have also been good at supporting new growers to get started, by partnering up with more established plots, on community plots or parcel plots. There was a general feeling that more powerful & informal networks of knowledge in communities were coming to light surrounding food production and the industries that surround it.
What’s the vision?
There seems to be a good culture of growing food across the city, so how can we continue to spread that message? This group spoke about food growing as connected to health in schools, and it being necessary part of the curriculum. We also spoke about a regular market for locally grown food, a cooperative of growers supporting micro-enterprise, and the need for clear pathways to farming food in the city.
What can we do together?
We can continue to develop a network of growers across the city, set up a hub for food growing & composting, and continue to connect the dots of public conscious between eating food and growing it.
Composting
What’s happened/ happening?
We had an update from Bobbie from SCC who was able to explain why there’s been no movement from the council to introduce curbside collection. She explained that it was not plainly down to the outright free Veolia had quoted the council, but also down to a national shortage of food recycling lorries, and the start-up costs including compost caddies and bins that would be needed. Guy Woodcock has been exploring setting up a private composting business, and John Le Corney has been campaigning and writing bids for composting initiatives at a national level.
What’s the vision?
Curbside collection, but since it sounds like we won’t get any movement on that until 2038, (without approaching the big dogs that deliberate such contracts…) and since the food waste is sent to BioTech to make digestate (which isn’t very useful for local agroecological farms) it seems we will have to take matters into our own hands. This might include growers having compostable space, and more community composting across the city.
What can we do together?
There is a whole webpage on Sheffield City Council’s website about how to set up a community composting facility, and being inline with all waste disposal regulation. Bobbie has kindly offered to run some workshops on tackling the legislation surrounding composting. She has also said to put us in a good word for obtaining some of the obsolete blue bins shortly exiting circulation.
How we collaborate as a group
What’s happened/ happening?
Developing the action plan was galvanising, and good things about the last wave of Sheffood included being able to pool resources, and pilot collaboration such as the NE community allotment partnership.
What’s the vision?
For the group to reflect the diverse communities of the city, and for local organisations and companies to promote connections to food systems. We want this network to become a place we can come to seeking collective power, and we want people of all walks of the industry to get involved, no matter how (in)experienced.
What can we do together?
We can support an advocacy group to the allotment department re changes in tenancies, and allotment sizes. We can promote small-scale growing,and make clear who is in the network by updating our website. We could offer site meetings and host a screening of Derek vs Derek!
AOB
Maddy has suggested that this group could be a powerful incubator to set up a City-wide Seed Library.