Local hero's, urban farming

Sam Kade

Anyone see this on RTE? Two Dubs growing vegetables on a rooftop of an old building in Dublin. They hope to start a business supplying local restaurants. Sounds like a great idea, only it is run by volunteers they had to bucket 15 tonne of top soil up the 4 story building using a small army. Also what about rates on the building, factor in all the costs and you will have expensive vegetables. If Irish farmers can't make profit from growing vegetables because of cheap imports how do these two imagine they can start a business doing it with even more costs added never mind all the labour needed.

Timmaay

Yeh saw it also. The 6 bloody hens were comical. The only way it might work is on the novelty aspect, say the 100 varities of spud etc. And the problem is if it successful on just this bases, someone else will go open another urban garden also, and before long the whole market gets saturated. However the biggest killer is the labour aspect, just not sustainable in comparison to a flat field which you can drive a 200hp tractor over.

amacca

Sam Kade wrote: »

Anyone see this on RTE? Two Dubs growing vegetables on a rooftop of an old building in Dublin. They hope to start a business supplying local restaurants. Sounds like a great idea, only it is run by volunteers they had to bucket 15 tonne of top soil up the 4 story building using a small army. Also what about rates on the building, factor in all the costs and you will have expensive vegetables. If Irish farmers can't make profit from growing vegetables because of cheap imports how do these two imagine they can start a business doing it with even more costs added never mind all the labour needed.

was wondering that myself. I suppose they may save on some things like transport....most of what the local places want could be carried in a bag to them every couple of days

their soil/compost/fertiliser appears to be solely organic waste from those very same businesses

once they get a good first crop of the veg etc, presumably they can save the seed

I say alot of the raw materials were donated for free.....old barrels, large water fountain bottles, what looks like old astro turf

perhaps they don't have to use much chemicals to control pests because of the location/how closely tended the garden might be

volunteer labour.....woudnt mind giving a hand myself as I believe I could learn a lot ---loved the vertical planter (barrels with holes in the side) idea


but you would think the use of the rooftop/building had to be free or subsidised for it to make sense as a business?

Timmaay

I couldnt help but think about H&S also, given the supermarket disaster in Latvia during the week, would make you think twice about hauling 15tons of soil onto a rooftop!

Sam Kade

Timmaay wrote: »

Yeh saw it also. The 6 bloody hens were comical. The only way it might work is on the novelty aspect, say the 100 varities of spud etc. And the problem is if it successful on just this bases, someone else will go open another urban garden also, and before long the whole market gets saturated. However the biggest killer is the labour aspect, just not sustainable in comparison to a flat field which you can drive a 200hp tractor over.

Duffy knew that they were hens but the two hippies called them chickens. A lot of drama added to the mix as well.

Sam Kade

Timmaay wrote: »

I couldnt help but think about H&S also, given the supermarket disaster in Latvia during the week, would make you think twice about hauling 15tons of soil onto a rooftop!

Yep and they mentioned that it was an old derelict building :eek:

amacca

Timmaay wrote: »

I couldnt help but think about H&S also, given the supermarket disaster in Latvia during the week, would make you think twice about hauling 15tons of soil onto a rooftop!

funny I was thinking how much of a pain in the hole would it be to repair an extensive leak in a flat roof with that much stuff on top of it and would the volunteers be there to carry it all back down

Kevhog1988

I did a lot of building work lately on one in manchester. Biosphericfoundation.com

bogman_bass

they actually got shut down since that was filmed

Sam Kade

bogman_bass wrote: »

they actually got shut down since that was filmed

You could see that coming, I have seen builders having to put a stop to their work over some trivial health and safety issue.

Timmaay

I'm curious now, do ya know the exact reason it got closed?

bogman_bass

I don't know I was following them on facebook and they said that they were shut down.

This is the crew on the roof of the Cadberys factory yeah?