An Orchard in the City
The cooling effect that is produced by trees was Giri's first attraction to the idea of a roof orchard. Now with rows of lemon trees, tomatoes, melons, chikoo, custard apples, local berries and drumstick trees the roof of Giri's office block is producing fresh food that his employees can have a part in growing and take home with them.
“We don’t have the luxury to grow ornamental plants”. In a country that has real problems with a supply of water, and a situation that is getting worse with the changing climate and a depleting water table (see link), the water that goes towards growing needs to be invested in plants that produce something in return. You really get the feeling from Giri’s rooftop that every plant there has a purpose, and practically speaking is providing fruit and veg produce for the workers in the office below. He has an impressive array of lemons, brinjal, melons, chikoo, tomatoes, sitafal (custard apples), pomegranates and many more. His lemons grow throughout the year, and as he pointed out “if they are on the tree all year round, it shows our body needs them year round”. We left with a handful of ripe ones that had dropped off ready to be collected.
Some of the plants that were growing were new to us - ‘drumsticks’ and some Gunda berries. Giri after experimenting with many different fruits, has determined that local, indigenous plants are easier to grow, as they develop less pest problems. Drumsticks, although not as popular these days, would be a great vegetable to grow as they are highly nutritious: they contain more potassium than bananas and more calcium than milk. Gunda berries are also not grown much - you can no longer find them in markets, most likely because they aren’t easy to make money from any more. Giri explained that he mainly grows trees, as they need less work and attention, simply pruning every now and again. Trees would therefore be a good plant for those less experienced farmers.
We very much got the impression that Giri was focused on the water supply needed when urban farming, and this is something that will need to be taken into account even more for poorer communities who don’t have an adequate water storage system, or easy
access to running water. There are several things that are able to minimise the amount of
water that goes into growing, which Giri has implemented. In order to be the most efficient with water he has installed a drip irrigation system, which supplies minimal water to the root zone of the plants, and also means that plants do not have to be manually watered. This pipe system would however have a setup cost involved, and would usually be linked to a water tap. Giri’s plants are also planted in a mixture of fertiliser (sheep dung), soil (only 20%) and rice husks - rice husks retain water that can then slowly be released to the plant throughout the day.
Water is therefore identified as one of the key challenges when urban farming in India, and something that we will be looking at solutions for over the coming months.
