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The school’s environmental club will be breaking ground for a community garden next weekend as part of this year’s Trinity Western University Earth Week.

A Rocha TWU (ARTWU) is hosting events March 16-21, which will conclude Saturday morning with the official start-up of the community garden project. The opportunity to be a part of the garden project is open to students, staff and faculty, and members of the community.

One of the club’s goals for the shared garden is to encourage people “[to connect] with the nature around them,” says ARTWU member Trish Buhler.

Buhler, who will be graduating this spring with a degree in environmental studies, explains that the project provides the opportunity to incorporate locally grown produce into one’s diet while being actively involved in its cultivation. “People are getting disconnected from the source of their food,” says Buhler.

The garden is one means of responding to numerous social, environmental and health concerns, both locally and globally. Buhler points out the struggle for local farmers to survive amidst market-driven prices, the cost and emissions from transporting food over long distances, and the increased dependency on processed foods as examples of such problems. Exploring local sustainability is just one way to start addressing these issues.

The club hopes that experiencing what it takes to grow fruits and vegetables yourself will also serve as a reminder of the importance of protecting the viability of the land through responsible environmental stewardship.

The site for the community garden is on the 57 acres TWU owns across the road from the main campus. Buhler says the size of the garden plot will depend on the number of interested people. The land also has an orchard with a variety of fruit trees which Buhler and others spent some time pruning earlier this month.

While the cost will be minimal – the purchase of one’s own seeds and perhaps contributing to fund the purchase of a hand pump for the well near the garden – Buhler says that people wanting to take part in the shared garden should be committed to work in it a couple hours per week.

“Chaos in one section of the garden can quickly spread,” she says of the necessity for weeding.

Buhler hopes that students who will head home for the summer will be able to partner with staff or community members who live in the area and can help take care of the garden and share in the vegetable harvest in autumn.

The project will also put to good use the composted soil that ARTWU has been working on since last spring.

Other events taking place during TWU’s Earth Week will involve things such as a coffeehouse, a meal prepared from locally grown food and a screening of the documentary Flow, which addresses the importance of water resources. Also, Debbra Mikaelsen and Philip Solman, editor and publisher of local magazine Edible Vancouver, will be speaking on the importance of locally grown food.
For more information about the community garden or to sign up to participate, contact arochatwu@hotmail.com