We celebrate World Organic Agriculture Day with the start of the PRACTICE in Rome (ITALY) of the 7 GARDENISERS = Garden + Organisers of the 5 urban community gardens that are being built in Barranquilla (Colombia). The Colombian gardenisers will learn first-hand about the experiences and good practices of urban community gardens in Rome, and discover the urban agriculture policies that civil society has built in collaboration with the Municipality of Rome.
The theme of the first week is the diversity of Rome spontaneous nature of the gardens and the relationship between public institutions and civil society, which determined the European award to the city of Rome for its resilient governance model.
We were honoured by the willingness to share their experience as representatives of the institutions, opening the doors of their offices: Sabrina Alfonsi, Councillor for Agriculture, Environment and Waste Cycle of Roma Capitale, Giammarco Palmieri, President of the Capitoline Environment Commission, Paola Marzi and Annamaria Appennini of the Urban Gardens Office of Roma Capitale, Cecilia Marocchino of FAO, the Food and Agriculture Organisation of the United Nations.
The urban community gardens we visited and would like to thank for the attentive welcome
Orti Urbani Garbatella (Rome Municipality VIII)
Orti Urbani Valle dei Casali (Rome Municipality XI)
Orti Sociali Arvalia (Rome Municipality XI)
Orti Urbani Monte Ciocci (Rome Municipality XIV)
O.U.C. Via della Consolata (Rome Municipality XII)
O.U.C. Parco Ort9 (Rome Municipality IX)
O.U.C. Valle dell’Aniene (Rome Municipality IV)
O.U.C Parco di Aguzzano (Rome Municipality IV)
O.U. adottati coop. Garibaldi (Rome Municipality VIII)
O.U.C. della Gru (Rome Municipality VI)
O.U.C. Tor Tre Teste (Rome Municipality V)
O.U.C. Tor Sapienza (Rome Municipality V)
where the international guests exchanged views with Roman gardenisers and gardensers, as well as with environmental councillors and chairmen of the environment commissions of the various city municipalities.
The learning path of the Colombian gardenisers in Rome continued with a one week-long immersion in the urban community gardens, spread between
OUC Monte Ciocci (Rome Municipality XIV)
OUC Ortolino (Rome Municipality VIII)
OUC Tor Carbone (Rome Municipality VIII)
OUC Parco Ort9 Sergio Albani (Rome Municipality IX)
Not only learning, but also sharing good practices. During the second week, the Colombian gardenisers contributed to the creation of a school garden at the Istituto Comprensivo Maria Capozzi in the Municipality XIII Roma Aurelio - where, together with Roman gardeners and gardenisers, and together with the students and their teachers, they implemented a paca digestora silva (of Colombian origin), continuing to multiply this good practice at an international level.
During the learning mobility, the Barranquilla gardenisers met not only Roman gardeners and gardenisers, but also gardeners and gardenisers from other European countries such as Spain, Austria and France, in Rome with the Erasmus+ Gardeniser Academy project.
With this exchange of worlds, we hope that they will return to Barranquilla full of useful learnings for their gardens in the neighbourhoods of Las Gardenias, Villa San Pablo, La Paz, Lipaya and Juan Mina.
