Market Gardener Training Program

Sowing the seeds for urban agriculture in Northeast Ohio.

Initiated in the winter of 2006, the City Fresh market garden training program aims to develop a learning network focused on the promotion of urban agriculture in Cleveland and other traditional urban centers in Northeast Ohio. The market garden training program has five primary features:

1. Education and training on basic business planning and growing techniques suited to urban areas
2. Hands-on learning through workshops at the George Jones Farm and Nature Preserve in Oberlin
3. Organization of youth entrepreneurship through summer employment opportunity
4. Cultivation of a network of urban market gardeners to promote sharing of tools, equipment, knowledge, and marketing
5. Provision of start-up funding for urban agricultural enterprises.

Farming is traditionally viewed as an activity confined to rural areas. While access to larger tracts of land affords some distinct advantages, a lot can be done on vacant lots throughout the city. Urban agriculture requires an intensive use of limited space, pursuing such horticultural techniques as succession planting (where you plant 3-4 crops in the same given area over the course of the growing season), companion planting (planting more than one plant in a given area), soil improvements through composting of urban food or processing wastes, greenhouse production, beekeeping, or propagation of crops in indoor environments (such as mushroom production).

Given that the residents of Cuyahoga County collectively purchase more than $3 billion of food each year, there are multiple opportunities for residents to turn vacant lots into productive urban market gardens. Close proximity to restaurants, corner grocers, farmers markets, or Fresh Stops reduces transportation time and makes marketing easier. Additionally, the market garden program can provide a new approach to creating urban green space. Imagine how the urban environment would differ if every square piece of vacant land was devoted to some form of food or native plant production!

Whether pursuing market gardening to provide supplemental income, learn basic business skills, prepare for a larger farming venture in places like the Cuyahoga Valley Countryside Conservancy, connect with the earth, or take a break from the workaday grind, the City Fresh market garden training program provides skills, resources, and connections with other green thumbs around the city. And who knows what a group of similarly motivated individuals can dream up?

• See Gardens and Meet some City Fresh Market Gardeners
• See the City Fresh Market Garden Training Curriculum
• Learn how to get involved with the urban farming network

For more information about the market gardening program, contact or call 216-429-8238.