Hope Blooms leads surge of community garden programs for kids across Canada

Before he started gardening, Craig Cain had no sense ofwhat he wanted to do with his life.

Cain grew up in Uniacke Square, a 250-unit block of low-incomepublic housing in Halifax's north end.

The neighbourhood is besetby high unemployment rates, and a dearth of recreational facilitiesmeans it can be hard for kids to fill their spare time.

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But when a local dietitian established a community garden in anearby park, Cain picked up a shovel and never looked back.

Nearlyeight years later, he's a scholarship recipient poised to studyculinary arts at the Nova Scotia Community College, an achievementhe credits directly to the Hope Blooms youth community garden.

"I'm pretty excited," he said. "I'll be able to pay for myschool and books."

Launched in 2008, Hope Blooms is an urban gardening program forat-risk youth between the ages of five and 17. The organizationworks with kids to grow fresh produce and sells dressings made fromthe herbs they produce.

"Hope Blooms is a bit of a special thing," said programco-ordinator Alvero Wiggins. "It's a community program and a socialenterprise wrapped into one."

"We really want to take a bite out of hunger in our community."

Youth urban community gardens are intended to teach inner-citykids the value of food and growing it themselves, while at the sametime tackling the problem of food security in these communities.

But studies have shown the gardens benefit their host communitiesand cities as well.

Green wave

A University of Illinois study showed youthinvolved in an urban gardening program in Rockford, ll.hadhigherleadership skills and better dietary behaviours than their peers.

A 2012 report from the University of Waterloo argues communitygardens prevent and reduce crime by creating a sense of community,empowering individuals and physically beautifying previously vacantareas.

Among the "green wave" of community gardens spreading acrossCanada Vancouver alone boasts more than 75 Hope Blooms inHalifax stands out as a success story.

Cain, who is now a mentor for young kids joining the program,says the impact of working to produce their own food is immediate.

"They get really excited when they come for the first night,"said Cain.

"Seeing them learning how to grow stuff is really agreat experience."

About 70 per cent of the food the youth grow goes home with them,helping reduce grocery bills and boost the nutritional value oftheir meals.

'It changed the way I eat'

"I didn't really like vegetables but I started to eat them more.It changed the way I eat," said Cain, who said he also discovered apassion for cooking that led to his plans to study culinary arts.

Hope Blooms earned national recognition in 2013 whenrepresentatives appeared on CBC's reality show Dragon's Den.

Duringthe emotional pitch, the program earned four $10,000 donations fromthe dragons on an all-students episode.

Profits from Hope Blooms go right back into the program or into ascholarship fund for graduates.

Wiggins said the program, whichstarted with nine youth, has boomed to more than 50 participants,and the garden itself has doubled in size.

Last month, Hope Blooms received another feather in its cap inthe form of a grant to fund construction of a solar array andbattery backup.

The solar panels will help the greenhouse runindependent of the grid and will extend Hope Blooms' growing season.

'The kids love it'

The group made headlines again Thursday, announcing a deal withthe national grocery chain Loblaws. Hope Blooms dressings will nowbe sold in four Atlantic Superstore locations in the Halifax area.

Organizers of community gardens across the country say they'reseeing similar growth and success from their programs.

The PACT Grow-to-Learn Schoolyard Gardening Program cultivatesfood on the grounds of five Toronto schools in priorityneighbourhoods."

"The kids love it," said Natalie Boustead, community gardenmanager for the program.

"In general, the kids are reluctant at first, but are amazed atwhat they can produce."

'A growing desire'

Boustead said each school in the Grow-to-Learn program has aslightly different objective.

Some gardens are for take-home veggiesand another school has a business course where they set up a marketto sell the vegetables, donating all profits to entrepreneurs inother countries.

During the summer, some students are hired as summer employees tomaintain the gardens.

Boustead said the kids, their families, and society at large arebenefiting from the humble task of growing plants in a garden.

"I think there's a growing desire for them," she said.

"For the relative low-cost of what it costs to maintain gardens,there's all of these implications for learning and mental andphysical health."