London's primary school kids encouraged to grow their own food

22nd January 2010, 9:39am

London's primary school children are being encouraged to grow their own fruit and vegetables by the Mayor, Boris Johnson, through a new Capital Growth schools competition launched this week.

The Mayor has written to all 2300 plus primary schools in the capital urging them to create food gardens. Schools with existing gardens will be encouraged to start growing food, expand their plots or start planting food from scratch. The competition has the support of Chris Collins, the Blue Peter gardener, who will visit one of the winning schools.

Judging London's top school gardens will be Rosie Boycott, the chair of London Food, Peter Holman, CEO of London in Bloom, Katie Law from the Evening Standard and a representative of London Food Link, the charity that manage Capital Growth.

There are three categories: 'Bugs and Slugs' (a garden focused on biodiversity); 'Collect and Create' (a garden encouraging the reuse and recycling of 'waste' items); 'Climate Cool' (a garden designed to cope with a changing climate).

The top food growing schools in each category will win a visit by a celebrity gardener, cash prizes of £500, plants and a wormery. There will also be prizes for 12 runners up including fruit and vegetable packs and gardening tools. The first 50 schools to register will receive a spring sowing selection of organic seeds from Duchy Originals.

Boris Johnson, said: '"What better way to bring alive elements of the school curriculum than through hands-on experience in growing your own grub. There is much top notch work taking place by green fingered teachers and pupils across the capital already, which I salute.

"We want to help cultivate this growing appetite for locally grown food, reward the top performers and bring more schools into the Capital Growth fold. Whether tending plots in some paint pots or on the perimeter of a playing field, food growing in our schools will help make London a more pleasant place whilst giving our kids a lifelong skill."

Rosie Boycott, who launched the competition by helping pupils from Ambler School in Finsbury Park plant their new garden, added: 'It has been shown that kids who grow their own go on to eat more healthily and appreciate good, nourishing food. Many kids in London don't know the magic of seeing a seed flourish into an item you can eat, or even the names of common vegetables. This is what we want to help schools conjure up to create a city of micro farms."

Related Articles:

• 01 Sep 2008 - Growing your own

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